TIME EUROPE
APRIL 10, 2000 VOL. 155 NO. 14
Confidence Meltdown
The future of British Nuclear Fuels is jeopardized by a series of safety problems at its Sellafield plant
By HELEN GIBSON London
It hardly needs saying that any company involved in the nuclear industry must demonstrate that its commitment to safety is above reproach. Then again, perhaps someone should have restated that truism for the people who run British Nuclear Fuels, a state-owned company with a $3 billion annual turnover. In September, the Independent revealed that BNFL employees had falsified quality control documents for reprocessed fuel pellets shipped to Japan. In February, a damning report from Britain's Nuclear Installations Inspectorate said the safety management system at BNFL's northern England Sellafield site was inadequate, and listed 28 recommendations for improvement.
The combination of the report and falsified papers had already jeopardized the company's major international contracts, brought calls from European neighbors for a halt to fuel reprocessing--25% of its business--and caused postponement of plans for BFNL's partial privatization. If that were not bad enough, last week the company revealed that a worker had sabotaged giant robot arms in a high security area at Sellafield. Much now hangs on a report from the nuclear inspectors, who in February gave BNFL just two months to present a plan of reform. The 10,000 permanent and contract employees at Sellafield await the outcome with understandable concern; any closures would have serious implications for the regional economy.
Meanwhile, the Japanese, already sensitized by a domestic nuclear accident in September, want to send back the Sellafield shipment of mixed plutonium and uranium oxide fuel pellets, even though they acknowledge the fuel is safe. Two other customers, Germany and Switzerland, have also suspended dealings with BNFL until Sellafield gets a clean bill of health. And now the Americans have announced that they, too, want to review their BNFL contracts for the cleanup of old nuclear waste sites. Not only are the U.S. contracts worth a hefty $9 billion over the next decade, but the American market could potentially yield new business worth tens of billions of dollars. It is here that Gordon MacKerron, head of Sussex University's energy program, sees BNFL's future. "I don't believe the company has a future in reprocessing," he says. "But it does in international cleanup and decommissioning." International support for reprocessing waste fuel is fading: the procedure produces quantities of plutonium that are no longer needed for the nuclear warheads of an arms race, but could be vulnerable to acquisition by rogue states.
Reprocessing also discharges radioactive residue into the air and sea, and Sellafield, sitting on England's western coast, has long been a target of complaint from Ireland and Nordic countries. Now with all BNFL's big customers in an uproar, Denmark and Ireland have announced that during an international maritime pollution meeting in June they will ask for an immediate suspension of Sellafield's fuel reprocessing. The convention may not be able to enforce the plant's closure, but the effort could hardly come at a worse time. Last week, the British government announced it would postpone selling off up to 49% of BNFL, expected to raise up to $2.4 billion. BNFL's top priority now must be to restore confidence at home and abroad, and to chart a future that does not include reprocessing.
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