The much delayed update from the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) on its plans for dealing with Sellafield’s burgeoning plutonium stockpile was quietly published at the end March 2019 under the title ‘Progress on plutonium consolidation, storage and disposition’. The lack of fanfare for its publication may be attributable to the absence of any major breakthrough … [Continue Reading]
Steaming into Sellafield’s sunset years.
Some 25 years ago Sellafield’s then operator British Nuclear Fuels plc (BNFL) took many by surprise by publishing plans to supplement Calder Hall’s electricity output (for Sellafield site use) not with a new nuclear plant but with a Combined Heat and Power plant (CHP) that would run on natural gas pumped from the Irish Sea … [Continue Reading]
NuGen to NoGen. Consortium liquidated by Toshiba as it abandons Moorside New-Build.
In a not unexpected announcement by Toshiba today (8.11.18), the Japanese conglomerate has pulled the plug on its subsidiary NuGen, the consortium tasked with developing the £15Bn Moorside new-build project in West Cumbria. In its press statement, Toshiba’s Board said “After considering the additional costs entailed in continuing to operate NuGen, Toshiba recognises that the … [Continue Reading]
Spendthrift Sellafield, Wayward Governance and the latest Plutonium view
The findings of the spending watchdog’s latest report on the status of Sellafield’s clean-up projects and costs makes yet more dreary reading for the UK taxpayer – the costs described as ‘a misuse of public funds’ by a spokesman for the report’s authors the Government’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC).
Chemical Chaos and Confusion at Sellafield – yet another intolerable risk ?
‘As a site, the full appreciation of chemical legislation, including The Dangerous Substances and Explosive Atmospheres Regulations DSEAR, has been inadequate’. [Sellafield Ltd Board of Investigation report on 2017 ‘chemical event’ and made available to CORE in April 2018]
Sellafield’s delayed Evaporator D now operating – specially gift wrapped for Christmas.
There can’t be many nuclear bodies that choose to bury – just three days before Christmas – what is touted as a good news story by the industry. But this is exactly what Sellafield Ltd has contrived to do in its 22nd December announcement that the long overdue and eye-wateringly expensive Evaporator D has come on line at Sellafield.
Change to Sellafield skyline as demolition of ‘seismic risk’ stack begins.
Perched atop Sellafield’s 1950’s Primary Separation Plant (the B204 reprocessing building) the 61 metre tall discharge stack is to be demolished at a rate of around 1 metre per week.
South Korea number-crunching its way to Moorside ?
NuGen’s updates on progress with its Moorside new-build project are an extremely rare commodity these days in the UK. The last update, made six months ago, reported CEO Tom Samson as saying that ‘a universe of options’ remained available to NuGen – even with the bankrupt Westinghouse and its AP1000 reactors apparently kicked into the … [Continue Reading]
Chemical Alert brings Bomb Squad to Sellafield’s confined Separation Area.
Sellafield Ltd was forced to put out a press statement in the early hours of this morning (Saturday 21st October) to calm fears of a potential chemical explosion in a laboratory on site.
Post Script to commemorating the 60th Anniversary of the Windscale Fire.
Arriving at Sellafield today to commemorate the 60th Anniversary of the Windscale Fire, CORE campaigners (and media) were somewhat dumbfounded by the mysterious re-emergence of the memorial plaque whose loss had recently been confirmed in a letter from Sellafield Ltd. With any explanation of the plaque’s reappearance still hard to come by, its return – albeit lacking … [Continue Reading]