A Secret UK Uranium Enrichment Plant Shut Down After Safety Breach
By Countercurrents.org
25 January, 2013
Counercurrents.org
A secret uranium enrichment plant in the UK has been closed down as safety concerns emerged there.
Rob Edwards’ exclusive report, “Secret UK uranium enrichment plant closed over safety fears”, in The Guardian on January 24, 2013 (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jan/24/secret-uk-uranium-enrichment-safety), said: A top-secret plant at Aldermaston in Berkshire that helps enrich uranium for Britain's nuclear warheads and fuel for the navy’s submarines has been shut down because corrosion has been discovered in its "structural steelwork".
Safety regulators, according to the report, have endorsed the closure as they feared the building did not conform to the appropriate standards. They demand such critical buildings should be capable of withstanding "extreme weather and seismic events", but the plant failed this test.
The UK nuclear safety watchdog has set a deadline, the end of the year, for fixing the problems.
The Guardian report said: The closed plant has not been officially named for national security reasons. However, the Guardian understands the plant is known as A45. It enriches uranium components for Trident nuclear warheads, and has recently been helping to make the uranium fuel for the Astute generation of nuclear-powered submarines.
A prolonged closure of the plant, the report said, could force the UK government to buy in materials from the US to ensure there is no disruption to the country’s nuclear weapons program.
The Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR), the government's safety watchdog, has taken legal enforcement action against AWE, the private consortium that runs the nuclear weapons complex, ordering that the corroded steel be repaired.
The corrosion was first found last May and the enforcement notice served in November. But, the information only emerged via an ONR newsletter published online in the past few days. This has prompted critics to accuse AWE of not being more forthcoming about a problem it first detected eight months ago.
An ONR investigation concluded AWE had breached a condition of its operating license meant to ensure that the plant is run safely. Quoting an ONR spokesperson the exclusive said: The breached condition is related to “arrangements to examine, maintain and inspect the structure”.
According to The Guardian report the ONR is planning to publish a report about it in February.
AWE is run by a group of three private companies: Lockheed Martin and Jacobs Engineering Group from the US, and the UK's Serco. It provides and maintains the nuclear warheads for Trident missiles carried by four Vanguard-class submarines based on the Clyde near Glasgow.
AWE confirmed it had found steel corrosion in May, and "degradation" in other structural components during inspections in July and August. "At that time, AWE immediately suspended routine operations as a precaution," said an AWE spokeswoman.
A defense ministry spokesperson said: "A regular inspection showed signs of corrosion in a steel column and AWE is now working to inspect the whole building, assess the extent of the problem and consider how best to rectify it."
The ministry, the report said, did not believe there was any risk associated with the corroding pipes.
Caroline Lucas, the Green MP, is tabling a series of parliamentary questions about the corrosion. She argued that "serious questions" remained over the adequacy of the inspections conducted by AWE in the past. The defense ministry’s “ancient and rickety nuclear infrastructure is clearly not up to the job of replacing the current Trident nuclear weapons system," she said. "Rebuilding it to modern safety standards will add even more to the vast costs of the program."
Peter Burt, from the Nuclear Information Service that monitors the plant, said: "We should be concerned that … the matter only became known when ONR insisted on reporting details in one of its regular reports."
Comments are moderated
