UK lumbered with foreign nuclear waste

The UK is set to become home to some 800 tons of highly radioactive nuclear waste after it emerged that the disaster-prone Thorp reprocessing plant may have to remain closed permanently.

The Government has admitted that the spent nuclear fuel shipped in from overseas and currently stockpiled at Sellafield may have to remain in Britain.

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The revelation is a major blow to the reputation of the nuclear industry at a time when the Government is mulling whether to approve the construction of a new generation of atomic plants.

The admission came as the Department of Trade and Industry prepared the ground for the permanent closure of Thorp, its controversial nuclear reprocessing plant at the sprawling nuclear complex in Cumbria.

The £1.6bn plant is now largely obsolete, as reprocessing spent nuclear fuel is no longer considered viable. It has been closed since April 2005 after a major radioactive leak was discovered.

Last week, the DTI released a consultation into changing the way Thorp operates. Included in the unannounced document was a warning that the planned re-opening - last scheduled for this summer after repeated delays - would now not take place until "around the autumn".

It added that "further delay" is possible because of another technical problem, and that the "worst case" scenario would mean the plant not becoming fully operational until around 2010 or 2011.

Thorp had been due to close permanently in 2010 when its reprocessing contracts run out. No new contracts are planned.

If Thorp were to be mothballed before this date, the document says the Government would consider transferring the remaining spent fuel to another reprocessing plant or keeping it in the UK.

Most of the 800 existing tons of waste came from Germany. Customers - which also include firms in Switzerland and Japan as well as British Energy - send their spent fuel to Thorp for reprocessing. Normally the plant's operator, BNG, then uses the separated plutonium and uranium to make the "Mox" fuel used by older nuclear plants, which it ships back to the country of origin. But the adjoining Mox plant has also been dogged by technical problems, disrupting production.

The consultation recommends that rather than wait for Thorp to re-open, the owners of the fuel waiting to be reprocessed should be given material that has already been treated at the plant, even though the fuel belongs to other customers.

Martin Forwood from campaign group Core (Cumbrians Opposed to Radioactive Environment) said the Government should take the opportunity to shut the plant permanently now.

The owner of Thorp, the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA), would also be hit by further delays in the re-opening or the plant's permanent closure.