As Safe as Houses?

The Nuclear Fallout of the Japanese Earthquake & Tsunami

While the reactors at the Japanese Fukushima nuclear plant were being dowsed in sea water in hope of cooling their highly-radioactive contents, Oldbury on the other side of the Severn let off a worryingly tall plume of steam which could be seen from miles around.

Here’s one witness – a mr. Jonathan Bailey: “I live on the edge of Thornbury (top of Butt Lane )… from this view the clouds of steam were as wide as the power station and there was a loud roaring noise – and I am 3 miles away as the crow flies.”

There’s been a lot of concern and calls for a re-examination of the ‘lessons to be learned’ – but no abandonment or even stalling of the new generation of privately-owned nuclear power stations in the UK, including along our Severn.

This is based on the premise that the Japanese geological uniqueness makes a similar tsunami impossible here. Right? There was one in 1607. Then it killed 2,000 people and flooded areas as far inland as Glastonbury.  In fact, Dr Haslett of Bath Spa University College and Dr Bryant conducted a geological survey of the estuary in 2004 and concluded that “two large chunks of farmland… were simply washed away, one where the foundation of the Second Severn Crossing is and the other is now the reservoir for the Oldbury Nuclear Power Station”.

A spokesperson from SANE (Shepperdine Against Nuclear Energy) said: “A possible cause of the 1607 tsunami is not yet known, but the possibilities include a submarine landslide off the continental shelf between Ireland and Cornwall , or an earthquake along an active fault system in the sea south of Ireland . This fault system has apparently experienced an earthquake greater than magnitude 4 on the Richter scale within the last 20 years, so the chance of a bigger tsunami earthquake is a possibility.”

Farfetched? Alarmist? I’ll let you decide, but I guess – on the plus side – it is probably right to say that another event like that is unlikely, if not entirely impossible. I mean it’s not as if we’re building these things along the second fastest tidal river in the world, right? Oh, we are. I guess it’s a good job then we’re not prone to a lot of flooding either. July 2007 anyone? I guess at least we’re not planning on storing the radioactive waste on site with the new builds. We are! And the site is three times the size of the existing one? Blimey.

At least there’s no case of international terrorists mad enough to hijack civil aircraft as a fuel-filled missile in a co-ordinated attack. Like, um, 9/11. Or a car loaded with explosives like at Glasgow airport; what about 7/7 or the audacious IRA mortar attack on the MI6 headquarters in London? These plants seem pretty vulnerable when you put it like that.

But none of that has happened to us. Yet.

I mean it’s not as if Oldbury is regularly shut-down for safety reasons, is it? Oh, hang on – that’s how we started this – with the shutdown and steam plumes of 17^th March 2011, the very same week Japan’s reactors of approximately the same age were at near-meltdown.

This event turned out to be benign. Failing to find out anything on their website I turned to the South Gloucestershire County Council’s Emergency Planning who, seemingly unaware of the event, merely passed on my questions to Magnox, the current operators at Oldbury. They said the issue was “Due to an electrical problem within equipment, housed in the turbine hall, an automatic safety process caused the shutting down of the turbines and the associated Reactor Two at the site.   The turbine hall is outside of the reactor building and is on the non nuclear side of the plants operation.  The steam which was released as part of this process is used to drive the turbines on the non nuclear side and is at no point in contact with radioactive material.

The automatic shutting down of the reactor is again a safety measure and stops the generation of heat used to produce steam to drive the turbines. 

Whilst I can fully understand your concerns in light of events in Japan, this event does not represent any safety issue at the site and is simply a standard safety process.”

Sounds fine. But consider the Oldbury fire of 2007, which also triggered a shut down. Imagine if that had got out of hand?

It’s all very well that these malfunctions occur in the non-nuclear parts of the plant and that their automatic shutdown is purely precautionary.

But if precautions of that magnitude are that necessary then the risk can’t be entirely benign. And let’s not forget, it wasn’t the tsunami or earthquake which released the radiation in Japan or (at the time of writing) could potentially expose their rods – putting the disaster at Chernobyl level – but the consequence of these things damaging the non-nuclear parts of the plant.

Following Japan, some countries have delayed decisions on new nuclear power; others like China cancelled them for now. No such move here. No delay – just observation which, one suspects, is mindful of the cost of delay since we’re dealing with the likes of commercial giants E-on and the leading French provider of nuclear power (Horizon their partnership is called). And yet this week I’ve heard the most sense from Walt Patterson of the London-based think tank, Chatham House when he said of nuclear power[i]:  “Why turn to the slowest, the most expensive, the narrowest, the most inflexible, and the riskiest in financial terms? Nuclear power needs climate change more than climate change needs nuclear power.”

You can see photos of the 17^th March 2011 steam plumes and the 2007 fire at Oldbury on the local Facebook group page for ‘NO to new NUCLEAR POWER at Oldbury‘.

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[i] Cited in BBC News online ‘Nuclear power: Energy solution or evil curse?’ by James Melik Reporter, Business Daily, BBC World Service, 14 March 2011 Last updated at 23:46 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12730473)

Not the time to go nuclear !

Do you sometimes suffer from one of those days when somehow your timing seems all wrong? When the odd remark that could have been perfectly innocent in a different context goes down like a lead balloon? Or worse?

So, what about this one for bad timing. On March 12, the Citizen came out with a front page headline, “Nuclear Hope for Thousands”. Jobs could be secured for generations to come, it declared.

The nub of the news item was that Gloucestershire could become a major centre for the nuclear industry, with thousands of “high quality” jobs being created. “If there is a certainty for the nuclear industry then there will be people needed to work in this sector,” the Tory MP for Stroud, Neil Carmichael, was quoted as saying.

Good news perhaps for those who liked that kind of thing! Of course, it goes without saying that we don’t. But on the same day, the news broke of the tragic earthquake and consequent tsunami in Japan. And, to make things worse, a few days later we heard that a nuclear power complex had been destabilised and was in danger of going critical. With radiation levels rising, the battle commenced to prevent the Fukushima plant from becoming another Chernobyl.

Now we on the Clarion have never believed that we should go down the nuclear road – and we’ve printed numerous articles pointing to the dangers and difficulties involved. Now surely is the time to stop flannelling and think again?

{click here for the Forest-side anti-nuclear presence on Facebook}

Making the most of our post…

There’s probably not many folk around these days who can remember the halcyon days when a letter cost a few pence (in old money) to post – let alone the time when if you popped it in the pillar box early enough it would be delivered the same day.

Back then the GPO was a government department, headed by a Minister called the Postmaster General. Not only did it handle the mail, but also pioneered the telephone system, routing our calls through a network of telephone exchanges who could connect you with places throughout the world. And you could have telegrams delivered, if you lacked a phone and had urgent news to send. And it was never afraid to embrace the latest technology when it came along.

Ah, those were the days! The rot set in, when MacMillan’s Government first allowed the GPO to distribute “junk mail” with our post. Later, the whole system was hived off, to become a public corporation.

Since then it’s been a sitting target for the circling vultures. It’s already faced the debilitating impact of “competition” – and now the Government wants to sell it off to the highest bidder – as the Tories under Thatcher did with the telephone system.

It’s no wonder that postal workers are campaigning to save the service and keep it in public hands. If we value our post, we should give them our backing.

Time for some cautious celebration?

Since our last issue, folk in the Dean have been celebrating victory in the campaign to save the Forest from the Government’s plans to snatch it from us – and then sell it back again. And we’ve every right to make a bit of whoopee.

But of course it ain’t necessarily over yet – and Jan Royall who led the campaign from the front was right to suggest we should stay vigilant. Whilst the Government has scrapped its plans for a wholesale sell off, they’ve appointing a panel to look at future plans and report back. I’m sure many folk will be waiting for its conclusions with bated breath.

Of course, this didn’t stop campaigners throughout the country from taking to the woods for a day of celebration on Sunday, March 20. Here in the Dean it was held at Wenchford. It was good to see so many people around the barbecues, strolling amongst the trees, and generally relaxing. One campaigner said to me, “it’s so good to be able to celebrate a victory, for a change!”

I agree. But there are so many more battles to be fought – and, who knows, there may be more victories to come, and times for more celebration!

Nuclear time bomb on our doorstep:

The Oldbury nuclear power station, situated down river from Lydney docks, is now on its last legs. But rather than merely decommissioning it, the Government has been backing plans to replace it with a new nuclear energy site that will be some seven times the size of the present one!

Because of its the size, it will be the only nuclear installation in Britain that will need cooling towers. These would either be 200-foot “short” ones, or 600-foot edifices that would dwarf the Severn Bridge. How that would affect the natural beauty and habitats of the Severn Vale remains to be seen! Inhabitants of communities around Thornbury have been campaigning against this monster on their doorstep for some time. All the inherent dangers in a nuclear power station will be multiplied by the sheer size of the project. And in a leaflet issued last month, the campaigners add the point: “did you know that you’ve been volunteered for high level radioactive waste to be stored there for 160 years, the ‘interim’ solution for nuclear waste storage?”

We can assume that a decision on whether to go ahead with this hazardous development is imminent. The “consultation” period closed on January 24 – and no doubt an announcement will emerge fairly soon.

Oldbury on fire in 2007, from the Dean side

It will follow a long and sustained campaign by local communities who are concerned not only about the disruption to the locality but also, for many, the presence of what could be a ticking time bomb on their doorstep. So far there is no such thing as completely “safe” nuclear energy.

The possibilities range from low-level leakage of radiation (which has occurred in many cases) to the kind of full scale disaster that happened in Chernobyl, and nearly took place at Three Mile Island in the USA. That, of course, is a “worst case scenario”!

But add the problems of security at such sites, the pollution caused by mining for uranium, and the mounting problems of nuclear waste storage and disposal, and one is left wondering why it’s considered worth it.

Gloucestershire CC: “Law will be rough and ready”

I spent a day last week trawling through the County Archives for research into a project I’m slowly working on called ‘Man Made Sun’. In it I look into why, in the 1980’s, Gloucestershire was the top-ranking rural county likely to be targeted by nuclear weapons in a Soviet attack. I qualify that observation in the parent work, but for now I wanted to share with you some of the terrible and terribly banal plans our County Council had in line for us during any such attack.

Aside from unearthing the 1984 War Book (that’s the Local Authority plan for dealing with a nuclear attack), which in itself is an eerie experience – handling two folders used by staff to cope with the detailed bureaucracy of Armageddon – I found what I presume is the Chief Executive’s response to the Grass Seeds exercise conducted in 1966 (with the response dating from around the start of the following year). While that original Civil Defence document details a predicted nuclear attack on Britain and its impact on our County – horrific enough both in detail and bewilderingly naïve optimism – it is the council response to the problems uncovered by that exercise which makes for the most chilling reading.

Bearing in mind the context being discussed is the post-nuclear attack stage and breaking the law could mean searching for loved ones after curfew, trying to get home or get  away through a restricted road, searching for food or demanding medical or food assistance – here I quote verbatim.

LAW & ORDER
…it will be essential to have Army and Police patrols…it will be essential to have a curfew in operation and one of the Assistant Town Clerks would be appointed personally responsible for reading the Riot Act…this officer would also take prosecutions for offences in the local Magistrates’ Court, which it is imagined would be boosted by the addition of legally qualified members to the Bench and with much wider powers. Justice would be very rough and ready.

The use of the Prison (Gloucester) would be impracticable and involve the use of scarce manpower for supervision and what is wanted is a barbed wire compound into which offenders will be placed. This could be by the side of the river, which would provide sanitation. The Police and Army guarding the compound would have to be armed. There would be no time or manpower available to look after the prisoners who would be left to fight it out between themselves in the compound…

It will be necessary to take drastic action and after curfew, presumably, the Army will be shooting on sight. One would expect the Information Officer to try and boost morale and one could consider putting up notices warning the public of what will happen if they do commit offences, although this tactically might be a bad move.

Of course, none of this is anything new to anyone who’s watched either ‘The War Game’ or ‘Threads’, but to see these things written down in local government documents for our own county is quite literally an astounding reminder of the fragility of life under the Bomb.

NUCLEAR REACTORS: Do You Want More?

This article is about getting up to date with the government’s proposals and trying to make sense of the processes used by government in deciding policy.

In 2002 the Government published an Energy Review. In over 200 pages of detail it discussed options for future supplies of energy. It was written by the Performance and Innovation Unit of the Cabinet Office and it has since become clear that the Department of Trade and Industry, although involved, was not the principal author.

On the generation of electricity in nuclear power station the review said that concern about radioactive waste and “low probability but high consequence hazards” may limit or preclude its use. It added that nuclear power seemed likely to remain more expensive than fossil fuelled generation and that nowhere in the world was there new build in a liberalised electricity market. Thus two of the objections of those opposed to nuclear power were conceded. It was not safe and it was not economic. Similarly the report mentioned the vulnerability to terrorism, the long lead times in planning and building new stations, the extent of public opposition and the need to gain public acceptance for any new development. It concluded that the option of new investment in nuclear power should be kept open, especially if safer and low cost designs were developed, but there would have to be widespread public acceptance.

A major stakeholder and public consultation was launched in May 2002. It was the largest ever on energy policy. There followed a white paper which concluded that diversity of supply was the best protection against sudden price increases, terrorism and other threats to reliability of supply.

On renewable energy the review had concluded that “the UK resource is, in principle, more than sufficient to meet the UK’s energy needs” and that “the UK’s wind and marine resources are the best in Europe”. Both publications were strongly focussed on the need to mitigate climate change. The review had already stated that while achieving a 60% cut in CO2 emissions would be challenging it could be done while still achieving economic growth of 2.25% per year.

It did not make sense that global warming and security of supply should be cited as the reasons for another energy review in 2005. But that is what happened and the prime minister who had written the preface to the first review and endorsed the detailed conclusions on those matters declared that the building of new nuclear power stations should be “facilitated” by ‘fast track’ planning inquiries and ‘pre-licensing’ of new reactor designs. Another public consultation followed.

This writer responded to these events with some dismay and the writing of a paper with the title Nuclear Reactors: do we need more?. The paper was published by the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation in the Socialist Renewal series and a review and an abstract appeared in the Spokesman journal.

It examined the historic claims that nuclear power was peaceful and safe and asked ‘Is the risk from terrorism too awful to be acknowledged?’. It described the failure to comply with a European directive on the provision of information to the public on possible emergencies, examined the lack of data on costs, discussed the known costs but lack of solutions on nuclear waste management and listed the, so far, neglected sources of safe, sustainable renewable energy.

The response of the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate to the government’s proposals was reassuring. The Health and Safety Executive endorsed the concerns of the Nuclear Safety Directorate by publishing a 150 page expert report with the title The Health and Safety Risks and Regulatory Strategy Related to Energy Developments which emphasised the importance of the licensing process to control risk by the design of license conditions after detailed appraisal of a reactor design and the builder’s safety case. The HSE made no concessions to the prime minister’s proposals. It explained that if the (13) vacancies for government inspectors were filled quickly the study of a designer’s safety case and proposed reactor for a specific location would take several years (as it always had) depending on the quality of the application. If more than one new design had to be appraised concurrently it would take longer. The publication reported on earlier experience of ‘prelicensing’ and mentioned the Commission’s finding in a 1994 review that the regulatory systems were “comprehensive, internationally recognised, vindicated by public inquiries, and that there was no reason to change them in any fundamental way to deal with changes to the nuclear industry or new construction.”

It is difficult to imagine a more severe reprimand of a lay prime minister’s interference in a process vital to public safety. Public concern about the government’s methods was not alleviated by the HSE response. Greenpeace, with the support of other organisations such as the Welsh Anti-nuclear Alliance (WANA) and the Nuclear Free Local Authorities, applied to the High Court for judicial review of the way in which the government had consulted the public while giving every indication of having already decided the matter.

Mr Justice Sullivan in the High Court on 15 February 2007 ruled that the government’s second consultation on energy policy was “seriously flawed” and thus “illegal”. There had been no consultation at all, he said, because the government had provided information “wholly insufficient for the public to make an intelligent response.” In fact the government had also blacked out the economic data in papers obtained by the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act.

The government is obliged to start again. This time it has published two white papers one, Planning for a Sustainable Future, dealing with planning procedures and the other, The Energy White Paper is linked with a consultative document on nuclear power. The documents, like the process criticised in judicial review, show the government’s commitment to nuclear power, this time described as a ‘preliminary view’. The energy white paper is 343 pages long and is characterised by enhanced optimism and a lack of vital facts. I have tried hard to find, for example, data on the present and historic costs of generating electricity by nuclear power but I found none. Instead there are unattributed forecasts of future costs only one of which favours nuclear power – that which assumes high gas prices and generous carbon credits. There is frankness combined with optimism in the discussion of the dangers of nuclear power, as in

“Not all costs are considered. The analysis does not attempt to monetise all costs and benefits. Specifically, a monetary value associated with potential accidents is not estimated. Evidence suggests that the likelihood of such accidents is negligible, particularly in the UK context.”

The justification for the above is found in a footnote which reads

1 The literature suggests a range for the probability of major accidents (core meltdown plus containment failure) from 2×10-6 in France, to 4×10-9 in the UK. The associated expected cost is estimated to be of the order £0.03 / MWh to £0.30 / MWh depending on assumptions about discount rates and the value of life; using the figure at the top end of this range would not change the results of the cost benefit analysis. Introducing risk aversion, the results of the cost benefit analysis in the central case (defined in Section 3 below) would be robust for a risk aversion factor of 20 at the highest estimated value for the expected accident cost. For a summary of the relevant literature, see “Externalities of Energy (ExternE), Methodology 2005 Update”, European Commission.

One in four billion reactors years! The debate on whether or not our nuclear reactors are capable of nuclear explosion is not yet settled. In evidence put to our last public inquiry (Hinkley Point ‘C’) an estimate of one loss of containment in one million years was treated with caution by our inspectorate and modified to 1 in 100 000 by the then director general of the Health and Safety Executive in consideration of the acknowledged lack of data on human error. On waste management the consultative document is no better, eg

We have technical solutions for waste disposal that scientific consensus and experience from abroad suggest could accommodate all types of waste from existing and new power stations.

Note that ‘disposal’ has replaced mention of a ‘repository’ and that the findings of CoRWM, the committee on radioactive waste management, have been improved to turn a topic requiring further research and a suitable site into a solution and that new waste, which CoRWM expressly excluded from its considerations, is now lumped in. If we have a solution one has to ask why we have not made use of it in the 30 years since the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution recommended that there should be no more nuclear power stations until a solution was found for the management of nuclear waste.

The local nuclear power station at Oldbury is not producing electricity because a fire affecting electrical equipment on 30 May 2007 caused reactor 2 to be shut down. Repair work and a report by investigators will have to be completed before the reactor can be started again. A report by BBC News 24 to the effect that the power station is unlikely to produce electricity again is disputed, but not vigorously, by British Nuclear Group who run this ageing Magnox station.

The condition of the Oldbury graphite cores and losses of initial integrity featured in an internal report revealed by the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act. The report shows that reactor 2 is not considered safe enough to operate until its planned closure date of December 2008 and that the permission to restart after its recent two years closure for safety work was conditional on a new safety case being acceptable in November this year. It is reassuring that the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate are making such conditional approvals. Similar considerations will apply to reactor 1 where a safety case for a restart is already with the inspectorate. Pressure on the inspectorate is envisaged given that the company desperately needs the income from electricity sales almost as desperately as the Prime Minister wishes us to believe that all is well. He has asserted that reactor safety can now be assumed and thus that events such as fuel fires, burst cladding and structural collapse of a reactor core leading to a total loss of control are impossible.

On Planning for a Sustainable Future, on the proposed Infrastructure Planning Commission and on local planning inquiries being required to exclude matters of national policy from their considerations a letter to The Guardian on 23 May summed up the argument very well.

If the government builds a nuclear power station on the site of London’s derelict Battersea power station then the rest of the country will know that these stations are completely safe. The new streamlined planning system should take care of any local opposition.

If you are satisfied that spending billions more on nuclear power will not impede and distract from the investment that we need to make in several forms of renewable energy, particularly tidal energy; if you are sure that the industry has nothing whatever to do with the proliferation of nuclear weapons, and if you know why every young person in Britain has plutonium in his teeth and you do not care you may want to respond to the consultation with your approval for a new nuclear future.

Christopher Gifford

11 June 2007

NUCLEAR REACTORS: DO YOU WANT MORE?

This article is about getting up to date with the government’s proposals and trying to make sense of the processes used by government in deciding policy.

In 2002 the Government published an Energy Review. In over 200 pages of detail it discussed options for future supplies of energy. It was written by the Performance and Innovation Unit of the Cabinet Office and it has since become clear that the Department of Trade and Industry, although involved, was not the principal author.

On the generation of electricity in nuclear power station the review said that concern about radioactive waste and “low probability but high consequence hazards” may limit or preclude its use. It added that nuclear power seemed likely to remain more expensive than fossil fuelled generation and that nowhere in the world was there new build in a liberalised electricity market. Thus two of the objections of those opposed to nuclear power were conceded. It was not safe and it was not economic. Similarly the report mentioned the vulnerability to terrorism, the long lead times in planning and building new stations, the extent of public opposition and the need to gain public acceptance for any new development. It concluded that the option of new investment in nuclear power should be kept open, especially if safer and low cost designs were developed, but there would have to be widespread public acceptance.

A major stakeholder and public consultation was launched in May 2002. It was the largest ever on energy policy. There followed a white paper which concluded that diversity of supply was the best protection against sudden price increases, terrorism and other threats to reliability of supply.

On renewable energy the review had concluded that “the UK resource is, in principle, more than sufficient to meet the UK’s energy needs” and that “the UK’s wind and marine resources are the best in Europe”. Both publications were strongly focussed on the need to mitigate climate change. The review had already stated that while achieving a 60% cut in CO2 emissions would be challenging it could be done while still achieving economic growth of 2.25% per year.

It did not make sense that global warming and security of supply should be cited as the reasons for another energy review in 2005. But that is what happened and the prime minister who had written the preface to the first review and endorsed the detailed conclusions on those matters declared that the building of new nuclear power stations should be “facilitated” by ‘fast track’ planning inquiries and ‘pre-licensing’ of new reactor designs. Another public consultation followed.

This writer responded to these events with some dismay and the writing of a paper with the title Nuclear Reactors: do we need more?. The paper was published by the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation in the Socialist Renewal series and a review and an abstract appeared in the Spokesman journal. The paper is available as an A5 booklet of 33pp with 61 source references price £2-00 from Spokesman Books telephone 0115 970 8318. It examined the historic claims that nuclear power was peaceful and safe and asked ‘Is the risk from terrorism too awful to be acknowledged?’. It described the failure to comply with a European directive on the provision of information to the public on possible emergencies, examined the lack of data on costs, discussed the known costs but lack of solutions on nuclear waste management and listed the, so far, neglected sources of safe, sustainable renewable energy.

The response of the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate to the government’s proposals was reassuring. The Health and Safety Executive endorsed the concerns of the Nuclear Safety Directorate by publishing a 150 page expert report with the title The Health and Safety Risks and Regulatory Strategy Related to Energy Developments which emphasised the importance of the licensing process to control risk by the design of license conditions after detailed appraisal of a reactor design and the builder’s safety case. The HSE made no concessions to the prime minister’s proposals. It explained that if the (13) vacancies for government inspectors were filled quickly the study of a designer’s safety case and proposed reactor for a specific location would take several years (as it always had) depending on the quality of the application. If more than one new design had to be appraised concurrently it would take longer. The publication reported on earlier experience of ‘prelicensing’ and mentioned the Commission’s finding in a 1994 review that the regulatory systems were “comprehensive, internationally recognised, vindicated by public inquiries, and that there was no reason to change them in any fundamental way to deal with changes to the nuclear industry or new construction.”

It is difficult to imagine a more severe reprimand of a lay prime minister’s interference in a process vital to public safety. Public concern about the government’s methods was not alleviated by the HSE response. Greenpeace, with the support of other organisations such as the Welsh Anti-nuclear Alliance (WANA) and the Nuclear Free Local Authorities, applied to the High Court for judicial review of the way in which the government had consulted the public while giving every indication of having already decided the matter.

Mr Justice Sullivan in the High Court on 15 February 2007 ruled that the government’s second consultation on energy policy was “seriously flawed” and thus “illegal”. There had been no consultation at all, he said, because the government had provided information “wholly insufficient for the public to make an intelligent response.” In fact the government had also blacked out the economic data in papers obtained by the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act.

The government is obliged to start again. This time it has published two white papers one, Planning for a Sustainable Future, dealing with planning procedures and the other, The Energy White Paper is linked with a consultative document on nuclear power. The documents, like the process criticised in judicial review, show the government’s commitment to nuclear power, this time described as a ‘preliminary view’. The energy white paper is 343 pages long and is characterised by enhanced optimism and a lack of vital facts. I have tried hard to find, for example, data on the present and historic costs of generating electricity by nuclear power but I found none. Instead there are unattributed forecasts of future costs only one of which favours nuclear power – that which assumes high gas prices and generous carbon credits. There is frankness combined with optimism in the discussion of the dangers of nuclear power, as in

“Not all costs are considered. The analysis does not attempt to monetise all costs and benefits. Specifically, a monetary value associated with potential accidents is not estimated. Evidence suggests that the likelihood of such accidents is negligible, particularly in the UK context.”

The justification for the above is found in a footnote which reads

1 The literature suggests a range for the probability of major accidents (core meltdown plus containment failure) from 2×10-6 in France, to 4×10-9 in the UK. The associated expected cost is estimated to be of the order £0.03 / MWh to £0.30 / MWh depending on assumptions about discount rates and the value of life; using the figure at the top end of this range would not change the results of the cost benefit analysis. Introducing risk aversion, the results of the cost benefit analysis in the central case (defined in Section 3 below) would be robust for a risk aversion factor of 20 at the highest estimated value for the expected accident cost. For a summary of the relevant literature, see “Externalities of Energy (ExternE), Methodology 2005 Update”, European Commission.

One in four billion reactors years! The debate on whether or not our nuclear reactors are capable of nuclear explosion is not yet settled. In evidence put to our last public inquiry (Hinkley Point ‘C’) an estimate of one loss of containment in one million years was treated with caution by our inspectorate and modified to 1 in 100 000 by the then director general of the Health and Safety Executive in consideration of the acknowledged lack of data on human error. On waste management the consultative document is no better, eg

We have technical solutions for waste disposal that scientific consensus and experience from abroad suggest could accommodate all types of waste from existing and new power stations.

Note that ‘disposal’ has replaced mention of a ‘repository’ and that the findings of CoRWM, the committee on radioactive waste management, have been improved to turn a topic requiring further research and a suitable site into a solution and that new waste, which CoRWM expressly excluded from its considerations, is now lumped in. If we have a solution one has to ask why we have not made use of it in the 30 years since the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution recommended that there should be no more nuclear power stations until a solution was found for the management of nuclear waste.

The local nuclear power station at Oldbury is not producing electricity because a fire affecting electrical equipment on 30 May 2007 caused reactor 2 to be shut down. Repair work and a report by investigators will have to be completed before the reactor can be started again. A report by BBC News 24 to the effect that the power station is unlikely to produce electricity again is disputed, but not vigorously, by British Nuclear Group who run this ageing Magnox station.

The condition of the Oldbury graphite cores and losses of initial integrity featured in an internal report revealed by the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act. The report shows that reactor 2 is not considered safe enough to operate until its planned closure date of December 2008 and that the permission to restart after its recent two years closure for safety work was conditional on a new safety case being acceptable in November this year. It is reassuring that the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate are making such conditional approvals. Similar considerations will apply to reactor 1 where a safety case for a restart is already with the inspectorate. Pressure on the inspectorate is envisaged given that the company desperately needs the income from electricity sales almost as desperately as the Prime Minister wishes us to believe that all is well. He has asserted that reactor safety can now be assumed and thus that events such as fuel fires, burst cladding and structural collapse of a reactor core leading to a total loss of control are impossible.

On Planning for a Sustainable Future, on the proposed Infrastructure Planning Commission and on local planning inquiries being required to exclude matters of national policy from their considerations a letter to The Guardian on 23 May summed up the argument very well.

If the government builds a nuclear power station on the site of London’s derelict Battersea power station then the rest of the country will know that these stations are completely safe. The new streamlined planning system should take care of any local opposition.

If you are satisfied that spending billions more on nuclear power will not impede and distract from the investment that we need to make in several forms of renewable energy, particularly tidal energy; if you are sure that the industry has nothing whatever to do with the proliferation of nuclear weapons, and if you know why every young person in Britain has plutonium in his teeth and you do not care you may want to respond to the consultation with your approval for a new nuclear future.

Christopher Gifford

NUCLEAR REACTORS: DO YOU WANT MORE?

This article is about getting up to date with the government’s proposals and trying to make sense of the processes used by government in deciding policy.

In 2002 the Government published an Energy Review. In over 200 pages of detail it discussed options for future supplies of energy. It was written by the Performance and Innovation Unit of the Cabinet Office and it has since become clear that the Department of Trade and Industry, although involved, was not the principal author.

On the generation of electricity in nuclear power station the review said that concern about radioactive waste and “low probability but high consequence hazards” may limit or preclude its use. It added that nuclear power seemed likely to remain more expensive than fossil fuelled generation and that nowhere in the world was there new build in a liberalised electricity market. Thus two of the objections of those opposed to nuclear power were conceded. It was not safe and it was not economic. Similarly the report mentioned the vulnerability to terrorism, the long lead times in planning and building new stations, the extent of public opposition and the need to gain public acceptance for any new development. It concluded that the option of new investment in nuclear power should be kept open, especially if safer and low cost designs were developed, but there would have to be widespread public acceptance.

A major stakeholder and public consultation was launched in May 2002. It was the largest ever on energy policy. There followed a white paper which concluded that diversity of supply was the best protection against sudden price increases, terrorism and other threats to reliability of supply.

On renewable energy the review had concluded that “the UK resource is, in principle, more than sufficient to meet the UK’s energy needs” and that “the UK’s wind and marine resources are the best in Europe”. Both publications were strongly focussed on the need to mitigate climate change. The review had already stated that while achieving a 60% cut in CO2 emissions would be challenging it could be done while still achieving economic growth of 2.25% per year.

It did not make sense that global warming and security of supply should be cited as the reasons for another energy review in 2005. But that is what happened and the prime minister who had written the preface to the first review and endorsed the detailed conclusions on those matters declared that the building of new nuclear power stations should be “facilitated” by ‘fast track’ planning inquiries and ‘pre-licensing’ of new reactor designs. Another public consultation followed.

This writer responded to these events with some dismay and the writing of a paper with the title Nuclear Reactors: do we need more?. The paper was published by the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation in the Socialist Renewal series and a review and an abstract appeared in the Spokesman journal. The paper is available as an A5 booklet of 33pp with 61 source references price £2-00 from Spokesman Books telephone 0115 970 8318. It examined the historic claims that nuclear power was peaceful and safe and asked ‘Is the risk from terrorism too awful to be acknowledged?’. It described the failure to comply with a European directive on the provision of information to the public on possible emergencies, examined the lack of data on costs, discussed the known costs but lack of solutions on nuclear waste management and listed the, so far, neglected sources of safe, sustainable renewable energy.

The response of the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate to the government’s proposals was reassuring. The Health and Safety Executive endorsed the concerns of the Nuclear Safety Directorate by publishing a 150 page expert report with the title The Health and Safety Risks and Regulatory Strategy Related to Energy Developments which emphasised the importance of the licensing process to control risk by the design of license conditions after detailed appraisal of a reactor design and the builder’s safety case. The HSE made no concessions to the prime minister’s proposals. It explained that if the (13) vacancies for government inspectors were filled quickly the study of a designer’s safety case and proposed reactor for a specific location would take several years (as it always had) depending on the quality of the application. If more than one new design had to be appraised concurrently it would take longer. The publication reported on earlier experience of ‘prelicensing’ and mentioned the Commission’s finding in a 1994 review that the regulatory systems were “comprehensive, internationally recognised, vindicated by public inquiries, and that there was no reason to change them in any fundamental way to deal with changes to the nuclear industry or new construction.”

It is difficult to imagine a more severe reprimand of a lay prime minister’s interference in a process vital to public safety. Public concern about the government’s methods was not alleviated by the HSE response. Greenpeace, with the support of other organisations such as the Welsh Anti-nuclear Alliance (WANA) and the Nuclear Free Local Authorities, applied to the High Court for judicial review of the way in which the government had consulted the public while giving every indication of having already decided the matter.

Mr Justice Sullivan in the High Court on 15 February 2007 ruled that the government’s second consultation on energy policy was “seriously flawed” and thus “illegal”. There had been no consultation at all, he said, because the government had provided information “wholly insufficient for the public to make an intelligent response.” In fact the government had also blacked out the economic data in papers obtained by the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act.

The government is obliged to start again. This time it has published two white papers one, Planning for a Sustainable Future, dealing with planning procedures and the other, The Energy White Paper is linked with a consultative document on nuclear power. The documents, like the process criticised in judicial review, show the government’s commitment to nuclear power, this time described as a ‘preliminary view’. The energy white paper is 343 pages long and is characterised by enhanced optimism and a lack of vital facts. I have tried hard to find, for example, data on the present and historic costs of generating electricity by nuclear power but I found none. Instead there are unattributed forecasts of future costs only one of which favours nuclear power – that which assumes high gas prices and generous carbon credits. There is frankness combined with optimism in the discussion of the dangers of nuclear power, as in

“Not all costs are considered. The analysis does not attempt to monetise all costs and benefits. Specifically, a monetary value associated with potential accidents is not estimated. Evidence suggests that the likelihood of such accidents is negligible, particularly in the UK context.”

The justification for the above is found in a footnote which reads

1 The literature suggests a range for the probability of major accidents (core meltdown plus containment failure) from 2×10-6 in France, to 4×10-9 in the UK. The associated expected cost is estimated to be of the order £0.03 / MWh to £0.30 / MWh depending on assumptions about discount rates and the value of life; using the figure at the top end of this range would not change the results of the cost benefit analysis. Introducing risk aversion, the results of the cost benefit analysis in the central case (defined in Section 3 below) would be robust for a risk aversion factor of 20 at the highest estimated value for the expected accident cost. For a summary of the relevant literature, see “Externalities of Energy (ExternE), Methodology 2005 Update”, European Commission.

One in four billion reactors years! The debate on whether or not our nuclear reactors are capable of nuclear explosion is not yet settled. In evidence put to our last public inquiry (Hinkley Point ‘C’) an estimate of one loss of containment in one million years was treated with caution by our inspectorate and modified to 1 in 100 000 by the then director general of the Health and Safety Executive in consideration of the acknowledged lack of data on human error. On waste management the consultative document is no better, eg

We have technical solutions for waste disposal that scientific consensus and experience from abroad suggest could accommodate all types of waste from existing and new power stations.

Note that ‘disposal’ has replaced mention of a ‘repository’ and that the findings of CoRWM, the committee on radioactive waste management, have been improved to turn a topic requiring further research and a suitable site into a solution and that new waste, which CoRWM expressly excluded from its considerations, is now lumped in. If we have a solution one has to ask why we have not made use of it in the 30 years since the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution recommended that there should be no more nuclear power stations until a solution was found for the management of nuclear waste.

The local nuclear power station at Oldbury is not producing electricity because a fire affecting electrical equipment on 30 May 2007 caused reactor 2 to be shut down. Repair work and a report by investigators will have to be completed before the reactor can be started again. A report by BBC News 24 to the effect that the power station is unlikely to produce electricity again is disputed, but not vigorously, by British Nuclear Group who run this ageing Magnox station.

The condition of the Oldbury graphite cores and losses of initial integrity featured in an internal report revealed by the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act. The report shows that reactor 2 is not considered safe enough to operate until its planned closure date of December 2008 and that the permission to restart after its recent two years closure for safety work was conditional on a new safety case being acceptable in November this year. It is reassuring that the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate are making such conditional approvals. Similar considerations will apply to reactor 1 where a safety case for a restart is already with the inspectorate. Pressure on the inspectorate is envisaged given that the company desperately needs the income from electricity sales almost as desperately as the Prime Minister wishes us to believe that all is well. He has asserted that reactor safety can now be assumed and thus that events such as fuel fires, burst cladding and structural collapse of a reactor core leading to a total loss of control are impossible.

On Planning for a Sustainable Future, on the proposed Infrastructure Planning Commission and on local planning inquiries being required to exclude matters of national policy from their considerations a letter to The Guardian on 23 May summed up the argument very well.

If the government builds a nuclear power station on the site of London’s derelict Battersea power station then the rest of the country will know that these stations are completely safe. The new streamlined planning system should take care of any local opposition.

If you are satisfied that spending billions more on nuclear power will not impede and distract from the investment that we need to make in several forms of renewable energy, particularly tidal energy; if you are sure that the industry has nothing whatever to do with the proliferation of nuclear weapons, and if you know why every young person in Britain has plutonium in his teeth and you do not care you may want to respond to the consultation with your approval for a new nuclear future.

Christopher Gifford

11 June 2007

11 June 2007

Designated Area for Protest

AWE Aldermaston

{CLICK HERE for the photo-essay}

It was still dark on that late October morning when our coach came to a polite halt outside the main gates of Britain’s atomic bomb factory, the Atomic Weapons Establishment at Aldermaston.

At about the same time – a pre-dawn 6.30am – other coaches and minibus vans pulled up at their pre-planned positions around AWE’s numerous high security gates. Wrapped in layer upon layer of warm clothing, activists piled quickly out and set to work blockading the entire base, despite the awaiting police.

For our part, we, the main gate contingent comprising of about a dozen misfits of varying age and dress, disembarked quietly but were met instantaneously by a squad of approaching and eager police. Dispensing with any formalities they immediately requested we move directly to the acutely ridiculous ‘designated area for protest’.

I felt like I was in a Woody Allen movie. I mean, have you ever heard of anything as pointless as an approved area reserved for safe and inoffensive civil disobedience? A middle-aged man standing at my side and dressed as Death was equally bemused.

‘Um, no thanks, we’ll go this way.’ Pointing to the main gate where the largest gathering of police stood ready to welcome us in more traditional fashion.

‘No, Sir.’ And gently motioning his patronising arms as if he were directing traffic added, ‘If you’d kindly step this way – to the designated area for protest – over here in the car park.’

And he finished his repeated request with that ‘Thank you,’ police officers tend to add just to let you know that they’ve already decided you will obey their order – why would you possibly consider doing otherwise?

‘And under what law do you think you have the authority to direct us anywhere? This is a public pathway.’ I objected.

He looked at me quizzically. This wasn’t the way it normally went when patrolling B-roads, ASBO-ridden estates and during the weekend rumble down the local pub. ‘Ministry of Defence Land Byelaws!’ He blurted, unbelieving my incredulous reply.

That was all we needed to hear: it meant they had nothing.

Unless he cited a Section 14 Public Order Act, which he didn’t, and, I am guessing, invoked it with some kind of paperwork, they couldn’t force us anywhere. Thus I had an impromptu but abject lesson in how to use the law to the letter against the police, who, it seems, will try and get you to do whatever they want just because they think they can and ought. In reality they can do very little unless one is breaking a specific law. It is in knowing which law applies and when to call them into play wherein the power really lays.

In the meantime the message had got about that this wasn’t going to be some tin-pot demo with a couple of hippies, a few songs and some scraggy banners: numerous coaches and vans were dropping off tens of activists at each gate – way more protestors than the chap in front of us could see. He capitulated, leaving the designated area for protest as impotent as actually using it would be. He rejoined the ranks of his high-vis’-clad compatriots probably thinking to himself ‘Worth a try.’ and who could blame him?

A second contingent of blockaders arrived having been diverted from the construction gate by the police along the way. Since things weren’t really happening at the main gate yet and by the fact we overwhelmingly outnumbered here, many of us elected to make off to the next gate instead. Only the horse-mounted police followed.

The point of this blockade was to halt the construction work going on at AWE Aldermaston but we weren’t going to be picky and aimed to stop all traffic going in and it was this which necessitated the early start. In March 2007, parliament voted to replace Trident – our submarine-launched nuclear weapon system. But despite only voting for only the replacement of the subs and missiles – and not the actual warheads – a massive construction programme is steaming ahead at AWE Aldermaston, creating extra facilities to design, test and construct the next generation of deadly nuclear warheads, in advance of any parliamentary decision. In July 2007, the CND obtains documents that proved the decision to press on regardless had already been made by Government.

Couple this renewal, expansion and investment with the US Missile Defence system planned for Eastern Europe and no wonder Russia is re-aiming some of its arsenal of nuclear missiles this way.

Worse, this is public money being spent as The Morning Star newspaper reported the day following our blockade: ‘The government has pledged to spend £76 billion – handing over much of it to private weapons firms – to upgrade the weapons of mass destruction during the next few years.’

Since we have signed up to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, why not consider Trident Ploughshares’ alternative proposal for AWE making it fit for use as an international centre of expertise on warhead decommissioning and verification as part of a global nuclear weapons convention?

Meanwhile, a mix of local, Thames Valley and MOD police were mostly professional, although I spotted one very over-zealous PC violently drag a protestor spread over the road across a kerb with way too much force. He did this with one arm free while the other clutched a police camera there to record evidence and add to their profiles of us. Perhaps it was his over ambitious nature that landed him the photographer role that day. Then I noted his lapels where his police id number ought to be clearly visible was not shown at all. It lay beneath his high-vis vest and stab-jacket.

Someone else commented that is a police requirement but when I questioned him on it he said ‘You don’t need to worry who I am.’

He was still visibly enraged and shaking with a glimmer of violence in his pursed lips, furrowed brow and piercing glare. Unlike the other constables there, this heavily-built copper looked to me like he was out for a good old-fashioned rumble and nothing more. I too had my camera and decided it was his turn to be snapped. Having done that, I decided to shadow him, letting him know clearly that whatever he did, I’d catch it on camera. It didn’t take long before he turned on me.

‘Have you got some kinda fixation on me or something?’ he snapped. Clearly the police aren’t so keen to have someone constantly taking their photo and surveying them quite so closely.

‘No.’ I replied, ‘I simply think, like the three other witnesses there, you man-handle people. You’re unnecessarily rough and…’ – but he interrupted with a booming ‘That’s my job!’
‘What, man-handling people?’
‘If necessary.’
‘Uh, I don’t think so. But I’ll watch just in case, eh?’

And he promptly pushed me roughly back to the pavement for ‘my own safety’ as a colleague of his put it, noticing the situation was rising and could get quickly and unnecessarily out of control.

For her part, the veteran campaigner Pat Arrowsmith, now 78, lay repeatedly in the road but was not arrested whereas a number of younger activists were led away. The first that I saw were three angels from our gate: three young female students dressed in white with kitsch home-made fairy wings. The police raised some screening, thereby inadvertently actually helping close even more of the road and assisting in our blockade, and prised them apart. There was a mix of superglueing each others’ hands together and the use of tubes to link hands so the police cannot use the usual 3 on 1 tactic to prise protestors apart from linking on to each other (the latter requiring specialist cutting teams instead, all taking more time and therefore prolonging the blockade).

The problem with non-violent direct action is that it is still pretty hardcore stuff. I don’t mind being arrested or having a record, but the fine for the most likely conviction – Obstruction of the Highway – carried a fine of anywhere between £80 to £500 with court costs. I simply don’t have that kind of money lying readily around what with two very young children, a mortgage which has increased over £150 per month in the last two months and the credit crunch to contend with.

On the other hand, what price should we put on the future of these very children? I felt utterly deflated with the moral quandary at hand. I needed to act responsibly as a parent but what did that mean when the state and rule of law was removing my ability to act practically against it? A selfless sacrifice can also be selfish I learned with knotted stomach. Before parenting children I would have been in there, in the very thick of it, but now, with children – even though it was FOR them I was here – I just couldn’t. A support role (legal and photographic witness) and my very presence was the best I could offer Trident Ploughshares while all about me pensioners, Quakers and students were being arrested and carried off to police vans.

Kate Hudson, Chair of the CND said the blockade had “…been a great success. We have effectively obstructed work at the site for many hours, closing gates and blocking roads. This is the largest blockade of Aldermaston for many years and signals an increased public concern about Britain’s weapons of mass destruction. At a time of economic crisis, our government is prioritising nuclear bombs over healthcare, job creation and investment in sustainable energy production. The majority of British taxpayers do not want their money sent on Trident replacement and the new generation of nuclear weapons that will be made here at Aldermaston.”

Paradoxically, the Big Blockade 2008 was also at times life-affirming. In Reading we raised the ghosts of the original March to Aldermaston with strangers coming together snoring and reading in a community hall attached to a church. And then there was the free hot supper, ginger cake and tea, jazz and folk music, brightly-costumed people and, more than anything, camaraderie across the faiths, years and ideologies.

Like most nuclear sites, the sheer size of the AWE is breathtaking, the magnitude for destruction terrifying. But the appearance of the size of the privately-run AWE doesn’t stop incompetence creeping in. In the July 2007 flooding that so affected our own area, AWE itself barely got by with one of the main bunkers where the nuclear warheads are maintained was almost ‘overwhelmed’. 84 buildings were flooded, some up to two feet and all live nuclear work had to be stopped for nine months.

Worse still, a Freedom of Information Act request revealed that both essential radiation safety alarms and criticality alarms were out of action for up to 10 days. Although heavily censored, the FOI request revealed that AWE’s own review said ‘Several key facilities experienced Near Miss events…’ This mostly overlooked piece of news (Channel 4 being the exception) was not missed by protestors and more than one banner referred to it directly. But did we raise the profile of our concerns on this day?

For sure all gates or roads to them were peacefully blocked at one point or another, many for a number of hours. Of the hundreds present at the blockade (estimates vary – as ever – from 150 to 400 or more), there were 33 arrests, the greatest number at the site in a decade. That would be the largest number since the end of the Cold War. But the press coverage was, as ever, minimal with most reports making pedestrian remarks at best as to the reasons behind the blockade.

Perhaps, though, this number will also be the largest number to beat at the start of a ‘New Cold War’? For sure it will be if ministers like our very own Mark Harper MP get their way.

Not content with supporting the renewal and replacement of the Trident nuclear weapons system, the Forest of Dean MP now backs the dangerously destabilising and controversial American Missile Defence System to be sited in Eastern Europe, as I mentioned earlier.

Although supposedly aimed at ‘rogue states’ – those, we presume, being Iran and North Korea (favourites in Bush’s axis of evil), the Missile Defence System is planned to be built in what was previously the other side of the cold war eastern bloc. It doesn’t, therefore, take a genius to deduce that this would rightly wind the Russians up somewhat.

At least on this occasion Mr. Harper is consistent. His argument for supporting Trident was that the future threat would primarily be a resurgent and aggressive Russia as we had seen in the Cold War. I couldn’t agree at the time of that argument but that was before the Litvinyenko case and the fall-out (ahem) that has since followed from events in Georgia. Now we’ve stoked the old fires in the great Russian bear and Putin’s puppet successor looks to continue the hard line. Indeed, it seems as if we WANT a second Cold War. After all, the war on terror seems to be going the same way as Vietnam.

NUCLEAR WASTE IS GOOD FOR THE COMMUNITY
On a final note and on the other side of things nuclear I caught an intriguing headline on the cover of the 12th June edition of the Municipal Journal [1]: ‘Councils set to be offered ‘carrot’ for nuclear waste’. The carrot this time being some vague form of virtual bargaining termed ‘community benefits packages’. How dumping nuclear waste constitutes a benefit to any community is such incredible spin as to be frankly beyond my logic.

[1] The Municipal Journal, Thursday 12th June 2008 edition, news article by Sally Guyoncourt.