BNFL/DRS Submission to the Greater London Assembly Committee of Inquiry 1. Electricity Generation Some 22 Per Cent of the UK's
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Item 5 – Annexe 1 BNFL/DRS submission to the Greater London Assembly Committee of Inquiry 1. Electricity Generation Some 22 per cent of the UK’s electricity is generated by nuclear power, a third of which comes from Magnox nuclear power stations owned and operated by the British Nuclear Fuels plc (BNFL) Group. The balance of nuclear generated electricity in the UK is provided by British Energy plc and a small amount is imported from France (via the cross-channel interconnector), a nation that has over 70 per cent of its electricity generated by nuclear. If nuclear generated electricity was replaced in the UK by coal fired generation, based on year 2000 emissions; an additional 79 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year would be discharged into the environment. 2. London’s Electricity Electricity demand for Greater London and the south-east exceeds the supply available in the capital and the region and demand is met from power stations in a wide area including the midlands and beyond. Consumption of electricity in the inner London Electricity area was 23,437,000 MWhs in the year 1999/2000. The total output from the south-east region Magnox stations at Dungeness, Bradwell and Sizewell, the Advanced Gas Cooled Reactor (AGR) station also at Dungeness and the Pressurised Water Reactor (PWR) station at Sizewell was 17,696,990 MWhs. This represents a south-east region nuclear generated electricity component that is in excess of 75 per cent of the total electricity demand for inner London. Clearly, it is impossible to establish precisely where the electricity generated by the south- east region nuclear stations is consumed - as all electricity is pooled into the national grid. However, it is reasonable to assume that a large proportion of electricity consumed in the capital is nuclear generated. The five south-east region nuclear power stations as well as the stations in Northern France, via the cross-channel interconnector, contribute to meeting this demand. The used nuclear fuel from Sizewell A, Bradwell and Dungeness A&B is transported via the London area to Sellafield in Cumbria. 3. Global Warming and Climate Change In July last year, the new Mayor of London and the Greater London Authority published a statement on ‘The State of London: Environment’. Item05 Annexe 1(b) Page 2 of 14 13 March 2001 It states that: “London’s future must be clean and green. The environment is not an optional extra to be added on to other policies as and when time and resources allow. “London’s economic future as well as the quality of life of every Londoner depends on the capital leading the way as a sustainable world city.” The statement refers specifically to the emissions that contribute to climate change. “We must make London a world leader in fighting dangerous climate change. Every year, the city emits 60 million tonnes of carbon dioxide. “I [the Mayor] want to make sure that London plays its full part in meeting climate change targets, and in particular the Government’s stated target of cutting carbon dioxide emissions to one fifth from their 1990 level by 2010. “A city which successfully reduces its carbon dioxide emissions will be well placed to benefit from the expanding market in green technology and renewable energy production which will be a major part of the world economy in the next century. “I will ensure that all my strategies include as part of their environmental assessment an estimate of the contribution they will make to the climate change target.” If the problem of global warming is to be tackled effectively, then nuclear generated energy can have a key role to play. As far as carbon dioxide emissions are concerned, nuclear power is making a major contribution globally. Nuclear stations do not impact on climate change. World wide, nuclear energy avoids the emission of 1.8 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide, the major contributor to the ‘greenhouse effect’, each year. Despite the recent setback at The Hague, under the Kyoto Agreement, the developed world has set targets for reductions in carbon dioxide emissions of 5.2 per cent below 1990 levels in the next few years. The UK has further set a more challenging target of 12.5 percent - so far the UK is on track. This has been managed by the scaling down of reliance on coal-generation, switching more towards natural gas and nuclear power. Although it does not produce the levels of greenhouse gases that coal does, natural gas still makes a considerable contribution to our climate change account. Nuclear power currently provides around 22 per cent of electricity in the UK. But, all but one of the UK’s nuclear power stations may well be closed by 2025. By that year, it is estimated that the nuclear share of the generation market in the UK could be down to only three per cent. BNFL supports the continued generation of electricity by nuclear power. Through our Westinghouse subsidiary we have developed a series of nuclear power plant designs for the future. 4. Management of Used Nuclear Fuel Fuel for nuclear power stations is made from uranium ore, which is made into fuel rods that are used in nuclear power stations to generate electricity. Item05 Annexe 1(b) Page 3 of 14 13 March 2001 The average life of a nuclear fuel rod in a power station is four to six years. During this time, waste products build up in the fuel rod that make it less efficient. Used fuel from all but one of the UK’s nuclear power stations is transported to Sellafield for reprocessing or storage. Reprocessing separates out the three per cent of waste from a typical fuel rod. Reusable products remain, consisting of 96 per cent uranium and one per cent of plutonium. The process involves the removal of the metal casing from around the solid fuel and dissolution of the fuel pellets in hot and concentrated nitric acid. Uranium, plutonium and waste products are then dissolved and separated from each other using several chemical processes. BNFL carries out these operations at Sellafield in Cumbria. The recovered uranium and plutonium can be reused as a fuel in nuclear power stations. 5. Transport • Transport in the UK Used nuclear fuel has been transported in the UK by rail since 1962. During that time more than 6 million miles have been travelled without an accident involving the release of radioactivity. The nuclear industry prefers the use of rail as the primary mode of transport for used nuclear fuel - as it is for many other cargoes of this type. Transporting by road would be relatively lengthy and involved process. The containers used for the transport of new fuel are also governed by domestic statute, which are based on International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Regulations that ensure the safe transport of radioactive materials. • Transport Operations Direct Rail Services Ltd., (DRS) carries out the rail transport of used nuclear fuel from power stations in the UK. The company is a licensed rail freight operator and a subsidiary of BNFL. Formed in 1995 and operating on a commercial basis the following year, DRS has a first class safety record and is certified to ISO9002 quality management. Rail transport, particularly of used nuclear fuel, is now a core part of BNFL’s business. DRS forms a part of BNFL’s overall in-house transport portfolio, which also includes road and sea transfers. Broadly, the most direct rail routes are taken between power stations and the Sellafield site in Cumbria and DRS has the facility to operate throughout the UK. • Transport in the South-East For business, operational, safety and security reasons, DRS marshalls three trains in London, from the Dungeness, Bradwell and Sizewell power stations, into a single train for Item05 Annexe 1(b) Page 4 of 14 13 March 2001 onward transport to Sellafield. This helps to minimise the overall number of train movements. The transport and marshalling of used nuclear fuel flasks are both safe operations and the joining of trains reduces the total number of journeys. The risks associated with both these operations are miniscule and broadly similar, and can be even further reduced by minimising the number of journeys. 6. Rail Safety The transport of used nuclear fuel is tightly regulated by the relevant authorities that govern the rail and nuclear industries. The principle regulations governing the transport of radioactive materials by road and rail are the Radioactive Material (Road Transport) (Great Britain) Regulations 1996 and the Packaging Labelling and Carriage of Radioactive Material by Rail Regulations 1996. These regulations reflect the internationally accepted standards contained within the IAEA’s Safety Series No 6 Regulations for the Safe Transport of Radioactive Material 1985 edition (As amended 1990). As in other member states, the UK regulations are in the process of being amended to reflect the latest revision of the IAEA Regulations for the Safe Transport of Radioactive Material, namely the 1996 Edition (Revised) of the Safety Standard Series No TS-R-1. Implementation of the new regulations within the UK is not expected to significantly affect the transport of used nuclear fuel. Transports strictly conform to the above regulations administered by the Department of Environment, Transport and the Regions (DETR), which issues Certificates of Approval. The system adopted in the UK fully recognises and embraces IAEA international transport regulations. • Safety Case The Safety Case for the transport of used nuclear fuel rests with four main elements. − The strength of fuel flasks (purpose built containers for carrying used nuclear fuel – See Section 7 ‘Safety and Used Fuel Transport Flasks’): It is extremely unlikely that a fuel flask could be breached in an accident − Accidents which could damage a flask are extremely unlikely − Even if a flask was damaged the release of radioactive materials and the radiological consequences would be small − Planned and practical emergency action would be effective in minimising any impact • Safety and Rail Transport Continued safe and reliable transport of used nuclear fuel is the number one priority for DRS, which has a fully approved Railway Safety Case in accordance with the Railways Item05 Annexe 1(b) Page 5 of 14 13 March 2001 (Safety Case) Regulations 2000.