A 44-YEAR-OLD cooling pond at the Sellafield nuclear complex in Cumbria is leaking radioactivity. But the problems that led to the leak are being kept secret because British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) believes the pond could be a target for terrorists. However, the UK鈥檚 former environment minister suspects the terror threat is being used to cover up the problem.
鈥淚 am concerned that BNFL may be using security considerations as a way of concealing serious environmental risk,鈥� says Michael Meacher, who was sacked last month after six years as environment minister. Meacher is now tabling a series of parliamentary questions to ascertain the state of the pond.
The pond was built in 1959 to cool, store and allow the robotic stripping of uranium fuel rods burnt in early military and civil reactors. But after the fuel began seriously corroding in the 1970s, BNFL says the water became too murky and radioactive for successful stripping operations. A replacement facility was built and the pond finally closed in 1992.
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No one knows for sure how much waste 鈥� much of which has turned to a sludge 鈥� is under the water. But a leaked BNFL report puts the uranium content at somewhere between 300 and 450 tonnes. It is difficult to be more precise, it says, because of the murky water and the fact that several submerged fuel containers have been overturned. Corrosion has reduced some of the rods to 鈥渟hards of metal鈥�, the report says.
Now radioactive water is seeping through the pond鈥檚 ageing concrete walls. BNFL says the seepage occurs in joints within the concrete as it contracts in cold weather. In 2001, the UK鈥檚 Nuclear Installations Inspectorate ordered BNFL to conduct an 鈥渦rgent review鈥� of the pond鈥檚 structural integrity. Two reports were produced, but despite MPs asking for them to be made public, BNFL has rejected the move on the grounds that publication 鈥渨ould be contrary to the interests of national security鈥�. A letter from former energy minister Brian Wilson to a fellow MP, seen by New 杏吧原创, confirms that this fear was related to the 鈥渆nhanced perception鈥� of what constitutes a terrorist threat after the 11 September 2001 attacks.
BNFL says the government鈥檚 security advisors will not permit it to release any structural details on any facility at Sellafield. The company accepts that radioactivity is leaking from the pond but says the levels are low and have 鈥渘o significant impact off the Sellafield site鈥�.
State-owned BNFL has to prepare a further detailed analysis of the leaking pond for the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate by June 2004, and remove 90 per cent of the radioactive sludge by 2010. Removal of the contents will be overseen by the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom) to ensure that they are not diverted for use in nuclear weapons.