Nuclear mud cancer fears
THE charity Children With Cancer UK has submitted expert evidence which claims the monitoring of mud from a nuclear power station that is proposed to be dumped in the Severn Estuary off Cardiff would be inadequate.
In 2018 around 120,000 tonnes of mud from adjacent to Hinkley Point power station in Somerset were dumped in the face of significant public opposition amid concerns that it could be radioactive and pose a threat to human health.
This was emphatically denied by the quango Natural Resources Wales (NRW), which licensed the dumping, the Welsh Government and EDF, the French company which owns the power station – all of which insist the levels of radioactivity present in the mud is well within legal limits.
Now there are plans to dump a further 600,000 tonnes of mud in the same location.
In a submission by Children With Cancer UK to a public consultation run by NRW on the latest proposal, Denis Henshaw, Emeritus Professor of Human Radiation Effects at Bristol University, states: “As a charity we are concerned about the causes of cancer in children and young adults of which ionising radiation is the largest known cause of leukaemia and some bone cancers.
“Ionising radiation in the environment, especially in a form that can be inhaled or ingested internally in the human body, is a dangerous contaminant. Some man-made radionuclides already found to be present have halflives of many thousands of years. Even the more active ones, strontium-90 and caesium-137, with half lives of around 30 years will still be a hazard after several hundred years.
“We consider the original sampling and evaluation to be completely inadequate to assess the level of contamination of the dredged material. We are especially concerned about the complete absence of monitoring of radiation levels in the sea water and air around Cardiff and along the Severn Estuary on both the west and east sides.”
Prof Henshaw goes on: “In the case of outfall contamination from early nuclear plants a significant part of any contamination will be in the form of radioactive particles. These will often be heavier than the fine sand/silt/ mud, become buried and then be fairly static and generally not be too great a problem if left undisturbed.
“However, the nature of dredging means that all the sediment is fully disturbed and mixes with the sea water and mostly becomes at least partly resuspended, both in the extraction process and also again in the deposition at the new dumping site.
“This will also mean that salt-water soluble radiological contaminants, like Caesium-137, will contaminate sea water over a wide area. This can travel large distances – especially in the case of the Severn Estuary with its river and fast tidal flows.
“Most, if not all nuclear power stations have a history of unintentional and often unacknowledged radionuclide releases. The two Hinkley-A Magnox reactors were commissioned in the mid-1960s. The Hinkley-A reactors were modified in order to be able to produce plutonium for the British nuclear weapon programme. The Hinkley-B (an AGR, enriched uranium reactor) was commissioned in the mid-1970s. These are time periods when history has now shown that unauthorised and unintended releases were more likely.
“We agree it is important in accord with the latest International Atomic Energy Agency protocols that a specific radiological assessment is carried out. We do not agree with a [minimalist] concept that just evaluates the bulk radioactivity and ignores the effects of radioactive aerosols and particulates when inhaled or ingested by people. We also ask that levels of plutonium and enriched uranium added to the list of radionuclides that are tested for.”
NRW is due to publish all the submissions made to the consultation shortly.