Nuclear waste storage plans for Harwell go on show

7:00pm Wednesday 18th July 2012 in Didcot

PUBLIC exhibitions are being held to outline proposals to build an extra storage site for radioactive material at the Harwell Science Centre, near Didcot.

The plan to provide storage for intermediate level radioactive material has been put forward by Research Sites Restoration.

The company is responsible for cleaning up former nuclear sites on behalf of the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority.

The first exhibition will be held at the Harwell Innovation Centre, in Curie Avenue, tomorrow, from 3pm to 8pm. There will also be an exhibition on Friday at Snells Hall, in Church Street, East Hendred, from 3pm to 8pm. A third exhibition will take place on Saturday at Harwell village hall from 10am to 2pm, and a fourth at Chilton village hall next Wednesday, from 4pm to 8pm.

For further details about the storage facility proposals and the exhibitions, click on the link.

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Comments(6)

CLLR KEN TIWARI says...
12:12am Thu 19 Jul 12

Whats the purpose of showing this now, why ?

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## Nonny Mouse ## says...
7:52am Thu 19 Jul 12

Because it's in the public interest?

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Geoff Roberts says...
8:17am Thu 19 Jul 12

The UK already has the largest stockpile of nuclear material in the world. Japan has a large stockpile of plutonium, something like 47 tonnes but only about 8 tonnes is kept in Japan, the rest is in Britain and France. There has never been a safe plan to store nuclear 'waste' or fuel. It's exceptionally risky, especially the mixed oxide fuel. Meanwhile the risks at Fukushima Dai-chi continue.

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Geoff Roberts says...
8:20am Thu 19 Jul 12

"Intermediate-level waste (ILW) contains higher amounts of radioactivity and in some cases requires shielding. Intermediate-level wastes includes resins, chemical sludge and metal reactor nuclear fuel cladding, as well as contaminated materials from reactor decommissioning. It may be solidified in concrete or bitumen for disposal. As a general rule, short-lived waste (mainly non-fuel materials from reactors) is buried in shallow repositories, while long-lived waste (from fuel and fuel reprocessing) is deposited in geological repository. U.S. regulations do not define this category of waste; the term is used in Europe and elsewhere." - Wikipedia

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Geoff Roberts says...
8:27am Thu 19 Jul 12

To put the amounts into context - the bomb dropped on Nagasaki contained just 6kg of plutonium. In the UK we have about 110 tonnes and that just the fuel I think (Uranium and Plutonium). When the industry talks about nuclear power they tend to talk about it being 'clean' but only mention the process of generating power through nuclear fission, which relatively speaking, compared to other forms of generation is 'clean' What they don't tend to mention is the fuel itself - which is the most dirty, toxic, difficult to handle and radioactive fuel we have. The industry will talk about comparing gas, coal and nuclear but that's a fallacy - what they are actually comparing are gas, coal and uranium/plutonium. Not so appealing.

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## Nonny Mouse ## says...
9:01am Thu 19 Jul 12

Indeed, but the waste produced can be localised and buried instead of being pumped into the atmosphere to dilute and be made everyone else's problem....

The next-gen fleet of reactors will in theory produce just 10% of the contaminated waste of the ones being taken down at the moment. That's because the ones built in the 50's had no consideration built in towards decommissioning because they didn't realise it was going to be such a problem.

There is no completely green answer to our dependency of ample and cheaply available electricity. The faster that is accepted and we can move on and actually DO SOMETHING to prevent the impending 'leccy shortage, the better.

You think the London riots were bad? You wait til the middle classes can't charge thier iphones as and when they like - the streets will run red with blood....

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