Minister Jacob speaks on dangers of Sellafield

March 2002

PUBLIC concerns about Sellafield have been conveyed to a briefing seminar in London by Minister of State Joe Jacob.

The Rathdrum based minister has responsibility for nuclear safety and radiological protection.

He told the gathering, organised by the Foreign Press Association, that Sellafield represented a potentially serious threat to Ireland’s public health and environment as ell as to the country’s fishing, agriculture and tourism industries.

The reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel was the dominant source of radioactive contamination of the Irish Sea, the minister said.

The storage on site of high level radioactive liquid waste, the continued operations of the old Magnox reactors and the transportation of nuclear fuels to and from the plant also gave cause for concern.