Tuesday 30 January 2018

Government nuclear waste plan will bring 'Mobile Chernobyl' risk to Britain


 

Five years ago today Cumbria County Council, representing several Lake District and coastal communities, blocked Government attempts to develop a subterranean geologic repository for long-lived radioactive waste (GDF) (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cumbria-21253673

Last week  specialist energy and environmental correspondents  reported on the latest attempts by ministers to resurrect this process, with a new 897 page public consultation, Working with communities: implementing geological disposal.(https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/working-with-communities-implementing-geological-disposal)

They all reported, ministers have now decided backing “communities” with  significant multi-million pound financial incentives/compensation is the new approach.

In the consultation document, energy minister Richard Harrington writes: “We believe the best way to select a site for a geological disposal facility is in partnership with communities.”

He adds “Building and operating a geological disposal facility is a multi-billion pound, intergenerational, national infrastructure project, which is likely to bring substantial benefits to its host community, with skilled jobs for hundreds of people over many decade.”

The document asserts its purpose “is to gather views on how communities should be engaged and represented…”

The Government commits itself to the following policy: “The final decision to site a geological disposal facility in a community will not be taken until there has been a test of public support that demonstrates clear community support for development at a specific site.”

The Government concept is to first identify a relevant‘ Search Area’ with some local support, and then back a ‘Host Community.’


The consultation insists that there will be all the usual opportunities for the public to have a say in the process through planning, safety, security and environmental permitting processes.

It is clear from the way the consultation that the government hasa very narrow concept of community, essentially the very close  area surrounding the planned GDF entrance

The one minor concession that there are wider ‘affected’ communities from such a 100 plus year development comes at Paragraph 4.7, which makes clear that transport links/routes, from the geological disposal facility site to the nearest port, railhead or primary road network (i.e. as far as where minor roads meet the nearest ‘A’ roads used for transport on a regional or county level’ will be considered relevant.

At footnote number 26 to the document adds: In selecting a site, the ‘delivery body’ would give consideration to existing transport infrastructure, suitable transport modes and routes, and appropriate mitigation measures to minimise any adverse impacts on a community.  

But the hundreds of miles of ‘affected communities along road and rail routes from radioactive waste stores, to any centralized repository, are being ignored.

Why does the Government believe  people living in these communities with  multiple loads of radioactive materials coming past where they live for many decades do not deserve significant financial compensation too?

In the US critics call this process, with some justification, “mobile Chernobyls’.
(https://www.nirs.org/why-we-call-it-mobile-chernobyl/)
 

Thursday 25 January 2018

The Atomic Ostrich policy: UK ignores Swedish landmark court decision in backing flawed radioactive waste technology

A path-breaking decision was taken by the Swedish independent Environmental Court on Tuesday this week to reject arguments advanced by the Swedish nuclear waste industry and Swedish nuclear regulator  in favour of the plans to bury long-lived high-activity  radioactive waste underground, in support  of independent  scientific criticism  by the Swedish umbrella  group, MKG, representing five major environmental groups.

My observations are included in an article I reproduce  below. Meanwhile, today the UK Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy department has released 890 pages of  consultation documents on developing nuclear waste repository, which includes advocacy of the very  packaging  technology using copper, rejected two days earlier in Sweden, where the technology ( called KBS3)  has been developed!
Details of the  UK Government consultation are also pasted below

It is the Ostrich posture: as Professor Andrew Blowers quotes evocatively in his  magisterial book 'The Legacy of Nuclear Power' (Routledge, 2017) of the French nuclear industry on the Cotentin Peninsula, where La Hague (France's Sellafield) is located:
"The Cotentin is like an ostrich. It puts its head in the sand. It doesn't see the hunter, but the hunter blasts its backside with his gun!"


 




08

Image: MKG/David Smythe

The Swedish Environmental Court says no to the power industry’s Nuclear Waste Company SKB’s license application for a final repository for spent nuclear fuel in Forsmark, Sweden. This is a huge triumph for safety and environment – and for the Swedish NGO Office for Nuclear Waste Review (MKG), the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation (SSNC), and critical scientists who have been presenting risks of the malfunction of the selected method. Now it is up to the Swedish government to make the final decision. ~ MKG  Read more here

“This is both an amazing decision and very important decision. The Swedish Environmental  Court has concluded that the scientific argument and evidence presented by an umbrella group ( Göteborg -based MKG) representing a wide range of environmental organisations had more credibility  than the evidence of the Swedish nuclear regulator and Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste company (SKB).
The UK nuclear waste disposal/ storage implementer, the Government-owned RWML, meanwhile is intent on obtaining under licence the SKB containment technology called KBS3 rejected as unacceptable by the Environmental court in the country of its development! Prudence might expect a ministerial re-think, but there again, this  is the semidetached UK from where  am writing.
Congratulations must go to Johan Swahn and his MKG team for demonstrating robust truthful science is more valuable than distorted science as presented by the so called independent Swedish nuclear regulator. This pronouncement in Stockholm this morning will reverberate across Europe sending shock waves into the nuclear waste establishment; as it should.”

Dr David Lowry

Dr David Lowry is a research consultant with specialist knowledge of UK and EU nuclear and environment policy.

The KBS-3 concept has been adopted by the UK for high level nuclear waste and spent fuel and this short slide show by Professor David Smythe summarises why it does not work.
 

The Swedish Environmental Court’s NO to the final repository for spent nuclear fuel: a major victory for safety



The Swedish Environmental Court says no to the power industry’s Nuclear Waste Company SKB’s license application for a final repository for spent nuclear fuel in Forsmark, Sweden. This is a huge triumph for safety and environment – and for the Swedish NGO Office for Nuclear Waste Review (MKG), the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation (SSNC), and critical scientists who have been presenting risks of the malfunction of the selected method. Now it is up to the Swedish government to make the final decision.
“This is a triumph for us. From now on, the work on evaluating safer disposal solutions will continue. The decision that will be made concerns waste that will be hazardous for thousands of years. Several independent researchers have criticized both the applied method and the selected site. There is a solid documentation as base for the Environmental Court’s decision. It is hard to believe the Swedish Government’s conclusions will be any different from that of the Court’s” says Johan Swahn, Director at MKG and Chair of NTW Radioactive Waste Management Working Group. 
This article is an extract of the full article of MKG.
Article by Johan Swahn published on 12/12/2017 on the on-going licensing process in the Swedish Environnemental Court for the proposed final repository at the Forsmark NPP.

 
 

 

Policy paper
Documents
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/676402/thumbnail_Final_NPS_Consultation_Document.pdf.png
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PDF, 967KB, 95 pages
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Implementing geological disposal: land use planning
The 2014 White Paper committed to bringing Geological Disposal Facilities within the definition of nationally significant infrastructure projects (NSIPs) and then to produce a draft National Policy Statement (NPS)
Published 25 January 2018
From:
Document
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Details
Intro
Published 25 January 2018
Related content
 

 

Tuesday 23 January 2018

Marking your own nuclear homework: a diplomatically unacceptable outrage



In evidence I submitted last November to the House of Commons committee examining the Nuclear Safeguards Bill (published on 13 November 2107; https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201719/cmpublic/nuclear/memo/nsb06.htm), I concluded as follows:

“The UK nuclear regulator is going to be given unprecedented responsibility for policing a diplomatically contentious new arrangement, which will increase suspicion among member states of the 1968 Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty ( for which the UK , as a co-drafter of the treaty text, is one of three depositary states) – which ministers pray-in-aid whenever they discuss the rationale for a UK nuclear safeguards system. However, ministers routinely cherry-pick those parts of the NPT that suite their purposes: but the NPT is an integrated diplomatic agreement, with its articles all relevant and related. Cherry-picking is both diplomatically unwise, as it normalises abrogation for other signatory nations, and undermines the very treaty for which the UK is supposed to act as a protective depositary state!

The UK is already in very bad diplomatic odour with many dozen NPT member states – the treaty has 191 signatories - for its fifty-year abject failure to abide by the NPT article 6 requirement to:

"pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament."

The proposed arrangements for a new self-policed "safeguards" regime for the UK will undoubtedly add to the bad image of the UK in the wider international community as a state that abrogates its international treaty commitments.

This diplomatic dimension has been totally overlooked by the ONR and utterly ignored by ministerial evidence to this committee: the consequences further down the road will be predictably dire.

There is time to avoid this outcome; but minister must be prevailed upon to change their currently untenable negotiating stance. ONR has a key, proactive and robust role to play in doing so. I hope for the future credibility of British diplomatic reputation- which has suffered serious damage in recent weeks due to the multiple failures of the Foreign Secretary - ONR steps up to the plate and intervenes.”

Today ( 23 January 2018) the House  of Commons  returns to examine the remaining stages of the  draft Bill in Parliament. It still contains the unacceptable UK opt out to proliferate from the civil programme if ministers decide to do so. (they have already done over 600 times under the current legislation) Our MPs have done a truly shockingly bad job in  scrutinizing this draft legislation, more concerned with cheerleading for Euratom ( such as the blinkered Labour  chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Select committee) than doing their real job of making the bill fit for purpose.

Unfortunately our independent national nuclear regulator, the ONR, is passively continuing to collude in this disgrace, by declining to speak out against this flawed  legislation, which is an invite to other nations to copy the UK and proliferate with impunity.

Here are the support documents and a summary article from a pro-nuclear  on-line nuclear new service.

Policy paper

Nuclear Safeguards Bill: draft regulations

A summary of the pre-consultation draft Nuclear Safeguards Regulations.

Published 19 January 2018

From:


Documents

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Details

The draft regulations above are:

  • The Nuclear Safeguards Regulations 20–, which set out the nuclear safeguards regime for the UK
  • The Nuclear Safeguards (Civil Activities, Fissionable Material and Relevant International Agreements) Regulations 20–, which will complete the powers of the Secretary of State to make regulations under the Nuclear Safeguards Bill by providing definitions

The publication of the pre-consultation drafts is timed to accompany the report stage of the Nuclear Safeguards Bill 2017 to 2019, which takes place on 23 January 2018.

The explanatory note provides context to the publication of the draft regulations and the next stages of their development as well as an overview of the regulations as they are currently constituted.

Published 19 January 2018

UK offers early engagement on nuclear safeguards

World Nuclear News, 22 January 2018


The UK government has published initial pre-consultation draft versions of the Nuclear Safeguards Regulations to enable early engagement with Parliament, industry and other stakeholders. The draft regulations, which the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) published on 19 January, set out the nuclear safeguards regime for the UK and the powers of the BEIS secretary of state to make regulations under the Nuclear Safeguards Bill (NS Bill).

The NS Regulations will create the legal framework for a new domestic nuclear safeguards regime to operate in the UK following the country's withdrawal from European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom). Publication of the pre-consultation drafts is timed to accompany the report stage of the NS Bill 2017 to 2019, which takes place on 23 January.

In explanatory notes to the two documents, BEIS said that during the House of Commons Committee Stage of the NS Bill in November last year, Richard Harrington, BEIS minister for energy and industry, had made a commitment to publish a pre-consultation draft of the regulations at the report stage.

"Although good progress has been made with the two sets of regulations, they are still being developed with the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR). Some elements are dependent on external issues, and some require further policy development," BEIS said.

"As such, the regulations are likely to change in response to this early engagement with Parliament and stakeholders and views received will inform the ongoing development of the regulations, prior to formal public consultation, which is currently planned for Spring 2018," it added.

Following this the government currently aims to lay draft regulations before Parliament before the end of this year.

IAEA and Euratom Treaty

 

The UK has in place two safeguards agreements with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) - a Voluntary Offer Agreement (VOA) and an Additional Protocol to the VOA. These are trilateral agreements between the IAEA, the UK and Euratom, BEIS noted.

The UK's current safeguards obligations are primarily fulfilled through its membership of the Euratom Treaty and associated regulations, notably the European Commission Regulation (Euratom) No 302/2005 on the application of Euratom safeguards, it added.

"As a result of the UK's intended withdrawal from Euratom the UK's current trilateral agreements with the IAEA, the VOA and the AP, will become ineffective. As a result, the UK will need to conclude new bilateral safeguards agreements with the IAEA, in connection with the Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, which detail the UK’s future safeguards obligations," it said.

"The new NS Regulations will enable the UK to give effect to its obligations under new bilateral agreements with the IAEA and under any relevant other international agreements on civil nuclear activities which may be concluded with other states before the NS Regulations are made, including on the subject of nuclear research and development. The NS Regulations will then be amended to list those international agreements which are entered into after the NS Regulations are made," it added.

The UK has committed to ensuring that domestic nuclear safeguards arrangements can be put in place following withdrawal from Euratom and that those arrangements will be "robust and as comprehensive" as those of the existing Euratom regime, and go beyond international standards, it said.

Powers

 

The NS Bill also enables the Secretary of State to give the ONR additional powers to take on certain responsibilities in connection with the UK's international safeguards and nuclear non-proliferation obligations including, for example, with the IAEA under the new VOA and AP agreements which are in the process of being negotiated.

The domestic safeguards regime will primarily involve reporting and verification processes, which will enable the UK to demonstrate to the international community that civil nuclear material is not diverted into military or weapons programmes, BEIS said.

The NS Regulations place legal obligations on UK operators of qualifying nuclear facilities and, together with many of its existing enforcement powers in the Energy Act 2013, provide power to the ONR to enforce these obligations, it said.

Nuclear safeguards are distinct from nuclear safety (the prevention of nuclear accidents) and nuclear security (physical protection measures), which are the subject of their own regulatory regimes.

The majority of the NS Regulations will come into force on the same date. However, it is currently anticipated that the commencement date for certain regulations may be later to allow operators and the ONR to develop suitable approaches to delivering and enforcing new requirements that go beyond the safeguards obligations currently in operation. The policy on this is being developed.

Operators

 

An operator will be required to declare the basic technical characteristics to the ONR using the questionnaire set out in the NS Regulations, and to provide the ONR with an annual outline of its programme of safeguards-relevant activities for the upcoming year.

"Acting on the basis of the technical characteristics, the ONR may impose particular safeguards provisions on an operator in relation to a qualifying nuclear facility," BEIS said.

An operator will be required to maintain a system of accountancy and control of qualifying nuclear material, which includes keeping accounting and operating records and providing reports to the ONR. The schedule concerning the accountancy and control system "draws upon, but will not totally replicate", it said, the European Commission recommendation of 11 February 2009 on the implementation of a nuclear material accountancy and control system by the operators of nuclear installations.

An operator will be required to send accounting reports to the ONR, including an initial book inventory and an inventory change report. In the case of a qualifying nuclear facility, which includes a reactor, the inventory change report must include information on nuclear transformations.

In addition, an operator will be required to provide the ONR with a material balance report in respect of each material balance area, and a physical inventory listing.

An operator will be required to submit a special report to the ONR in the event of an unusual incident or a change in containment or where, following exceptional circumstances or an incident, an operator has been informed that qualifying nuclear material may have been lost.

International agreements

 

It is anticipated that, in addition to new Safeguards Agreements with the IAEA, the UK will also enter into new bilateral nuclear co-operation agreements with other States, which will include nuclear safeguards obligations, including, for example, with Australia, Canada, Japan and the USA.

It is intended that the Nuclear Safeguards (Civil Activities, Fissionable Material and Relevant International Agreements) Regulations will list those international agreements, which have already been entered into before those regulations are made and that those regulations will be amended, as appropriate, to include any relevant international agreements which are entered into by the UK in the future, BEIS said.

These international agreements may impose safeguards obligations on the UK in relation to the supply of qualifying nuclear material. As a result, the ONR may need to share certain information, which it receives from operators, not just with the IAEA, but also with certain other States, it added.

"It is anticipated that the NS Regulations will enable the ONR to do this by requiring operators to provide information relevant to these additional obligations alongside the information already required by the NS Regulations to be provided, in respect of qualifying nuclear material, in the initial book inventory, inventory change report, material balance report and physical inventory listing and in respect of intended imports and exports," it said.

The NS Regulations will also: set out the weight units and categories of qualifying nuclear material to be used in the notifications which are required under the regulations; provide for the removal of any derogation applied to any qualifying nuclear material when it is stored with any qualifying nuclear material which does not benefit from a derogation; require an operator to provide the ONR with advance notification of exports and shipments; require an operator which is an ore producer to comply with certain reduced safeguards requirements and to inform the ONR of ore exports; and require an operator to submit an initial stock list and accounting records for waste and to inform the ONR of transfers of conditioned waste. They will also prohibit an operator from withdrawing qualifying nuclear material from civil activities except with the previous written consent of the ONR.

Role of the ONR

 

The NS Regulations provide for the regulatory role of the ONR in nuclear safeguards. In general, their activities are governed by the Energy Act 2013, but the regulations set out some additional provisions including inspections, publication of information, provision of information to the IAEA, communication with the IAEA on the issue of derogations, and the characterisation of material, for example, as waste.

The ONR said today that it has worked with BEIS in the development of the draft regulations, and will continue to do so as the regulations are developed further. ONR said it will engage with stakeholders to discuss the operation of the future domestic safeguards regime in the coming months.