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All four of the documents the government has chosen to inform the public
on the controversial nuclear fuel reprocessing plant at Sellafield argue
firmly in favour of starting up the plant. Environmental groups say the
information is biased and that the public consultation is a ‘sham’.

Publication of the documents marked the start of the second round of
consultation into the opening of Thorp, British Nuclear Fuels’ thermal oxide
reprocessing plant, which is ready to start up but needs authorisation from
the environment and agriculture ministers to discharge radio-active waste.

After the first round of consultation, Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of
Pollution and inspectors from the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and
Food concluded that the provisional discharge levels for Thorp would not
harm the environment or the public’s health. On the basis of their report,
ministers say they are ‘minded’ to permit the plant to operate.

But many opponents argued against Thorp on wider issues: for example,
that it is no longer needed because there is no market for the uranium and
plutonium it will generate (This Week, 10 July).

Because of these objections, ministers announced the second round of
consultation. The new consultation is ‘a matter of good governance because
of the widespread public interest in these questions’, said an official.
The ministers will decide whether to grant the licence, or to hold a public
inquiry, after 4 October, when the consultation ends. ‘Their minds remain
open,’ he said.

Two reports specially commissioned to inform the debate were also published
last week. The first argues that Thorp will have no damaging effect on the
environment ‘radiologically or nonradiologically’. The second presents an
economic justification for Thorp. Both are written by BNFL.

The plant’s opponents are amazed: ‘All the evidence is produced by BNFL,’
says Bridget Woodman of Greenpeace. All along, opponents have called for
an independent analysis of the economics of Thorp. Many figures in the BNFL
report have long been contested. For example, according to BNFL a delay
in the opening of the nuclear waste repository beneath Sellafield would
cost £10 million. An analysis earlier this year by Frans Berkhout
of Princeton University in New Jersey put the cost of such a delay as high
as £190 million.

The government has decided not to publish a review of the economics
of Thorp by the financial consultants Touche Ross, and DoE officials said
there are no plans to commission an independent report.

The government also published its own statement on Thorp last week.
It argues strongly that the plant should open, dismisses the environmental
and health objections to it, and says the economic case is a matter for
BNFL. If Thorp does not operate, says the report, Britain would be branded
as an unreliable trading partner.

William Walker of the Science Policy Research Unit at the University
of Sussex says this argument is ‘untested’. Walker says Japan, Germany and
other countries that have sent their fuel to Thorp are bound to reprocessing
by tightly written contracts. ‘Nobody believes reprocessing is the cheapest
option,’ he says. By offering space for spent fuel until those countries
have built their own stores, BNFL could come out without an ‘economic loss’
says Walker.