Shock over plan ‘to bury nuclear waste in Wales’
ANTI-NUCLEAR campaigners say they are shocked by plans that could see radioactive waste from England and Northern Ireland buried underground in Wales.
The Welsh Government has devised a scheme that could see communities bidding to store socalled higher-activity radioactive waste (HAW) on a long-term basis in return for payment.
The waste would be deposited in what is known as a geological disposal facility (GDF).
Officials are now considering responses to a low-key consultation document that was issued at the start of the year, with a deadline in late April for submissions.
The document states: “Geological disposal provides a safe, permanent solution for the legacy of HAW accumulated over the last 60 years from military, civil electricity generation, medical, industrial and educational uses of radioactivity. It also provides a disposal route for the waste that will be generated as part of the UK Government’s anticipated programme of new nuclear power stations.
“Alternatives to geological disposal, such as ongoing surface storage, do not provide a permanent solution and leave future generations to take responsibility for the safe and secure management of these materials. The Welsh Government does not consider that ongoing surface storage would meet our responsibility to future generations or meet the requirements of the Well-being of Future Generations Act.”
The UK Government would like a single GDF to receive all the relevant nuclear waste from England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
The document states: “The Welsh Government recognises that there may be concern about possible radiological aspects of hosting a GDF. This can be expected to be an important part of discussions between the potential host community and RWM (Radioactive Waste Management, the delivery body for nuclear waste).”
The Welsh Government envisages that “communities” – which could involve a group of individuals who form a group – could bid for the GDF to be sited locally.
RWM estimates that a GDF will directly employ between 550 and 1,000 well-paid staff throughout the working life of the facility. During a period of “constructive engagement”, RWM would make between £1m and £2.5m available for community projects per year.
Elwyn Vaughan, an anti-nuclear activist and leader of the Plaid Cymru group on Powys County Council, said: “I think this idea will generate a lot of opposition. We are trying to promote Wales as a country that is clean and green, with renewable energy. This goes totally against that. I am also concerned at what could be described as bribes offered to local communities, and the fact that democratically elected councils are being bypassed in favour of some vague notion of ‘community’. And I find it odd that they are using the Well-being of Future Generations Act to justify nuclear dumping.”
A Welsh Government spokeswoman said: “Our position is clear – no GDF can be developed in Wales unless there is a community which volunteers to enter into discussions about hosting. No areas of Wales are being targeted as potential sites for a GDF. Development of a GDF would depend on the successful conclusion of discussions with a willing potential host community (which could last more than a decade) – during which time the community would be able to withdraw from discussions at any time. As a further safeguard, a test of public support would also need to be passed within the potential host community before any GDF development could proceed. The development of a GDF in Wales would also depend on a safety case being made and accepted by the environmental regulator, Natural Resources Wales, and by the Office for Nuclear Regulation.”