More submarines are being held in storage than are in service
SEVEN of Britain’s decommissioned nuclear submarines have been in storage for longer than they were in service because the Ministry of Defence is unable to dispose of them.
The UK has twice as many submarines mothballed than operational because the MOD has failed to get rid of the 20 vessels it has decommissioned since 1980.
The Government has lacked the facilities to remove nuclear fuel since 2004 and there is not a fully funded plan to restart the work, according to a report by the National Audit Office.
MPS have warned there is now a risk the UK may “run out of space” to safely store its scrapped submarines and Britain’s reputation as a “responsible nuclear power” could be harmed.
Nine of the 20 decommissioned submarines still contain nuclear fuel. The Government had originally planned to have a disposal programme operational by 2011, but it is now estimated it will not be in place until 2026.
No submarine has been defuelled in the UK for 15 years after the Office for Nuclear Regulation found that facilities in Devonport were not up to scratch and work was stopped.
The MOD hopes to restart defuelling from 2023 but the project budget has ballooned from £175 million to £275 million.
The inability to dispose of old nuclear submarines means the UK has spent an estimated £500million since 1980 on storing and maintaining them.
Meg Hillier, the chairman of the public accounts committee, said: “For more than 20 years the Ministry of Defence has been promising to dismantle its out-of-service nuclear submarines… The ministry needs to get a grip urgently before we run out of space… and we damage our reputation as a responsible nuclear power.”
The MOD spends an estimated £12million a year to store and maintain the nine submarines still carrying nuclear fuel in Devonport, which is expected to run out of space by the mid-2020s.
The lack of space means the MOD does not currently have a dock where it can prepare the most recently retired boats for long-term storage and submarines which cannot be placed in storage must be kept partially crewed, draining resources.