And finally, where do you think the uranium to fuel nuclear reactors came from in the first place? That's right. It's natural. And that's how it's disposed. Buried deep underground in reinforced glass/steel/concrete containers posing absolutely no risk to the environment, animal or human life. Radiation emitted from uranium is called alpha radiation. This type of radiation does not have the power to penetrate one piece of paper, let alone human skin, let alone a lead lined glass, steel and concrete container.

Thanks for reading my views; I would be interested in reading your response to my comments,

Richard

KARE's reply:

The idea that we would still be guarding nuclear waste, if the Romans had nuclear power is simply intended to illustrate the timescales involved. In fact nuclear waste would remain dangerous for a lot longer than 2,000 years, and yet we still have absolutely no idea what we are going to do with it, yet we keep producing more.

British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) has almost 1600 cubic metres of extremely dangerous liquid high level waste, which has to be constantly cooled, stored in tanks at its Sellafield site in Cumbria. An accident or malicious act which caused just 50% of the radioactivity to escape would be equivalent to 44 Chernobyls. Dounreay has a smaller quantity, but does not even plan to start building a vitrification plant until 2007.

We also know that Sellafield has a stockpile of around 70 tonnes of weapons-useable plutonium, and that this could increase to 150 tonnes over the next decade or so. The House of Lords Science and Technology Committee has called for the bulk of this to be declared a waste, making a mockery of BNFL's main business which is to separate plutonium from spent nuclear waste fuel.

A recent RWMAC/NuSAC report highlighted the problems associated with Intermediate-Level Waste (ILW), which, although it doesn't generate its own heat like high-level waste, is still extremely dangerous, and requires shielding to protect workers who handle it. The current nuclear programme will generate some 215,000 cubic metres of this category of waste, 74,000 cubic metres of which are already stored at sites around the UK - more than half at Sellafield. Surprisingly 5,000 cubic metres are located in Oxfordshire at Harwell, 2,000 cubic metres at Aldermaston, and the rest spread around the nuclear station sites and Royal Dockyards.

What is particularly worrying about the RWMAC revelations is that 88% of the ILW is not stored in, what is called a 'safe, passive Form'. In other words it is in a dangerous condition. RWMAC, in a classic understatement, call this 'unsatisfactory'. This is a committee made up of pro and anti-nuclear voices that has published its findings in a consensus report. So for 'unsatisfactory' read 'outrageous'.

Some 28,000 cubic metres of the waste not stored safely is described by the nuclear industry's waste management agency, Nirex, as 'challenging'. These are wastes which are difficult to 'immobilise', in other words may easily leak out of their packaging; wastes which could spontaneously combust in contact with normal air; wastes which are far too heterogeneous or mixed to be safely packaged in their current form.

Here at Dungeness we have Magnox fuel element debris which has a high hazard potential because it can cause hydrogen explosions or fire. Stored in water tanks in the spent fuel storage ponds. Both the AGR and Magnox reactors have stored ILW wastes in the voids inside the reactors which will result in more complex removal procedures.

The Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII), the Government's nuclear regulator, reported in 1997 that ILW wastes may be poorly 'characterised' - in other words we don't really know what's there; they are 'potentially mobile' so may leak out into the groundwater or wider environment, and they are in a physically and chemically degraded condition, in '40-50 year old facilities that fall below current standards and are subject to further deterioration'. In other words, unknown waste, which could easily leak, stored in buildings which are falling down.

Since then the NII has become increasingly concerned at the lack of progress in addressing the problem, and on several occasions recently it has had to resort to using its legal powers to persuade BNFL "to target areas on the Sellafield site where waste management practice or progress has not been acceptable".

One of the biggest problems seems to be British Nuclear Fuels' reluctance to spend money 'characterising' the waste it has built up over the past five decades. We have got to know the chemical and physical properties of the waste and the radiation content before we can decide how best to package and store the waste as safely as possible. The company recently spent £400 million building a plant known as 'Drypac' on the Sellafield site. But the plant has still not been commissioned. According to the company 'Drypac is taking a breather'. BNFL is having to re-examine the way it deals with its ILW before it can open the plant. Packaging ILW on the cheap, without characterizing the waste first, will simply cause us more problems in a few decades time.

We can only hope that the issue of putting our nuclear wastes into a form that allows it to be stored as safely as possible, will be a top priority for the new Liabilities Management Agency and that there are no disasters in the meantime. But one thing is certain, we cannot let this industry build, yet more nuclear power stations adding to Britain's growing mountain of dangerous waste which we have no idea what to do with.