. Energy Inefficiency

Skewering our energy future

UK Nirex _ out of its depth

Waste­ a b~rning ISSUe

Renewable energy potential

Some partnership COMMENT

UCLEAR POWER is on the are the bold claims of being the profit will be temporary and pale into ropes, and it's only round cheapest source of electricity, now msignificance when staked against the N one. The bell has rung for the they say that one day in the not too industry's liabilities. The 'City' will long-awaited government review of distant future all other energy sources not be slow to notice this. nuclear power and already the press will become very expensive and make It won't be the 'City' which saves is writing it off. nuclear power look cheap. An old nuclear power from extinction, that threat. Yesterday's technology? Too ex­ particular privilege belongs to pensive? What are we going to do with They say that there is no nuclear waste government if it dares! the waste? How are we going to crisis, who would believe that, If there is any resurgence in the dispose of decommissioned power certainly not UK Nirex. The costs have industry's fortunes it will be because stations? These are all questions which all been quantified and can be met by the government has bought its have been asked in the columns of modem power stations, but not by the dubious environmental claims and august newspapers - the Financial old ones. So they now want us to sell rudimentary rejection of renewable the PWR and the AGRs to the highest Times, The Times, The Independent and energy and energy efficiency backed bidder while the taxpayers, who have of course The Guardian - questions by dean-coal technology. which have failed to find answers already paid for decommissioning worth taking seriously. nuclear power stations, will be left Although the current debate may be holding the bill for the bulk of the economics-led we must remember it is The nuclear industry's three main liabilities. protagonists - Nuclear Electric, environment-driven, and only by Scottish Power and the Nuclear Utilities Nothing has really changed for driving home nuclear power's alarming Chairmen's Group - have all nuclear power despite bold environmental implications can we submitted their evidence to the statements of new prosperity made in warn the public, the 'City' and Departmentoflndustrywell in advance the companies' annual reports, any ultimately the government that nuclear of the 30 September cut-off date. Gone gains in productivity or operating power is simply too hot to handle.

AILING THE MYIH that there That report has led to a further the ART Osprey and the PS Frog, were is only a small renewable downgrading of wave power and its excluded from the '94 study because N energy resource, the Energy virtual exclusion from government the analysis in the '92 review had not Technology Support Unit's (ETSU) RD&D funding - a move which put been sufficiently rigorous; the third latest report ("Renewable energy poten­ at risk European Union (EU) funding device, the SEA Qam, was costed at tial", page 18) shows that renewables for two UK wave power projects. 8-9p at only one specific site and at exactly 10.3p at other potential sites. could meet the UK' s electricity needs. It The 1994 assessment gives a tiny is a useful contribution to the debate on 'accessible resource' for offshore wave So, we have a total accessible resource future energy supply, but once again power, using a lOp per unit of which could be met by just five ART E'ISU has downphiyed wave power. electricity (8% discount rate) cut-off. Ospreys, priced at 7p in the '92 study and now being developed off Ever since 1982, when the govern­ The justification for its findings is the Dounreay with EU support. ment's wave energy programme was 1992 wave energy review; yet three of cut in suspicious circumstances, ETSU the seven offshore devices considered Wave power has, for over a decade, has taken an unduly negative view of in that report were costed at less than suffered from an unjustified lack of wave power. lOp per unit. enthusiasm at ETSU. There is a real risk of the self-fulfilling prophecy: Tom Thorpe, while undertaking ETSU's explanation to Safe Energy for ETSU's 1992 review, tried hard to ETSU says there isn't the technology this apparent anomaly is coherent, but to exploit the resource, the mend fences with wave research not convincing. teams, but still the cost estimates for government cuts RD&D funding, the wave power were overly pessimistic. Two of the devices costed below lOp, technology isn't developed, QED.

2 Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 SAFE ENERGY CONTENTS

FEATURES

8 Energy inefficiency Regulation of the gas and electricity industries, and its interpretation by the regulators, is preventing the promotion of energy efficiency. With the Energy Saving Trust seriously underfunded, the government's programme for reducing carbon dioxide emissions is in disarray, argues Pete Roche, a Greenpeace campaigner.

10 Skewering our energy future With the government's long-promised nuclear review now under way, Mike Townsley looks at the arguments being put forward in the submissions by Nuclear Electric, Scottish Nuclear and the Nuclear Utilities Chairmen's Group.

13 UK Nirex- out of its depth IfUK.Nirex is allowed to proceed with its plans for an underground nuclear waste repository atSellafield by 2010, public safety will be compromised, warns Friends of the Earth (FoE) in a new report. Dr Patrick Green, FoE's rad waste campaigner, summarises serious deficiencies and contradictions in Nirex's programme.

14 Waste - a buming issue Should waste incineration remain part of the government's Non Fossil Fuel Obligation? Max Wallis of the University of Wales, Cardiff, and Alan Watson of Friends of the Earth Cymru look at the environmental issues and consider the best approach to the waste problem.

18 Renewable energy potential The size of the UK renewable energy resource which could be practicably used for generating electricity is greater than the country's present electricity demand. Graham Stein reviews the findings of a new study by the government's Energy Technology Support Unit.

19 Some partnership Since donning green garb in the eighties and calling for a partnership with renewable energy, the nuclear industry has taken it upon itself to provide information about renewables as well as nuclear power. Graham Stein reports that it promotes a consistent and inaccurate view: renewables are a good thing but they can't make a major contribution to energy supply.

S.fe Energy 101, Summer 1994 3 for completion of its repository is the Many US utilities built their nuclear Nirex all wet most realistic yet. in Rwmac's view, it stations with limited storage facilities, does not account for the possibility of believing that the government would take NCONSISTENCIES between regulators demanding further tests. Knill possession of their radioactive waste in I computer models and observed further warned that within "a small 1988. However, after paying some $10bn groundwater flow at Sellafield cast number of years, although not in fees to the government. many will run considerable doubt over Nirex's choice immediately ... the storage issue will be out of storage in the next few years. of the site for a deep dump, according critical." to the government's Radioactive Waste Nirex, however, is not unduly disturbed • Several hundred police, in a dawn raid, Management Advisory Committee by Rwmac's criticisms. A spokesperson removed over 400 protesters from a (Rwmac). for the company said that the past year's makeshift village outside the proposed The committee's 14th annual report research had left it "more confident, not nuclear dump site at Gorleben in states that "a very significant amount of less" that Sellafield would eventually Germany, at the beginning of July. work will have to be done before the state prove suitable. While the action remained peaceful, of knowledge of the Sellafield area could Nirex is expected to submit a planning with the police showing good faith by be sufficient to provide a confident basis application for a £200 million Rock arriving unarmed, the move has for the detailed assessment of the safety Characterisation Facility sometime in the highlighted the growing confusion over case for a deep repository." next few weeks. Germany's plans to dispose of its nuclear While Nirex's computer models show waste. groundwater flow through the area • Meanwhile, things across the Atlantic The Lower Saxony state authority, in moving steadily away from the site into appear to be moving just as slickly for the which Gorleben lies, controls the state rock deep under the Irish sea, Rwmac dumping industry. police and ordered them not to charge any chairman Sir John Knill said it was "just A coalition of US state utilities a!ld of the protesters, but the district authority as conceivable" that groundwater would regulators has filed a suit accusing the banned any public assembly, forcing the flow up from the volcanic rock, in which federal Department of Energy (DOE) of police to take action. the waste would be buried, through the defaulting on its promise to take spent The federal government in Bonn and sandstone above it and onto the surface. fuel. the state authorities have been a "A few years ago," said Knill, "we Under the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy loggerheads for the past two decades over thought Sellafield would be a simple site, Act the DOE was to begin accepting waste plans to dispose of high-level waste in a in fact it is incredibly complex." in 1988 but the Department is now salt mine currently being excavated at the Not only did Nirex's computer models arguing that the federal government is not site. contradict observations on the site but, obliged to take the fuel if it has no central Repeated calls for extended planning according to Rwmac, they also contradict store. inquiries have now run their course and basic physical laws. For example, one The search for a permanent waste dump Monika Griefahn, the state environment model shows lower-density fresh water has dragged on for many years, and the minister, admits that her efforts have been moving downwards into higher-density DOE now says that its proposed central exhausted. Shipments of vitrified brine. dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada will high-level waste, to be stored at Gorleben Another six or seven years' research, not be ready until2010 at the earliest. pending a decision on final disposal at the including the possibility of another deep Under the 1982 law, and amendments site, are expected imminently. borehole in the Lake District, will be made in 1987, in return for abandoning its Just how soon they can begin will required before a clear picture of the right to veto the site Nevada State would depend upon the speed at which the access groundwater flow in the area can be have been paid by the federal government roads to the site can be repaired as a obtained, said Knill. to accept the waste, however, the State number of tunnels were dug under them While Nirex's estimated date of 2010 refuses to give up its right of veto. by the demonstrators. a

Dry-store delay

COTTISH Nuclear (SNL) has Sdenounced the decision by Scottish Secretary Ian Lang to postpone a judgement on the company's plans for on-site storage of nuclear waste at its Tomess power station until after the Department of the Environment's review of radioactive waste management ("Skewering our energy future", plO) as "totally unnecessary". SNL is angry that seventeen months after the report from the 2-month inquiry 5 Air 11 warmed b¥ into the proposed dry-store was submitted hell from a1ored full 4 Cool air enters here to Lang it is facing yet another delay. The A modular vault dry-store dry-store concept is central to the company's drive to reduce costs. If built recommended that "the decision be SNL chair James Hann lamented the at both Tomess and Hunterston, SNL deferred until an appraisal of the decision saying: "It really does seem that believes they will save the company £4S implications of a multi-store strategy, every time our industry tries to take a step million annually. compared with the potential benefits to a forward it is being halted in its tracks as a Although R M Hickman, the inquiry single-store strategy, has been carried out, result of operating in the public sector." reporter, concluded that the "proposal preferably as part of the wider review of However, such a project regardless of its presents a sound engineering solution, the nuclear industry that is intended." By ownership would be bound by planning law where the spent fuel can be held safely, this, he means that on-site storage should which would require a public inquiry and monitored, and retrieved if necessary," he fttst be compared to central storage. therefore a decision from government a

Safe E,.rgy 101, Sum~Mr 1994 the decaying reactor building at a cost of Decommissioning sham • Meanwhile, NE has abandoned plans £95 million and landscaping by 2032. to build an incinerator at Trawsfynydd This is unlikely to be acceptable to for disposing of radiation-contaminated UCLEAR Electric's (NE) public government authorities, argues NE. oil at the plant, despite having just consultation on what to do with the WANA's response* argues that: "The N gained Department of Trade and closed Trawsfynydd Magnox reactor in information provided was heavily biased the Snowdonia National Park has been towards variants of NE's preferred Industry approval for the plan. dismissed as a sham by the Welsh Anti choice, (the sarcophagus), yet too limited Any move to bum the radioactive oil Nuclear Alliance (WANA). to provide details of other options. This would have required new site discharge NE states: "Whilst wholeheartedly crude exercise was insulting both to the permits from HM Industrial Pollution committed to a meaningful consultation public and the local authorities. There is Inspectorate which has confirmed that, process, NE has a duty to ensure whatever very little evidence that NE understands following the March "Potts" ruling in option is adopted for decommissioning what measures will be acceptable to the Thorp case, NE would need to show Trawsfynydd meets with the approval of protect the human environment from that the process offers a net benefit to the government as well as with the nuclear radioactive waste." society. industry's regulators," Its consultation The Alliance believes that any delay, Instead, NE now plans to have the oil literature offers three options two of regardless of the economic and practical incinerated at Hinckley Point, in which it immediately rejects. justifications, is morally unacceptable: Somerset, which already has a certificate The first option would involve "Our generation created the mess, so our of authorisation for burning contaminated spending £500 million over the next 18 generation should clear it up ... Delay will oil. years to return the site to so-called build up hazards for future generations." According to NE, there will be about 12 greenfield status. NE reject this as being WANA agrees with the government's lorry loads in total, andt the plan "will not dangerous, "very expensive" and Radioactive Waste Management be used" to send "vast quantities" of involving "large quantities of radioactive Advisory Committee which pointed out radioactive waste to Hinckley. waste" with nowhere to put it. that even if there is a general proposal to While the quantities of radioactivity The second option- NE's preferred defer decommissioning then it is still involved are fairly small, it does raise the approach - would involve entombment necessary to demonstrate that the worrying posibility of the industry using of the radioactive parts of the site at a cost technology exists to do the job safely. discharge permits at operating sites to of £60 million, waiting for about 135 "There are 26 Magnox reactors in Britain, 'launder' waste from decommissioning. a years, to allow radiation levels to drop, so a Research and Development with site clearance taking place by 2146. programme based upon the prompt * "Trawsfynydd - decontaminating the The fmal option would see a mountain dismantling of Trawsfynydd would future" by Hugh Richards. Welsh Anti of local quarry waste being heaped upon justify the expenditure," argues W ANA. Nuclear Alliance, June 1994.

Chernobyl choices BELARUS Reactor type LANS for Western aid to Ukraine Pgeared towards closing the 0 RBMK remaining reactors at Chernobyl continue to be shrouded in confusion 0 WER following a 07 meeting at the UKRAINE beginning of July. WER In total, Western governments have + offered $800 million towards the costs of part-built closing the station the International (South Ukralne-4 not on list IIHlJNGARV Atomic Energy Agency has denounced as of five for completion) unsafe. The Ukraine says that Chemobyl cannot close until the country has would carry out the work. the Ukrainian nuclear authorites. alternative power supplies. Western companies are not protected Marshall said that they could not supply At the meeting, France and Germany under law against law suits for damages the electronics required for safe plant. called on Western donors to pay to shut in the case of accidents in Ukraine At the 07 meeting the US DOE had the station and to finish Ukraine's five involving stations they have worked on. attempted to steer Western donors away new VVERs. The VVERs would cost Normally, companies that build nuclear from funding the completion of any of the about $2.7 billion to complete and plants are protected from liabilities by unfinished reactors - an approach produce about 5,000MW- roughly 3-4 national law or by an international treaty, favoured by the US Sate Department - cents/kWh, and the US Department of the Vienna Convention. Ukraine has no by arguing that energy efficiency and Energy calculates that it would cost such laws and has not signed the renewable energy sources offered a much another $786 million to close Convention. cheaper and safer route. Chernobyl. The 07 approved aid of only In June a US consortium which According to a paper produced by the $200 million to be added to the $600 includes the Brookhaven National DOE, by the time the VVERs could be million already promised by the Laboratory abandoned a contract to build fmished basic improvements in industrial European Union. training equipment for nuclear plant efficiency - from turning off unused Even if the VVERs were to be fmished operators in Ukraine becasue the US equipment to installing more efficient they would still not be up to Westem government refused to assume liability lighting and motors - could save safety standards. Last year the IAEA for the work. 4,250MW at a cost of between 1 and 2 highlighted 16 areas in which the VVER Claims by French officials at the 07 cents/kWh. design failed to meet W estem safety meeting that the VVERs could be Further, the DOE calculates that by standards, including fire risk, completed by Ukrainian firms were speeding up existing plans for wind farms embrittlement of pressurised steel vessels, rejected by the former head of the UK's and upgrading hydro stations Ukraine and containment of radioactive Central Electricity Generating Board, could generate a further 2,000MW at a emissions. It is also unclear who exactly Waiter Marshall, who is working with cost of 2-3 cents/kWh. a

Safe En•TfiY 101, Summer 1994 begun under the Carter administration to away from the site .. obviously cast a Dounreay dumped force research reactors to use question mark over the future of the non-weapons grade low-enriched plant." NCE described as a .. gold-mine", uranium (LEU) fuel with its promise to He added: .. It is purely a market ODounreay has all but abandoned keep the highly active spent fuel being situation which depends on US policy. If any hope of securing further contracts used as a lever. the US policy is confirmed, and they take from the world's beleaguered research The US is strongly opposed to back something like 15,000 fuel elements reactors to store and possibly reprocess Dounreay entering the market and even from around the world, that would be a spent highly enriched uranium fuel. offered a Belgian reactor operator some cheaper option for those operators than The UKAEA, which operates the $500,000 to break a contract with having it reprocessed at Dounreay. Dounreay site, had hoped to capitalise Dounreay in 1993. ..We came to the end of the outstanding on a 1989 US decision to suspend its Last year the US Department of Energy contracts and decided to undertake the policy of taking back US-origin highly also said that research reactors facing a regular maintenance programme. The enriched uranium (HEU) research .. bona fide emergency" would be allowed plant will be mothballed." reactor fuel from around the world to begin returning their spent fuel Even if the US decided against pending an environmental assessment. immediately using a Presidential waiver resuming spent HEU fuel imports, there is That decision left a number of research on environmental laws. The US is considerable doubt over whether reactor operators in a difficult position. expected to lift its embargo on imports of Dounreay could attract any further spent research reactor fuel early next year. contracts. Many of the reactors were built with While many operators are reluctant to According to the industry journal American assistance and with switch to LEU they may have little Nuclear Fuel, a German fuel cycle study minimum spent fuel storage capacity as choice as the US option is about five has concluded that reprocessing at US policy at that time dictated that the times cheaper than using Dounreay. In Dounreay would be twice as expensive as weapons grade material be returned for addition, any contract with Dounreay storage and direct disposal of spent HEU reprocessing and disposal. would involve all waste generated fuel. Now, however, the US is planning to during reprocessing being returned to Dounreay refused to comment on the resume taking back the HEU as part of its the customer. report, saying: .. It is a commercial non-proliferation policy. The Clinton A Dounreay spokesman said that the business. We discuss costs with our administration hopes to continue a drive US's attempt to entice a Belgian operator customers, not in the press." Q

the government's decision. HEU not for sale Dounreay reprocessing According to one US official quoted in the industry journal Nuclear Fuel, the LANS to force Dounreay to ~LLOWING intense pressure from US views the EU area as a .. black box Preprocess 30 tonnes of spent fuel .F the US, the UK has annmmced that where Euratom is trafficking in HEU," from its now closed prototype fast it will not resell any of its inventory of the UK 's decision .. has begun to tighten reactor (PFR) in only three years 600-SOOkg of US origin weapons-grade the noose" around research reactors have been dropped by the govern­ highly-enriched uranium (HEU) to its usingHEU. ment. European Union (EU) partners. The US is also believed to be trying to It is believed that the tight time-scale France, the Netherlands and block off other possible sources of HEU originally demanded by government for Germany have all approached the UK - France, Russia and China. Russia is .. economic reasons" has been extended government in the hope of buying some already thought to have accepted a US because the site's reprocessing plant of the HEU for their research reactors deal which prohibits it from selling any of could simply not have coped with the and are now reported to be furious about its 1,000-tonne inventory. Q throughput. Since 1974, when the reactor opened, only 17 tonnes of its spent maintenance where final Decommissioning costs fuel have been reprocessed. decommissioning is deferred, and of According to information supplied to programme management and Highland Regional Council by ECOMMISSIONING nuclear sites supporting research." Dounreay, the plant has an annual Doperated by the UK Atomic Energy The Authority is soon to be design throughput of 6 tonnes, Authority could cost £12 billion - treble privatised, but the liabilities will remain assuming a SO% loadfactoranda 10% the previous estimate - according the on the books of UKAEA Government bum-up rate in the fuel. energy minister Tun Eggar. Division, according to Eggar. However, the PFR has achieved fuel Announcing the new estimates in the Nuclear Electric has been quick to bum-up in excess of 20%, greatly House of Commons, Eggar said that the distance itself from the massive increasing its radioactivity. Even UKAEA 's decommissioning liabilities, decommissioning price-hikes, arguing without considering the burn-up rate it at £8.2bn, were more than double the that the AEA's plans had no relevance would take five years to reprocess 30 earlier figure of £3bn to £4bn. to its own. tonnes of spent fuel. However, he added that the new According to the industry, the AEA's Given the decision to extend the estimates were still open to task is complicated by the fact that it has reprocessing timetable, Dounreay .. considerable uncertainty" and could nuclear operations on more than 100 may now be forced to revise rise to as much as £12bn. sites or units and because ..each site is downwards its application for new Eggar said: ~e increase reflects the unique, requiring delicate handling. site discharge permits, which for more systematic review, together with The early estimates failed to take this some isotopes involved massive the inclusion in the new estimate of the into account, assuming they could all be increases of more than 1000%. 0 costs of infrastructure, of care and dismantled in the same way." Q

S.fe Energy 101, Summer 1994 international standing and are willing to maintain Kim Jong D's regime." N Korea turns critical offer aid. However, the Financial Times reports However, if the North continues to stall him as saying: "By possessing nuclear RUCIAL talks between the US and on the issue of fulliAEA inspections the weapons, North Korea thinks it can be CNorth Korea aimed at resolving the US has warned that it will push for relieved from security worries and will be crisis surrounding the North's potentially crippling UN sanctions. able to divert resources from the arms suspected nuclear weapons ambitions Sanctions that the ailing North Korea and industry to agriculture and light industry." are due to resume shortly, following its unstable new dictator can ill-afford. Kang told the press conference that he their collapse, on the flrSt day, because Even if full IAEA inspections are had gained this information from a senior of the death of the Korean dictator Kim acceded to its difficult to say what it security official at Yongbyon. n Sung. would tell us about the North Korean His claims have been rejected as Sung, who had ruled the Democratic weapon's programme. According to the unlikely by the US State Department Peoples Republic of Korea (DPRK) since IAEA director, Hans Blix, "Humpty which said they were "not consistent with 1948, had, after years of tense conflict Dumpty has fallen down." Blix said that information within in our own over the country's nuclear ambitions, even if tests were carried out on spent fuel intelligence community." The Central finally begun to talk to the US government rods from the Yongbyong nuclear Intelligence Agency (CIA) believes that in an attempt to avoid UN economic complex the Agency would not be able to North Korea has reprocessed enough sanctions. He had also agreed to holding determine how much weapons-grade plutonium for only two weapons. discussions with the South Korean prime material had been extracted in the past. minister for the first time since Korea was He said the Agency had no way of • In a move that was clearly aimed at partitioned. telling where in the reactor the rods had North Korea, the Japanese prime minister It is widely believed that Sung was come from, which is vital to the method for the first time confirmed what playing games on a grand scale, using the of testing developed by the inspectors: international observers have known for a suspicion of a nuclear weapons "There is no way to put Humpty Dumpty long time - that Japan could build programme as a tool with which to prise together again. Maybe we can learn nuclear weapons if it wanted. diplomatic recognition and economic aid something, but never to the extent that In response to a 'fed' parliamentary from the US. might have been possible with the method question, Prime Minister Tsutomu Hata While continually denying that it has a we had." said: "It is certainly true that Japan has the weapons programme North Korea has The situation has been further confused capability to posses nuclear weapons, but persistently refused International Atomic by claims made by two North Korean has not made them." Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors defectors who have said the country Hata 's carefully weighed statement has adequate access to its nuclear facilities to possess five nuclear bombs. unsurprisingly caused a storm of protest allow an agreed 'safeguards' programme According to The Independent within Japan. As the only nation to have to be carried out. North Korea signed the newspaper, one of the defectors, Kang felt the full atrocity of the power of the Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1985 and Myong-do, the son-in-law of the North atom, Japan has staunchly rejected its use accepted a safeguards package in 1992. Korean prime minister, told a press for military purposes. If the North, under Sung's son, Kim conference in the South Korean capital, Hata's statement would not have been Jong 11, agrees to abandon or proves that Seoul: "North Korea is not simply trying made lightly and reflects the growing it has no weapons ambitions, then the US, to use its nuclear development fear that if the Korean crisis is not South Korea and Japan are all prepared to programme as a negotiating card. It sees solved soon it could well lead to an arms make efforts to improve the DPRK's nuclear development as the only means to race in east Asia. a

nuclear-related exports. Countries listed formally that the equipment wouldn't be US lax with exports as benefiting from such exports were: used for a weapons programme, say the Israel, Iraq, Iran, South Africa, India and GAO, there was no serious checking of VER the past five years some Pakistan. these assurances. O1,500 US government permits The licences approved the export of Senator John Glenn, chairman of the have been issued to countries formally high-speed computers, specialised government affairs committee, welcomed listed as of "special proliferation machine tools and lasers, metallic the report, saying: "We have all heard concern" according to the top compounds and high temperature stories about sneaky procurement congressional watchdog the General furnaces, worth over $350 million. The operations. But the news today is that many Accounting Office (GAO). goods were all classed as dual-use of these good9 did not have to be smuggled Despite a firm US policy against equipment, which can be used for into secret nuclear weapons facilities. They proliferation the GAO warned of a non-military purposes. were available over the counter - quality dangerous laxity in US controls on While each country was asked to state items, made in the US." a

UK-US bomb nuclear bombs, even though it has international trade in weapons-grade known for over three decades that it is. material through reprocessing. On 26 May last year, when asked to DOE head Hazel O'Learly said the EPROCESSED reactor-grade confirm that "reprocessed plutonium information was released to "enhance Rplutonium can and has been used to make a nuclear weapon according to from commercially operated power public awareness of nuclear revelations made by the US Department stations is not suitable for nuclear proliferation issues associated with of Energy (DOE) which has published weapons manufacture," the Foreign reactor-grade plutonium that can be details of a test carried out using UK Office minister Baroness Chalker told separated during reprocessing of plutonium at its Nevada Test site in 1962. the House of Lords: "That is so, to the spent commercial reactor fuel." The British government has best of my knowledge." (Heads have The release once and for all destroys repeatedly tried to mislead Parliament rolled for less). the government myth that there are into believing that reactor-grade By releasing the information, the US two kinds of plutonium - military plutonium is not suitable for making is stepping up its campaign to stop the and civil. a

Sllfe Energy 101, Summer 1994 Government plans for energy efficiency- a key part of its programme to meet carbon dioxide reduction targets - are in disarray. The refusal by the gas and electricity regulators to allow more than token expenditure on energy efficiency has left the Energy Saving Trust seriously underfunded and is preventing other energy efficiency measures, argues Pete Roche of Greenpeace. Energy inefficiency

LARE SPOTTISWOODE, the This is why the EST is such an her discretionary powers to define Director General (DG) of Gas important part of government strategy. 'significant' as 'zero'. In May, at her CSupply, has thrown a pretty Funding for the EST was supposed to latest appearance in front of the large spanner into the Govemmen(s come from gas and electricity Environment Committee, she indicated programme for reducing carbon consumers via the utilities, rather than that she was now prepared to allow dioxide emissions, but the the taxpayer. The EST estimates that its slightly more flexibility. But it is clear controversy surrounding her strategic plan would cost the average there is no way the FST will get the reluctance to allow British Gas to fund consumer, who spends £700 per year on £150m per year they were hoping for energy efficiency projects is obscuring gas and electricity, an additional 2% - from British Gas. the pathetically small spending by but only until energy efficiency work is electricity utilities who are missing the carried out in their home. Eventually The government has been hoist by its opportunity to reduce emissions by bills will go down - in stark contrast own petard. It set up independent up to 50 million tonnes of carbon to the 10% nuclear levy on electricity regulators to regulate the gas and (MtC) per year and save up to £15bn bills. electricity industries, gave them over the next ten years. discretionary powers to decide on how Lawbreaker best to protect the interests of the Under the International Framework consumer and promote the efficient use Convention on Climate Change the UI< The Office of Gas Supply (Ofgas), under of energy, then proceeded to appoint is committed to returning its carbon the previous DG, Sir James McKinnon, free-market enthusiasts to the posts. So emissions to 1990 levels by 2000. This, had allowed British Gas to fund the it can't really complain when the gas according to government estimates, will condensing gas boiler scheme, which regulator uses those powers to drive a require a reduction of 10MtC per year. offered grants to those willing to install coach and horses through its climate these efficient boilers, and a residential change programme. The government Only a few short months ago, the combined heat and power (CHP) has left itself with no powers to Energy Saving Trust (FST) published its scheme. With the arrival of Clare persuade Clare Spottiswoode to change strategic plan, which set out an Spottiswoode at Ofgas, the her mind. In the words of John Mitchell, ambitious energy efficiency programme government's plans began to go awry. head of the oil and gas division at the to save 2.5MtC by the year 2000, at a The condensing boiler scheme has now Department of Trade and Industry cost of around £1.5bn. The EST hoped ended, despite a successful pilot stage, (DTI) (and recipient of a now very to spend around £125m next year, rising and the CHP scheme will finish in May famous bunch of roses after to around £400m per year by 1998. But 1995. In March this year, Clare Spottiswoode' s appointment), the now these laudable aims have been put Spottiswoode told the House of government is now beginning to realise in jeopardy by the Gas and Electricity Commons Environment Select this is not a "robust mechanism" for Regulators - the very people charged Committee she thought her predecessor funding energy efficiency. with protecting consumers - and the had acted illegally in supporting the EST appears very unlikely to meet its two projects managed by the EST, and Grilling targets. she would not fund any more unless they fitted into strict "least cost The government claims it is trying to Wreckers planning" criteria (Investment in solve the FSTs problems "urgently". energy efficiency as a cheaper When senior civil servants from the DTI The government claims it "attach[es] alternative to investing in new supply and Department of Environment (DoE) great importance to energy efficiency". capacity rather than funded by a levy were grilled by the Environment Select Not enough importance, however, to on consumers' bills). Committee in April, they said they were stop ten or so Tory MPs from wrecking looking at a number of other funding A1an Beith MP' s Energy Conservation In April, she wrote to the committee sources, including the Treasury or the Bill, with over 200 amendments drafted saying that "on further consideration I utilities making payments out of their by the Parliamentary Counsel. (1) The Bill believe the ... expenditure authorised by profits. Introducing a new clause in the would have required local authorities to my predecessor falls within the Director Gas Act, which will have to be laid produce an energy saving plan for all General's powers of discretion and is before Parliament in early 1995 to the housing stock, both public and therefore not unlawful." Although introduce competition into the Gas private, in their areas, providing the efficiency schemes may reduce industry, seems to be its most practical FST with the data it needs to use its consumers' overall bills, the legislation option. But it also hinted at another, resources most effectively. Such a bill requires Ofgas to keep the price per more ominous, option for solving the would have imposed "additional and therm as low as possible. Nevertheless problem. unnecessary burdens on local the Regulator has the power to fund government and would hinder our energy efficiency schemes as long as The DTI is in the process of revising efforts to control public expenditure," they do not have a 'significant' effect on Energy Paper 59 - the document which argued the government. Oearly, if we the price of gas per unit. Unfortunately, projects the UI<'s carbon emissions up take the government on its word, it this slight change of emphasis will to the end of the century and beyond. supports energy conservation provided make no difference to the EST because The revised version will probably be the Treasury doesn't have to pay for it. Clare Spottiswoode has decided to use published at the end of this year in time

8 Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 or gas. If they spend on energy efficiency, they reduce their sales and hence their profit. The two regulators Funding shortfall could remove these incentives, and 400 allow the utilities to make a profit from 11 Funds available to date energy efficiency work.

Robert Jones MP, Conservative chair of the Environment Committee says "we have to change these industries into suppliers of energy services, not sellers of a commodity". He lays the blame for the lack of action firmly at the feet of the two regulatory bodies for their reluctance to follow the lead of their US counterparts. Statutory duty 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 Clearly the electricity and gas companies will only invest in Illustrative profile of EST investment levels required aggressive energy efficiency programmes if it is in their business for the first Conference of the Parties four years. But, he has made it pretty interests to do so. But experience from (COP1) to the International Climate clear that is all they are going to get. The the US suggests there is no real Convention, due to take place in May EST's strategic plan requires an substitute for giving the utilities a 1995. COP1 will no doubt discuss the expenditure of £150m per year by the statutory duty to carry out energy adequacy of the various commitments electricity companies by 1998. efficiency projects. The best way to to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, achieve this would appear to be to and assess progress. Given that the Uttlechild has the opportunity at the amend the Gas and Electricity Acts. UK' s economy has been straining under end of July, when he announces a new a recession since 1990, and that much of price control mechanism for the There will be an opportunity to resolve our coal-fired electricity generating distribution side of the industry, to this situation with respect to the gas capacity has been replaced by gas, it introduce a further levy for energy industry with the introduction of a new wouldn't be too surprising to discover saving measures. The distribution side Gas Act early next year, but there is no that we have already exceeded our of the business is, after all, where the such prospect on the horizon for the rather unambitious carbon emissions supply companies make most of their electricity industry. reduction target. The EST's target could profits. But given statements he has then be revised dramatically already made to the Environment Select The government failed to introduce the downwards. Committee, the. prospects are not necessary incentives and statutory looking too hopeful. duties to force the utilities to carry out Action needed energy efficiency measures when One of the organisations making privatisation presented the oppor­ This gloomy scenario cannot be allowed representations to Offer is the tunity. In 1989, it was Tony Blair who to come to fruition. Given the increasing Foundation for International Environ­ complained to Cecil Parkinson that his signs of Climate Change already mental Law and Development (FIELD). Electricity Privatisation Bill failed to becoming evident,(2) and the fact that we FIELD calculates that if the UK impose any obligations on the Director will need to reduce carbon emissions by electricity industry invests in energy General, but merely left it to the DG's around 60% of 1990 levels globally in efficiency on a scale comparable with discretion. When the government later order to stabilise atmospheric carbon at the leading US utilities over the next 10 realised it was going to have to the present level, action now is years, not only would we reduce our introduce energy efficiency schemes to imperative. Real reductions in carbon carbon emissions by 30-SOMtC, but we meet its international obligations to emissions are almost certain to be could also save £10-£15bn into the reduce carbon emissions, it kept its required by the Climate Convention bargain, to say nothing of the jobs fingers crossed that the Regulators after 2000. A target reduction of around created and the assistance given to would play along. The 'wishful 20% by 2005 for the developed world people on low incomes. thinking' method has failed. It's now does not seem unreasonable given the time to act before the climate change scale of the problem. The EST and Profit motive programme becomes thoroughly energy efficiency measures in general discredited. a can make an important contribution to There have been some tentative moves that cut. (The other important towards investing in energy efficiency Notes contribution being an end to the road measures by a few of the electricity 1. A list of the "wreckers" and those MPs building programme). utilities. Manweb has been promoting energy efficient light bulbs on Anglesey who failed to support Alan Beith's Bill Meanwhile, over at Offer (the Office of to avoid having to upgrade the trans­ also available from Greenpeace. Since Electricity Regulation) the situation is mission system and Scottish Hydro has the biU will hopefully be reintroduced not much better. Professor Stephen carried out an Integrated Resource next year lobbying is required. Uttlechild, the DG of Electricity Supply, Planning (IRP) exercise for the Shetland 2. "The Climate Time Bomb" -summary has agreed to allow the 12 Regional Islands, which compares the relative and full catalogue of signs of climate Electricity Companies (RECs) in benefits of providing new electricity change alnce 1990, available from England and Wales and the two Scottish supplies with energy efficiency Greenpeace, Canonbury Villas, London Companies to fund the EST's work to measures. But the main incentive for all N1 2PN, and toon to be available on the tune of £25m per year for the next the utilities is still to sell more electricity Internet.

Safe En•l'fiY 101, Summer 1994 9 With the government's long-awaited nuclear review now in progress, the industry is arguing for privatisation but with risks and liabilities retained in the public sector. MIKE TOWNSLEY summarises the submissions made by the nuclear industry. Skewering our energy future

T has been five years since the then been made then no decision on how to nuclear power in the UK. (1) The report sets Energy Secretary, John Wakeham, proceed is possible: "We will have to the tone of the industry's argument: I pulled nuclear power from the wait and see. 11 However, it is extremely "The external and environmental costs privatisation of the electricity unlikely that there will be any motion of nuclear power are significantly less industry, announcing that the until early next year. than those for fossil fuels, and the cost government would conduct a for proper disposal of all wastes arising fundamental review of nuclear power. While the ultimate responsibility for the are included in the cost of nuclear That review is now upon us and the industry rests with the self-styled generation." Department of Trade and Industry President of the Board of Trade, Michael (DTI) - which assumed the now Heseltine, a parallel review of nuclear The pitch is clearly aimed at both the defunct Department of Energy's waste management policy will be 'City' and the DTI. "Nuclear generation responsibilities - has finally conducted by John Gummer's costs are largely insensitive to increases announced the terms of reference. Department of the Environment (DoE). in the cost of fuel. Further, the nuclear The results of that review will be fed companies believe that over the longer In a parliamentary statement on 19 May into the DTI review. The DoE intends to term fossil fuel prices will increase and Energy Minister Tim Eggar said: "The publish the results of its investigations fossil generation will attract government believes that the future role sometime in the summer as the basis for environmental penalties. Nuclear of the nuclear power in the UK's public consultation - not exactly a would then become the cheapest major electricity industry will depend upon it concrete timetable but a little better than form of generation and this, together proving itself competitive while the DTI can manage. with the environmental benefits, maintaining rigorous standards of justifies maintaining the nuclear safety and environmental protection." The DoE process is to be further component of UK electricity generation He laid out three principal questions supplemented by a review of "the by investing in new capacity." This which the review must answer: approach for site selection [for nuclear statement, and others in the report, waste] disposal facilities and the criteria show that the industry is no longer • What are the future prospects for for ensuring the protection of human trying to delude us that it produces the nuclear power, including the health,n to be conducted by the cheapest power, but that it has decided possibility- "without commitment" government's Radioactive Waste to revive an old promise in a new guise: - of privatisation? Management Advisory Committee nuclear power, sometime in the future, (RWMAq. will offer cheap and limitless power. e Do new nuclear power stations offer particular diversity, security of supply And finally, "HM Inspectorate of Continuing with the environmental and environmental benefits or Pollution will also be issuing for theme, it warns: "Nuclear power is the disadvantages? consultation a revision of the only non-fossil form of generation that Department's 1984 publication Disposal will be available for limiting UK C~ • Are current arrangements capable of facilities on land for lcno and intermediate emissions during the period 2000-2020. meeting the full costs of nuclear level radioactive wastes: principles for the Even if energy efficiency measures, power, including waste management protection of the human environment." renewable energy sources and policies liabilities? for controlling emissions form road Given the extremely tight timetables vehicles are used to their fullest (Answers on a postcard to President involved for submissions to the DTI it practicable extent, new build of nuclear Heseltine, The DTI, 1 Palace Street, seems unlikely that the DoE's generation will be required to restrain London SWlE SHE) conclusions will go forward to the DTI UK C02 emissions." before the public consultation. The review process The government's plan to cut UK C02 Public consultation, according to Eggar, emissions by 2.5 million tonnes, After five years of planning, the will be a key feature of the review. All through the Energy Saving Trust, will government is calling for submissions on substantive submissions will be made cost about £1..5 billion, says the NUCG. the future of the nuclear industry - an public, he said, except where issues of This equates to an investment of £1.,200 industry which will leave a deadly legacy commercial confidentiality are per tonne of carbon emission per endangering thousands of generations to concerned. This could mean that once annum. The twin PWR reactor Sizewell come, an industry which is intrinsically again the reality of nuclear economics C would cost 0.5 billion and save 5Mt linked to nuclear proliferation, an will be kept hidden from the public. of carbon annually, it claims: "Even if industry which spawned Windscale, the whole investment were attributed to Three Mile Island and Chemobyl ... to be The three main industry bodies, the reduction in carbon emissions rather made to the DTI by 30 September. And Nuclear Electric (NE), Scottish Nuclear than to electricity production ... costs that's about it! What will happen after (SNL) and the Nuclear Utilities would only be £.700 per tonne of carbon that is anybody's guess: the DTI certainly Chairmen's Group (NUCG), have now emission reduced per annum, when doesn't know. all published their submissions, which compared to generating the same are available on request. amount of electricity from coal." Any suggestion that the process is vague is rejected by the DTI, which Areas of general concern are covered by Despite a heavy reliance on so-called argues that since no submissions have the NUCG's submission: The role of 'green arguments' the group can't resist

10 Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 the temptation to make bold statements However, the Windscale reactor is world's top ranking nuclear stations about the industry's economics. Sizewell pitifully small compared to a along with the "successful completion C, according to the nuclear gang of four, commercial plant and has only just of Sizewell B within the committed could generate power at 29p/kWh. 'IlUs reached stage three of programme and below budget, provide involves some very favourable decommissioning; the Shippingport assurance that Nuclear Electric has a assumptions: that an 8% rate of return reactor was not so much sound commercial base on which to will be acceptable to investors and that decommissioned as removed intact and operate profitably and competitively in the station will have a lifetime load factor shipped down the river to the massive the market." of 85% - ie its output will be 85% of its US Savannah River weapons complex. design rating. Private investors require a Further, removing fuel from a reactor Such has been the change in the rate of return typically between 12 and core is a routine nuclear operation company's operations it now believes 15% and a lifetime load factor of 85% has carried out throughout a reactor's that the majority of the liabilities never before been achieved by any UI< lifetime and is the least novel aspect of associated with its AGR and PWR nuclear station. decommissioning. operation could be transferred to the private sector. A new private company, "The technology for safe management Safestore does not yet have government it says, could take about £6bn worth of of radioactive wastes, and for approval, nor does it have the approval liabilities into the private sector. decommissioning of nuclear stations of the nuclear regulatory bodies. However, while the continued and their fuel plants, is available operation of the Magnox stations, today," claims the NUCG. It also Of the areas which will most concern according to NE, is justified on the suggests that the reason for isolating potential investors, the Chairmen grounds of their "low avoidable costs", nuclear waste from the environment is comment that the fear of "retrospective the risks associated with their back-end because "Nuclear power generation re.gulatory changes and incidents costs, "resulting from decisions taken produces quite small volumes of waste overseas or accidents to the plant will decades ago, would not be acceptable so the planned routes for its affect costs, or the continued operation to private investors." management involve packaging for of the plant, will be the most difficult to storage and disposal rather than dispel" despite the fact the industry One option, says NE, would "involve discharge to the environment." That itself is completely satisfied that NE divesting its operations to a new should be enough to convince the DoE "modem plants in the present strict subsidiary, whose shares would be sold that there is no crisis in nuclear waste regulatory framework will not be to the private investors and which management and leave them feeling subject to similar uncertainties. It also would then take forward the electricity pretty silly for initiating a full review. believes that safe waste disposal generating business of Nuclear Electric. options are available at acceptable The unprivatisable risks and liabilities For PWR decommissioning, says the costs." would be retained by government." group, "the contribution to generating cost is very small (0.01-0.02p/kWh). Having read the general submission of "Would a privatised NE choose to build This low cost ... arises because the the Chairmen's Group reviewers are Sizewell C? Probably not," says the engineering operations are easier and expected to then turn to the company's Or Bob Hawley. However, waste volumes lower and, most independent submissions of the two "that's the wrong question. The importantly, the high power density of nuclear power generating companies - question is, do you want to maintain PWRs reduces the cost per kWh." Nuclear Electric and Scottish Nuclear. nuclear power with all its benefits - Each company has presented a case for environmental, security and diversity of Decommissioning cost estimates rely privatisation and for the construction of supply, independence from volatile fuel heavily on a concept the industry calls future plant. They are, however, quite supplies and prices?" 'safestore'. This involves a three stage different. decommissioning process: first, spent If so, how is this to be achieved? NE' s fuel is removed from the reactor core, Nuclear Electric preferred route involves a mixture of taking up to five years, and the station public and private risk: "Given is then placed on a care and Things have changed since the dark government support, new plant based maintenance basis for 30 years; second, days of 1989, argues NE: "The company on the Sizewell B design could be all non-radioactive plant (the toilets) are can and should be privatised at the financed, constructed and operated removed and a large concrete shield is earliest opportunity ... the original commercially by means of joint venture built over a five-year period to house obstacles to privatisation in 1989 have capital and risk-sharing between the the remaining plant, the station then been largely overcome. "(2) public and private sectors." being abandoned for 95 years; and finally, over a fifteen year period the site NE claims that it "is set to become the To fund a future PWR government will be returned to green field status. lowest-cost producer of electricity in the support will be required in three key UI< ... " the company boasts that it has areas: Safestore gives decommissioning costs "increased output by 45% and doubled of 0.12p/kWh (Magnox), 0.07p/kWh productivity ... [and] is on target to make e security for lenders during (AGR) and 0.014p/kWh (PWR). an operating profit in 1995/96 before construction; taking account of the levy." NE now Claims that decommissioning costs accounts for 23.2% of the English and • income security in the form of a cany a high degree of confidence are Welsh electricity market, a rise from long-term electricity purchase based on information gained during the 16.7% in 1989. However, if no new plant contract to cover project borrowings; decommissioning of the UI< Atomic is ordered then nuclear power's and Energy Authority's 33MW AGR at contnootion to the UK'selectricity supply Windscale, US experience of will fall from 27% to just 3% in 25 years. • sharing of regulatory risks. dismantling the 72MW PWR at Shippingport and preliminary work NE operates six Magnox stations, five In reality the company has admitted involving the removal of spent fuel AGRs and is about to begin operating that this will mean government from the reactor cores of the closed the UI<' s fll'St PWR, at Sizewell. The fact providing £1 billion of the estimated Berkeley and Hunterston reactors. that the AGRs are now amongst the £3.5 billion cost of building Sizewell C. c:::> Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 11 Any delay in ordering and building a After much wavering, SNL has finally The risks which would be either new PWR could seriously jeopardise embraced privatisation: "Scottish Nuclear completely or in part unacceptable to the country's abilities to build believes that to secure a long-term future, the private sector are given as: indigenous reactors. Delays, warns NE, it has to be put on the same commercial "will progttssively erode UK industry's footing as other generators. To continue • waste fuel risk - the project company capability as the present skill levels start with the process of commercialisation, the will need a contract with a to reduce, increasing costs and risks and company needs to be restructured - this credit-worthy entity who will accept preclude possible export opportunities should then lead to privatisation. This responsibility for disposal of the spent based on the Sizewell B design, despite will continue the transfer of risks from the fuel. This may be a segregated fund or its high international reputation." public to the private sector and complete a government agency; the government strategy for the electricity NE concludes: "privatisation ... would be industry." • decommissioning risk - these liabilities advantageous for government, electricity may need to be shared between the consumers, private investors and the SNL wants its AGR business to be investors and the government. The company itself, securing its commercial transferred to a new company - project company would be responsible freedom to meet customer needs and Scottish Nuclear plc - while a public for defuelling and a segregated fund invest for the future to meet shareholders' company - Hold Co - would retain could be responsible for other activities; expectations. It could be completed the Magnox and "certain" AGR within an 18-month time-scale, without a liabilities, including all reprocessing elegislative risk - this is also a risk need for new primary legislation." liabilities up to the date of privatisation. financiers will wish government to accept It is the risk of future legislation Scottish Nuclear While the new private company would increasing the costs or reducing the own and operate the AGRs, SNL also revenues of the project; and Scotland is a very different nuclear proposes that it would be responsible prospect from England and Wales. for front-end decommissioning work. It • regulatory risk - this is the risk which According to SNL: "It was originally would also operate the dry-stores. the government directly or indirectly envisaged that the nuclear stations However, long-term liability for this will have to accept. The concern is that would form part of the privatisation of would remain in the public domain. the regulator requires some new the SSEB and NoSHEB. Detailed plans investment or imposes certain were well advanced for this process and The time-scale for decommissioning operating restrictions on the plant. many of the issues that caused nuclear under the 'safestore' plan is in excess of Given the sensitivity of the nuclear privatisation in E&W to be deferred had 135 years. SNL comments: "Few power industry, such regulatory been satisfactorily resolved."<3> institutions other than government can interference is difficult to predict or embrace liabilities against such even to define in advance. The company operates two AGR extended time-scales." stations and is decommissioning a SNL concludes: "Privatisation ... will Magnox station at Hunterston. Since A number of proposals for dealing with transfer further risk from public to 1989, it has turned an annual net loss of this are put forward. However, the private sector. It will increase £33 million into a net profit of £:72 company clearly favours the competition to the ultimate advantage million; output has increased by 16% establishment of a segregated to the consumer and help secure the and the cost of generating each unit of decommissioning fund- Fund Co. SN benefits offered by a successful nuclear electricity has been reduced by 12% to plc would make payments to this fund industry - long-term stable prices, 2.83p/kWh. during the operating life of its stations, security and diversity of supply, geared towards the estimated costs of sustainability and less environmental If given the go-ahead to dry-store spent decommissioning, with the ownership impact than fossil generation." fuel at both its stations - making an and any subsequent liabilities passing annual saving of £45 million - SNL to Hold Co upon closure. While the industry's evidence is tired and believes that its generation costs will drop unoriginal and there is a genuine feeling to below 2.5p/kWh, making it profitable Unlike NE, SNL is in no great hurry to amongst environmentalists that we can without subsidies. Currently, Scotland's order a new power station. It is the win this one, this is not a time to relax. It two privatised electricity companies, company's intention, however, to have is a time to step up the pressure: the Scottish Power and Scottish Hydro, are a replacement - probably a PWR - 'City' must be made fully aware of bound by the government-imposed ready for operation by the time exactly how uncertain the future of Nuclear Energy Agreement to take SNL's Hunterston B closes around 2011. It is nuclear power is and the government entire output and to pay a premium price possible that market forces, with a little must be reminded that it will be called until1998. After 1998 the premium price help from environmental legislation, may upon to justify its actions. a obligation will lapse, however, the have created the correct climate for a agreement to buy the entire nuclear purely private financed project, says 1. "The role of nuc:lear power in the UK: a output will not end until 2005. SNL. If not, and "if government wishes background paper to the nuc:lear review. • to see further nuclear investment it will Nuc:lear Utilities Chairmen's Group, June While a public inquiry into the proposal have to put in place the necessary market 1994. Available from The NUCG RSG Secretariat. Tel: 0565 68 2053, Fax: 0565 68 2514. for on-site dry fuel stores was mechanisms." concluded in January last year, the 2."The Government's Review of Nuc:lear Scottish Secretary has postponed giving Government support need not be in the Energy: Submission from Nuc:lear Elec:trlc:", form of cash, comments SNL. It could "Vol 1: Further nuc:lear construction 'in the a final ruling until after the DoE's waste UK", "Vol2: The Environmental and Strategic: review. One of the questions the DoE is be a "supportive political and benefits of nuc:lear power.•, "'Vol 3: addressing is whether to pursue on-site regulatory climate and the Privatisation of Nuc:lear Elec:trlc: benefits and or centralised fuel storage. The inquiry underwriting of certain risks." One of feasibility." & "'Vol 4: Supporting reporter concluded: "... the proposal the main prerequisites for a private documents." NE June 1994. Avallable from NE. represents a sound engineering sector financed nuclear station would Tel: 0452 653839, Fax: 0452 653090. solution, where spent fuel can be held be a "power purchase agreement" for at 3."Sec:uring our energy future•, Scottish safely, monitored, and recovered if least part of the output with a specified Nudear, July 1994. Available from SNL, Tel: necessary." price for a certain period of time. 03552 62000, Fax: 03552 62626.

12 Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 Public safety will be compromised if UK Nirex Ltd is allowed to proceed with its plans to develop an underground nuclear waste repository at Sellafield by 2010, according to a new Friends of the Earth report. Here, Dr PATRICK GREEN, FoE's Rad waste campaigner, summarises the report which highlights a number of serious deficiencies and contradictions in Nirex's research programme. UKNirex- out of its depth IREX- the government body by the repository, Nirex lacks the data solubility calculations. In this test responsible for finding a firuil necessary to carry out the calculations. uranium solubility was under­ N resting place for the UK's Nirex reports have admitted to both the estimated by a factor of 200 million. growing mountain of intermediate­ "paucity of data" and the "'major level nuclear waste - claims that the deficiencies• in the data which is FoE is not alone in aiticising Nirex over "technical ability to deal finally" with available to use in the risk equations; the gulf between its modeJs and reality. radioactive wastes "exists noW" and some data has even been described as RWMAC's 14th Annual Report said that that its underground 'repository' will •virtually non-existent*. Further, the Nirex's computer modeJs for predicting be"safe for all time". However, Out of methods available to Nirex to generate water flow are "inconsistent" with their depth, a new FoE report by Or missing data are not adequate to observations from its boreholes. RWMAC Rachel Western, demonstrates that provide reliable predictions of the concluded: "Important advances have Nirex lacks the scientific under­ radiation leakage from the repository or been made by Nirex in the acquisition of standing to guarantee the long-term the resultant public exposure. the geological and hydrogeological data safety of the proposed method of essential to the understanding of a radioactive waste disposal. Third, consequently, Nirex has been complex site. Nevertheless, there is still a forced to make enormous simplifications very significant amount of work to be Before Nirex can be given approval to in an attempt to allow the complexities of done before the state of knowledge of construct a repository at SeUafield, it will the real world to be represented by the Sellafield area could be sufficient to first have to produce a detailed safety case computer code. For example: It has been provide a confident basis for the demonstrating that members of the forced to grossly simplify its chemical detailed assessment of the safety case public-for up to 1 million years into the modelling, it uses only a single for a deep repository." future- will not face a risk of death from parameter, the"solubility of the element*, fatal cancer of more than one in a million for calculating how much of a particular The FoE report concludes: the each year as a result of release of radionuclide will dissolve in ground­ inadequacies and inconsistencies of the radioactivity from the repository. Its water in the repository (a key current research programme indicate Safety Assessment Research Programme determinant of its safety). However, in that no reliance can be placed onNirex's is geared towards fulfiWng this objective. reality, the solubility of a particular evaluation of the quantity of radionuclide will depend on the precise radionuclides that will be released from Consequently, Nirex must quantify how chemical environment of the the repository. It is inconceivable that radioactivity will be released from the radionuclide. For instance, Nirex has these inadequacies and inconsistencies repository and how it will behave in the reported experiments on uranium can be overcome within the current environment over hundreds of thousands solubility observing a 100,000-fold timetable for the development of a of years. To achieve this it must obtain a variation between different chemical repository at Sellafield. comprehensive understanding of the compounds. This produces particular processes and mechanisms that will act problems for N'uex as it does not lcnow Many of these contradictions are generic on the radionuclides and translate this the exact chemical form of the to the problems of developing a safety into computer codes which accurately radionuclides in the waste. .case for deep waste disposal and are not represent the real world so that site specific. The complex geology and quantitative, rather than qualitative These over-si:mplifications encompass a hydrogeology at Sellafield only serve to predictions can be made. This is a task of wide spectrum of phenomena and complicate Nirex's task. Furthermore, phenomenal proportions. processes: redox (oxidation-reduction) Nirex's proposed Underground Rock assumptions are undermined by the Laboratory at SeUafield will not resolve Out of their depth highlights a number of neglecting of the radioactivity of the these contradictions and will only serve key points. waste; solubility assumptions are further to increase the level of uncertainty as its undennined by the neglecting of the role construction will destroy the base Fll'St, Nirex is incapable of developing a of colloids and ionic strength; engineering hydrogeology it seeks to measure. computer code that realistically assumptions are undermined by the represents how radioactivity will be pressurisation effects of gas generation This means that if Nirex does submit a released from the repository and how it and the need to allow gases to escape - planning application for its under­ will behave in the environment. Indeed, to prevent excessive pressure build-up­ ground rock laboratory later this year, it has acknowledged that any set of while needing to contain dissolved a very wide-ranging public inquiry equations will be an imperfect radionuclides; and water flow must be held. Furthermore, given the representation of reality. Further, the assumptions have been undermined by difficulties that Nirex faces, it is quite government's Radioactive Waste the impact of salinity and the complexities absurd for the government to maintain Management Advisory Committee of fracture flow. that its disposal policy is credible. (RWMAq has warned that it 11&eemS impossible" that such a safety assessment Fourth, the level of uncertainty If the current Department of the system could be "fully quantitatively introduced by such simplification& Environment review of radioactive validated". translates dkectly into large errors in waste management policy is going to be N'uex's safety assessment cakulations: in anything more than a cheap rubber­ Second, even if a comprehensive set of 1991, N'uex reported the results of a field stamping operation, these issues, which fully validated equations were available test, canied out at the Pocos de Caldas lie at the heart of the deep disposal policy, for the calculation of the risk presented uranium mine in Brazil, of uranium must be central to the process. Cl

Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 13 Some environmentalists have criticised the inclusion of waste incineration in the government's Non Fossil Fuel Obligation programme. MAX WALLIS and ALAN WATSON* look at the environmental impacts involved in different approaches to dealing with waste. Waste a burning issue

:A.STE incineration is not essentially prototypes. Several were projects in the US have either been new in the UK, a small coal-burning furnaces which turned cancelled outright or put on hold. In W percentage of rubbish has out to be unsuitable for domestic 1985 the state of California, for always Eeen burned, especially in waste, having problems with melted example, had plans to build 35 cities. Incinerators were operating ash solidifying and sticking to incinerators, to date they have built before the turn of the century. A machinery,forinstance.~alfunctions only three. plant in Cheltenham was operating meant that plants were frequently out in 1895, one in Oldham in 1896 and of use for repairs. Control of pollutant What was really happening in Europe one at Shoreditch in London in 1897. emissions, apart from particulates, was not that we had enthusiastically The Shoreditch plant operated until was not an important factor and embraced incinerators but that, just as 1940. It was also common practice to operations were generally not the Americans were starting their burn rubbish on domestic fires. designed to minimise emissions. High building programme, we were capital costs finally meant that many stopping building. This was not By 1914 there were about 300 plants manufacturers went out of business. because of market saturation - since operating, many with energy The recession of 1981 was the final only 6 out of 15 European countries recovery. These were even less blow. were incinerating more than 30% of efficient than modern energy from their municipal solid waste. waste plant and were closed down The UK was thus left with a wide primarily because of the availability variety of poorly designed We are now facing a role reversal of cheap homogeneous fuels such as incinerators,()> all built between 1968 where incinerator developers are gas, coal and oil. and 1978 with minimising cost and pointing to the developments in the refuse volumes as their prime US to support their claims that While environmental problems were objectives. Incineration technologies incineration is a solution to our waste not envisaged with the earlier plants have advanced considerably in some management problems. - they were generally quite small other European countries due to and particulate emissions from government support. ~unicipal Readers may be familiar with the coal-fired plant probably obscured incinerators in the UK have tactics and recognise similarities in their emissions - incineration has developed poorly in comparison. The the approach used by the nuclear had a chequered history in the UK. result of this is that the current industry. This may not be surprising proposals for incinerators copy given that many of the major players In the 1960s and '70s the amount of European combustion chambers and in the incineration industry are those domestic refuse increased, mainly air pollution control devices. companies who would otherwise be because of an increase in packaging, engaged in building nuclear power disposable products and plastic items Bluff stations. in general. Some local councils started to find a shortage of landfill sites. One of the great ironies of incinerator Although energy recovery was the Incineration both directly and construction is the 'push me-pull you' exception on the older plants it has through the medium of 'refuse relationship between the United become an essential for any new derived fuel' became the fashionable States and Europe. In the early 1980s scheme. This is partly to promote solution to this problem, superseding many US decision makers were incineration as an environmentally some recycling programmes which persuaded that Europe had a long friendly technology but mainly were already in existence or being and trouble-free record of operating because of 'the big subsidy available started at this time. waste incinerators and that the under the Non Fossil Fuel process was popular with both Obligation (NFFO) for electricity The main aim of incineration was to officials and citizens. Incinerator generation. reduce the volume of the rubbish so developers reinforced the impression that landfill sites would last longer. The by offering expenses paid trips to Is incineration primarily a process to ash, it was hoped, would not give off carefully selected European plants dispose of waste or to generate gases, and would landfill tidily. The ash (avoiding any contact with local electricity? was not considered to be hazardous in pressure groups or activists). any way. Burning was therefore crude, The question is an important one. The and stack gases were cleaned with The bluff worked - and the US newly-formed Energy from Waste simple electrostatic precipitators which experienced a rapid growth in group claims that the main purpose is trapped some of the larger dust incinerator building in the 1980's - energy reclamation, but others at the particles and reduced obvious smoke. until the mid-1980's when opposition recent Winchester conference rwaste groups educated themselves and debaten, page 23) argued that Incinerator design in the 1960s was networked effectively to stop the incineration is really for waste fairly crude, and many plants were trend. Since 1985 over 137 incinerator disposal. Gerald Atkins, the

14 Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 Chairman of South East London subsidy, direct sales of electricity a relatively small proportion of Combined Heat and Power through the pooling and settlement industrial wastes are designated (SELCHP), the only municipal waste scheme would be uneconomic. 'hazardous' amounting to about incinerator built on mainland Britain 2.5Mt per annum. Even incinerating in the last 16 years, said this outright For example, W S Atkins have costed as much as 10Mt/yr. would hardly Professor Pearce has admitted that his a 200,000t/yr waste facility with mass change the landfill problem but analysis of incineration applies to bum incineration and metal reclaim(5) would require an investment of £4bn, waste disposal alone. (2) For electricity - 17.5% is diverted to landfill ahead with an annual subsidy of £150 generation, the economics don't stack of the incinerator, 29% is bottom ash million. up. It's pretty inefficient in reclaiming and 4.5% fly-ash, also to be landfilled. energy as electricity -1.5-2GJ/tonne Estimating net electricity production So what are the claimed advantages out of the 10-12GJ/t average calorific of 450 kWh/t at a pool price of 2.5p, of incineration? value of municipal waste. So use of they find a 'gate fee' of £39ft (no the renewable energy order to profit). At the NFFO premium price Environmental benefits are claimed to subsidise waste disposal can be of 6.55p/kWh, the gate fee comes accrue from utilising the energy value viewed as a seam - electricity down to £21/ t, which is barely of waste as compared to other, consumers subsidising the inefficient competitive with the most expensive mainstream, waste disposal routes. disposal of other people's waste. landfills (range £7-20/t) Even if These benefits lie in reducing the modem gas and leachate controls will volume of landfill, with ash residues NFFO and waste make landfills more expensive - and easier to handle, in avoiding the a larger incinerator could have lower methane and smells from landfills, in A single project by Cory unit costs - the NFFO subsidy reducing transport costs in the big Environmental won a contract to (available for only a limited number conurbations and in offsetting the supply 103 MW of electricity from of years) is clearly crucial. costs via energy reclaim. their proposed Belvedere Station (since refused planning permission Does incineration solve the landfill Plastics, because of their variety and but a revised application is being problem? relatively high calorific value, appear submitted) under the 1991 tranche of to be the main justification for the NFFO. The Belvedere output The UI< waste disposal authorities incineration, but they comprise only represented 22.5% of this tranche and deal with about 35 million tonnes (Mt) 7% of the waste stream. 39.4% of the waste band.(3&4) of household and commercial wastes Incineration proposals constituted each year. There is at least another But there are strong arguments 53% of the total1991 tranche. 60Mt of other industrial wastef much against incineration. being inert building and industrial Winning a NFFO contract is crucial to wastes, but including up to 20Mt Incinerators are extremely expensive the financial viability of a new animal and food processing wastes to build, £3000/kW being quoted for incineration plant. Without this landfilled by the private sector. Only SELCHP. The 1991 tranche NFFO Q

0.9 0.8 B particulates .... 0.7 :::s 0 -'= 0.6 0SD2 :::::: 0 ;it 0 0.5 .NOx :3<: ..... Q) 0.4 C02 0.. 11 Q) u c:: 0.3 Q) 0.. 0.2 0.1 0 coal-fired incineration combined Coal· fired incineration gas -fired cycle gas CHP CHP CHP turbine

External costs of emissions from different types of generating plant

Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 15 subsidy for such an incinerator is equivalent to a discounted sum of about £1,000/kW -which is more than the full costs of small-scale CHP or CCGT plant.

Just as for nuclear power plants, relatively few continuing jobs are created per unit of capital investment; most jobs are in the construction phase. There is little economic spin-off for the host community. .. .. •' " Opposition to new incinerators from the public and environmentalists is intense as nearly all the promoters of new schemes have found. Many local authorities have found that the thin green veneer of 'energy from waste' is unlikely to convince the public that new incinerators are any more acceptable as neighbours than the smoking dioxin factories of the 1970s. Energy Implications Overall more energy can be obtained by an alternative strategy of recycling and composting (including anaerobic digestion) than can be obtained by burning the same waste.

When an object or material is burned, that object or material has to be replaced. Replacement involves society bearing the full energy cost of extraction and production from virgin materials. Several studies in the US and by Warren Springs Lab(6l in the UK have shown that three to five times more energy can be saved by reusing and recycling materials compared to burning them. Paper and board The chimney of en lncinemor at Aalkn Lane, Bolton Manufacturing recycled paper uses these wastes. Another important warming because of methane only between 10~ and 20~ of the consideration is the conservation of emissions which far outweigh the energy required for virgin paper. limited resources such as oil and the COz from combustion - methane Taking into account the fulllife

18 S.t. Enet'fJY 101, Summer feN the Environment sponsored study by tonne per day incinerator by an extra oriented to processing putrescibles - Pearce et al(2) which concluded that $4-$5 M/year, say $8 or £5/t. which serve poorly as fuel and incineration has a positive social generate the major landfill leachate benefit of around £4/ tonne. However Incineration does not reduce and methane problems. Composting this benefit is calculated by the dependence on landfill to the extent and anaerobic digestion reduce by simplistic analysis of taking an old, claimed by its promoters. In the W S about half the amount of raw organic polluting, coal-fired station, ascribing Atkins study,(5> half the initial mass is waste, and if contamination can be it a zero social cost and replacing it still landfilled. But incineration may kept down, the remainder can be used with a brand new waste incinerator indeed worsen the landfill problem. as soil conditioner rather than going with all its costly anti-pollution Most heavy metals in domestic waste, to landfill. Some paper and products technology. The coal-fired station for example, are bound into the stable can be composted too, to meet the could, indeed, be retro-fitted with plastic matrix. However, heavy limit on re-recycling of paper fibres. anti-pollution technology at a fraction metals in incinerator ash are present of the cost of the new incinerator. If as soluble metal chlorides and may be This is a flexible 'resource one follows the Pearce methodology easily leached. management' strategy which creates in setting a price on each pollutant, jobs, is relatively cheap to finance, it's only fair to compare an incinerator Dioxin quick to build, easy to extend and, for energy generation purposes with compared to incinerators, materials alternative modem technology. The If any single word can strike terror into recycling facilities (MRFs) and Figure shows calculations of the social the heart of incinerator operators and bio-digestors should have an easier costs for electricity generation or for developers it is 'dioxin'. In spite of passage through planning. a CHP (combined heat-and-power) recent attempts by industry and their generation, including mini-CHP apologists to talk down the dangers of 1. "Review of solid waste incineration in systems for industry, hospital or dioxin (linguistic detoxification!) the the UK", WSL LR 776(PA). office complexes. The 'costs' of the problem is not going away. The final 2. "Externalities from landfill and individual pollutants are taken from draft of the EPA dioxin reassessment, incineration", CSERGE, WSL & EFrEC, Pearce's book(9); though scepticism recently leaked to the press, has shown HMS01994. over such costs is justified, the that dioxin is actually more potent than 0 method indicates that incineration for previously suspected. 3. Subsidising the dash to bum trash", ENDS 211 August 1992. energy supply is a very poor option, with high social costs. The EPA verdicts about the hormone 4. Greenpeace Toxics Campaign evidence disrupting effects and risks to the to "The Energy Committee Fourth report Ash foetus will dramatically increase Renewable Energy Vol 11", March 1992, pubJic concern. The report also HMSO. It is logical that as air pollution indicates that we are already exposed 5. "An assessment of mass burn control devices become more effective to levels of dioxin in our normal diet incineration costs", ETSU Report at filtering the small particles from that are 600 times higher than a B/Rf/00341, by M R Fox et al of W S incinerator waste gasses the ash will 'tolerable daily intake'. In other words Atkins. the chances of getting cancer from become more toxic. Incinerator fly ash 6. "A review of the environmental impact has already been described as "a dioxin are greater than those of being of recycling", Warren Springs Laboratory significant occupational hazard" to dealt four of a kind in poker. The LRS11, 1992. exposed workers at incinerators (the obvious conclusions must be a strong authors are aware of at least one UK. presumption against any new source 7. "Incineration of waste", Royal incinerator where staff are expected to of dioxin, including incinerators. Commission on Environmental sweep out ducts with a broom!). Pollution, 17th Report, HMSO 1993. Alternative waste strategy 8. "Waste incineration reassessed", On 2 May 1994 after a hard-fought Warmer Bulletin no.41, May 1994. court battle between the Incinerators are expensive and 9. "Blueprint 3: measuring sustainable Environmental Defence Fund and the therefore their financial backers development" (Table 10,4), D Pearce et al, incineration industry - supported by require contracts to guarantee a Earthscan, 1993. the US Environmental Protection constant diet of high calorific value Agency (EPA) - the US Supreme material over a long period of time Further read.ing:"Municipal waste Court ruled in a seven to two decision (15-25 years). Local authorities are incineration. Wrong question, wrong that ash from municipal solid waste therefore presented with a choice answer", P & M Connett, The Ecologist, incinerators has to be regulated as between incinerators and a p14-20, January 1994. hazardous waste. The implications of recycling/waste-reduction strategy. For help in campaigning against this ruling are that ash will henceforth incineration projects: Campaign Against be treated as hazardous unless it A better environmental option would Toxics (CATs), Ralph Ryder, 31 Station passes the EPA Toxicity be to concentrate on taking steps for Road, Little Sutton, Wirral L66 lNU, Characteristic Leaching Procedure reduction and reuse. Recycling can 051-339 5473; Greenpeace, Canonbury (TCLP) tests i.e. guilty until proven then be considered e.g. Dr Barry Villas, London N1 2PN, 071-354 5100; or innocent. Commoner with 84% recycling rates the present authors, at FoE Cymru, 33 The in trial schemes or the SORT scheme Balcony, Castle Arcade, Cardiff CF12BY, Test results for 23 facilities show that at Leeds which is serving about 80,000 Fax 0222 228775. for fly ash 97% of samples fail for households and diverting about 50% • Max Wallis is a researcher in cadmium and 91% for lead whilst 36% of their waste from landfill. atmospheric science and energy systems of bottom ash samples fail for lead. The at the School of Mathematics, University Supreme Court ruling is estimated to Waste strategies for the residual of Wales, Cardiff; Alan Watson works for increase the operating costs for a 1,600 municipal waste could then be Friends of the Earth Cymru.

Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 17 The UK's maximum practicable renewable energy resource is sufficient to meet all the country's electricity needs by 2025, according to a recent report by the government's Energy Technology Support Unit, reviewed here by GRAHAM STEIN. Renewable energy potential

HE latest assessment of and provide a useful counter to critics and onshore potential quoted as being renewable energy in the UK* by of renewables who say that there is not greater than present UK electricity T the Energy Technology Support a large enough resource. supply at 380TWh/year and Unit (ETSU) has been overshadowed 343TWh/year respectively. Their by the disappointing, anodyne The total resource is achieved despite a maximum practicable resources (MPR) accompanying DTI document Ener~ derisory contribution from wave are put at 140TWh/year and Paper 62 ("Eggar's renewables plans', power. ETSU has stuck to the woeful 541Wh/year. Safe Energy 100), but it is a much better. costings of the 1992 Wave Energy publication. Review ("Wave costings", Safe Energy Another major contributor could be 93) leaving a shoreline accessible energy crops which has the same MPR While not without faults, it provides a resource of 0.4TWh/year and just as wind at 1941Wh/year; this assumes useful overview of renewable energy 0.03TWh/year from offshore. The that all the accessible resource could be technology and most importantly offshore figure is particularly hard to used, though this is subject to the assesses the size of the renewable understand: it could be met by just five vagaries of European Union agriculture resource. 2MW devices like the nearshore Osprey policy on set-aside and subsidies. currently being developed by Applied The headline figure of an 'accessible Research and Technology ("EC boost Solar power also rates highly in the resource' for ~lectricity generation of for wave", Safe Energy 97), which it was report: photovoltaics have an 1,1001Wh/year (11Wh •1 billion kWh) predicted by the 1992 review could 841Wh/year accessible resource with is three and a half times present UK generate at 7p/kWh (8% discount rate). other photoconversion technologies electricity supply (based on a maximum (biological, chemistry and cost of electricity of lOp/kWh at an 8% Discount rates electrochemistry) at between 50 and discount rate). While constraints on 100TWH/year. The MPR for deployment of technologies reduces the Tidal and hydro power also appear to photovoltaics is put at just 8'IWH/year resource to a 'maximum practicable suffer to some extent from the high by 2025 and other photoconversion resource' of 4001Wh/year by 2025, this is discount rates (in historic terms) of 8% technologies are considered still greater than the country's current and 15% used in the analysis. In insufficiently developed for any 3101Wh annual electricity consumption. addition, hydro schemes with heads of forecast to be made. less than 3m (2m for existing civil These figures will not be particularly engineering schemes) were not Solar could contribute further with active surprising to those involved in considered in the report. and passive heating systems, and natural renewable energy, however, what ia lighting reducing demand for electricity, greatly encouraging is that they have Wind power is assessed as the largest oil and gas. In total an accessible resource been produced by a government agency accessible resource, with both offshore equivalent to over 401Wh/year.

Total Resource: 1100 TWh/year

Offshore Wind Energy f- Onshore Wind Energy f- EnE>rgy Crops 1-""' Photoconversion f- Photovolta ics I..:- c.· Municipal and General Industrial Wastes "-1- Tidal Power ~ 1- Agricultural and Forestry Wastes ~ large-scale Hydro ~ Landfill Gas I Specialised Industrial Wastes

Small-scale Hydro 1992UK •I Electricity 1- Wave Energy Supply 1- Geothermal HDR 1 0 so 100 150 200 250 300. 350 400 PhotovoltaiCs and Photoconvers10n will compete for sites as Will Crops and Onshore Wind TWhlyear

Accessible Resource for electncity producing renewable energy technologies at a cost of lOp/kWh or less (1992) 8% discount rate.

18 Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 Despite the continued antipathy to wave These fine words are perhaps an (NFFO) in England and Wales and power at ETSU, the report makes a indication that ETSU appreciates that its renewables obligations in Scotland and valuable contribution to the energy paymaster is no longer the (defunct) Northern Ireland. debate (some of the numbers are buried Department of Energy but the deeply in the midst of the text and Department of Trade and Industey The first two rounds (of five) under the colourful graphs of the 308-page report). (DTI). NFFO have seen over twenty wind farms built in England and Wales but Some important general points are The report also recognises that: "From less than 20% of these 400 turbines are made in the conclusions: a global viewpoint the renewable UI< machines. energy technologies are envi.ron­ "If renewable energy technologies are mentally benign and can provide a Not only have the NFFO and its belated to be readily deployed in the UI< an major contribution to sustainable Scottish and Northern Irish equivalents infrastructure appropriate to the development," sensibly adding: done little so far to develop UI< particular needs of renewable energy "Planning procedures sensitive to the industey, they are due to make their will need to develop. In particular, a needs of local communities are required final orders in 1998. skills base of experienced equipment if the renewable energy technologies are manufacturers, installers and operators, to fulfil their potential to improve the Unless there is a commitment from planners and financiers - together global environment." government to support new projects Mth~planningandre~toey into the next centuey, UI< companies systems responsive to the needs of Intervention will not develop the infrastructure for a renewables - will be required. domestic-based industey. To judge by Energy Paper 62, however, "The worldwide market for renewable ETSU' s conclusions have yet to sink The UI< does not need a energy products and services is home at the DTI. Michael Heseltine - Califomian-style wind rush any more potentially enormous .. . If this a man who told his party conference than it needs the dash to gas. It does potential is to be realised it will that he would intervene before need a steady planned build-up of require the development of a renewable breakfast, before lunch and before indigenous renewable energy energy industey far greater than that dinner to make British industry technology in a secure home market currently existing. The disparity successful - shows little sign of doing providing UI< companies with the between the potential world market and so for renewables. opportunity to compete in a growing the current world industey offers the world market. a opportunity for the development of a The government's major mechanism for significant UI< industey for domestic supporting renewables comes in the • "An assessment of renewable energy and export sales." form of the Non Fossil Fuel Obligation for the UK", ETSU; HMSO, 1994.

The nuclear industry claims that it wants a partnership with renewable energy as part of a balanced energy programme. GRAHAM STEIN looks at information on renewables supplied by the nuclear industry and finds it economical with the truth. Some partneiShip

INCE draping itself in the green ardent supporters of renewable energy of further coverage in future issues. cloak of environmentalism in agree that, if the necessaey investment Sthe eighties, the nuclear industry was made, then renewables could only In an inauspicious introduction, has often claimed it wants a support a maximum of 15% of energy mention is made of "splitting or fusing partnership with other energy source, needs. 11(1) (sic) uranium atoms in a nuclear especially renewables. The reactor". A simple error - though not information it puts out often covers Sadly, such lies are not limited to one you would expect from the Atomic renewable energy as well as nuclear internal literature; by far the most Energy Authority. power. But, what does it actually have worrying trend is the increasing to say about its prospective quantities of nuclear propaganda being The basic descriptions of different "partners"? sent to our schools which purport to renewable technologies are innocuous give a balanced view of renewable enough, if lacking in clarity. However, The reality is that the information it energy. on solar power the article states: "If we supplies on renewables - much of it knew the sun would shine regularly, we sent to schools - attempts to rubbish Activate, a magazine produced by AEA could make lots of electricity using solar them. Their line is that, except for the Technology at Harwell, is apparently cells". This is presumably meant to noise and visual intrusion of wind sent to eveey school in Britain. The suggest a corollaey 'because we know power, renewables are nice and publication is financed by the British the sun won't shine regularly we can't generally environmentally friendly Nuclear Industry Forum, while make lots of electricity using solar cells'. (like nuclear power) but that they editorial control curiously remains with Solar panels are described as expensive cannot hope to make a major AEA. and are only credited Mth being able to contribution to our energy needs. reduce energy bills in the summer. In the summer 1994 issue, as well as pro­ One internal briefing for BNFL nuclear items, two pages are given over Further criticism of solar power comes employees states: "Even the most to renewables, Mth a promise (threat?) in a section insincerely titled "power Q Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 19 partnership•. "We don't have enough sunshine to make good use of solar power", it claims. This is followed by the he price of electricity from renewable absurd assertion that we do not "have t sources is still higher than from fossil­ vast areas of land with the right wind fuelled power stations because building the speeds to develop huge wind farms." Leaving aside the question of whether we equipment is expensive but it produces should develop "huge" wind farms, only a small amount of electricity. rather than smaller schemes, does AEA not realise that it is talking about the country with the best wind resource in Europe, much of it in the sparsely populated Scottish Highlands.

Interestingly energy crops are not included in the article - is this because Had AEA been honest in its coverage In reality, the industry has always they are too difficult to attack? and consulted properly with ETSU it starved renewables of research and would have been able to tell school development funding, remains prime On power prices nuclear power is not pupils that the accessible renewables suspect in the killing off of the wave mentioned, but it says: "the price of resource (at below lOp/kWh, 8% energy research programme in the early renewable sources is still higher than discount rate) is three times our current eighties, and is linked, at least indirectly, from fossil-fuelled power stations electricity supply, including sizeable to the nationwide anti-windfarm group because building the equipment is contributions from wind and solar.(2) Country Guardian. expensive but it produces only a small Instead it makes the unsubstantiated amount of electricity." Tell that to and vague comment: "Renewables are While pro-renewables groups exist on Scottish Hydro-Electric whose hydro expected to provide about 10% of the shoestring budgets, pro-nuclear stations produce electricity at less than UI<'s electricity in the future." Is this propaganda is churned out by BNFL, 1 pence per kilowatt hour - the intended to be seen as an upper limit? Scottish Nuclear, Nuclear Electric, AEA cheapest power in the country. Technology, Nirex, British Nuclear Market share Industry FOI'Uil\ the National Campaign Having been invited by Safe Energy to for the Nuclear Industry and others. As justify its coverage of renewables, the The nuclear industry's main argument these companies reside entirely in the editor, Meriel Lewis of AEA, dealt only both for the current government review public sector, this material is produced with solar power. Interestingly, with the of nuclear power and in the wider with~~moneyand~mootedto government's renewables agency ETSU debate is that they want a "balanced" schools which, starved of resources, have next door, AEA's sources of information energy policy which includes an little choice but to use it were a fact card from the Science entrenched place for nuclear power. Museum and Friends of the Earth's 1991 The idea that nuclear power is the friend publlcation Energy without end. While it When James Hann, the Cllair of Scottish of renewable energy is absurd. That so is true that Energy without end produced Nuclear, began touting this line he talked much of the information being a scenario where solar played a minor of around 20% nuclear generation. This disseminated on renewables comes role compared to other renewables, it figure has slowly crept up to the point from the nuclear industry is wonying did not justify AEA's assertions. where he is arguing for 25-30% nuclear. - that much of this is funded by the taxpayer an outrage. 0 It is conceivable, though, that the Considered alongside its literature on nuclear industry is coBecting material renewables, the suggestion that the "Energy options: plans for the 21st produced by environmental groups in nuclear industry wants an energy mix t. order to take the least optimistic which includes renewables can be seen century", Employee communications, Risley, 1992. assessment for each technology, collate as a cynical attempt to appear them and present it as the reasonable and environmentally 2. "An assessment of renewable energy environmentalists' scenario. enlightened. for the UK", ETSU, HMSO 1994.

a. ecently, there has been a strong environmental lobby in favour of renewable rsources of power. But, although they are generally less hannful to the ·-.1: environment, renewables simply cannot produce enough energy to meet the r! demand in industrialised nations, nor the needs of developing countries as their ._CD demand grows. CDC:: Renewables are expected to provide about 1096 of the UK's electricity in the lit: future. We don't have enough sunshine to make good use of solar power, nor do a ea we have vast areas of land with the right wind speeds to develop huge wind farms. a. a. Hydroelectricity has been operating for many years, yet it produces only 2% of our electricity. A balanced energy programme is required where renewables are used alongside other energy sources.

20 Sate EnetriY 101, Summer ,., by the Association for the Conservation Energy policy, but no plan of Energy (ACE) for failing to criticise the Nothing to report worsening energy efficiency in the UK. K government energy policy has "We are now using more fuel to produce HE government published its first ~ U been endorsed by the International fewer goods," commented ACE... How T annual energy report in June, a Energy Agency (lEA) in a report can the lEA square these figures with its self-congratulatory document published in June.* applause?" designed to show that the policy of Aware of the common criticism that the The report had to be approved by the leaving the energy markets to 1-114 UK has no energy policy, the authors felt UK government before publication, and it necessary to state: "If a policy is an ACE says "it seems quite obvious [the themselves is being successfully ,-J approach based on a clearly articulated report] has been subjected to major implemented. 1-114 principle of reliance on market forces the editorial changes before being issued." Only where strong environmental, '-J United Kingdom does have an energy Eggar felt sufficiently enthused by the social or economic reasons remain ~~ policy." A big if. supportive aspects of the report to fully will the government intervene, While the Agency's findings were articulate the government's approach to according to the report. welcomed by an "absolutely delighted" energy: ..People confuse a plan with a There are no categorical statements energy minister Tim Eggar, there was policy, the government doesn't have a of intent to be found in the document, ,..,. considerable criticism of the government plan, but does have a policy." and it stresses that it is not up to ~ in the text of the report: the confused state The lEA has called on the government to: of the regulatory system; the National •ensure that nuclear power can support government to produce a plan about ~ Power PowerGen duopoly; insufficient itselfby 1988; how much energy, and what kind of pressure on utilities to pursue energy • clarify the issue of decommissioning energy, should be produced and efficiency; uncertainty over the economic nuclear plant; consumed. framework for nuclear power; and • consider extending the C(h It would appear that the only inadequate monitoring procedures. commitment beyond the year 2000; and reason for the report's existence is Supply/demand forecasts would be • ensure that there is a clear link between that it was part of the package of useful, particularly for analysing trends in the government's energy and measures drawn (dreamt?) up in the greenhouse gas emissions, argues the environmental policies and its R&D coal review which followed the lEA, whose membership is drawn from all priorities. a the OECD countries except Iceland and public outcry over pit closure plans Mexico. * "Energy policies - the United Kingdom announced in 1992 ("Little help for The report has been strongly criticised 1994", lEA, June 1994. coal", Safe Energy 94). a

• With the National Grid Company (NOC) Son of Thermie Energy sell-offs having made healthy profits in the last financial year, its owners, the 12 regional NCREASED profits produced by both HE European Union's (EU) Thermie electricity companies in England and I National Power and PowerGen, job Tprogramme- which provides funding cuts, and the decision by the electricity Wales,haveappointedKleinwortBensonto for demonstration projects and promotional regulator, Prof Stephen Littlechild, in advise on a possible sell-off. NGC plans a activities in the areas of energy efficiency, February not to refer the duopoly to the further 400 redundancies by March, and a renewables, and clean use of coal othct and Monopolies and Mergers Commission £4bn-plus flotation is likely in the spring. hydrocarbons - expires at the end of this have paved the way for the sale of the year having allocated a total of Ecu700m. government's 40% stake in the • Government plans to privatise British Although Ecu1bn will be available for generators. The sale is expected to take Coal (BC) progressed with the decision in R&D on non-nuclear energy under the place in the current financial year, June that liabilities for all health-related EU's Fourth Framework Programme, the probably next February. claims with respect to past service with European Commission hopes to establish It was announced in May that BC will be retained in the public sector, Thermie-11 to continue the full range of Littlechild will be re-appointed for a and the passing of the coal industry bill by Thermie activities. a second five-year term. Parliament on 5 July. a

gas industries operate would be changed role of the Department of Trade and Labour plans efficiency to allow profits to be made from energy Industry and a managerial, at least, conservation measures. Homes would be separation of the Energy Technology ABOUR'S plans on the environment made more energy efficient with the cost Support Unit from its nuclear landlord L were published in July, with the main being recouped through small increases in and paymaster AEA Technology. proposal being a moratoriwn on all new the unit price of fuel. Labour believes that There is little change in policy on road building - signalling a rejection of this would create up to 50,000 jobs. nuclear power from the last general the Conservative's "great car economy" Targets for renewables have been set at election: "The Labour Party has resolved - and a strong commitment to energy 10% of UK electricity demand by 2010 not to build any new nuclear power efficiency. and 20% by 2025, to be achieved through stations" but there is no commitment to The document calls for a shift in energy a number of measures including: a phase out existing stations or close the policy away from selling more electricity specific renewables obligation; an Thorp reprocessing plant at Sellafield. and gas to energy saving. Chris Smith, improved R&D effort; and a greater share Clarifying the policy for the possibility Labour's shadow secretary for environ­ of the fossil fuel levy. of a privatised industry, Smith told Safe mental protection. said: "We have got to get The 20% by 2025 target is the level the Energy: "Labour will not allow any new away from the old assumptions that concern government's Renewable Energy nuclear power stations to be built." about the environment costs jobs. In fact the Advisory Group considered could be Energy will be covered in more detail reverse is true - it creates employment" achieved in its 1992 report. in a forthcoming review by the party's Labour proposes a .. self-financing Labour's 1990 plan for a Renewable energy policy working group, which will programme ofenergy efficiency. "The rules Energy Apw::y has been replaced with the take its lead from the overall under which the privatised electricity and intention of strebgthening the renewables environmental programme. a

Safe Enerr~y 101, Summer 1994 21 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate to secure funding for the Energy Saving DoE climate conference Change: it is untrue that the computer Trust ("Energy inefficiency", p8) came models are now predicting smaller from Dieter Helm, director Oxford HE government "has always temperature rises; it is untrue that Economic Research Associates, when T recognised the need for post-2000 satellites don't confirm surface discussing the failure of energy industry action" on carbon dioxide emissions, temperature measurements; and although regulation. according to Derek Osbom, Head of sulphate aerosols may be having a cooling Dr David Fisk, the DoE's chief Environmental Protection at the effect over the northern hemisphere, it scientist, proposed both fiscal and Department of the Environment (DoE), cannot be expected to balance the regulatory measures to reduce emissions, writes Pete Roche. warming effect of greenhouse gases. and suggested that renewable energy Osborn was speaking at the Hougbton warned that next century's rate sources could contribute S-20% of our government's Climate Change of temperature change will be way out of electricity by 2005, while energy Conference on 14 July, which was billed scale with anything we have seen so far. efficiency could produce a 25% saving. as a participatory process to address future Sean O'Dell, chief economist at the The presentations on transport were options. The ultimate aim of the International Energy Agency, highlighted perhaps the most remarkable. 71le government's climate change programme the rapidly rising energy consumption in Guardian, the following day, gave a is to stabilise atmospheric concentrations. South-East Asia, particularly of coal flavour of the DoE's view of the UK road Sir Crispin Tickcll, of Green College rather than nuclear. OECD countries building programme: "Many in the DoE, Oxford and the Convenor of the should be concentrating on reducing off the record, would love to see the DoT government's Panel on Sustainable emissions from the power generation and [Department of Transport] get a bloody Development, told the conference "we transport sectors, be said. nose over air pollution." And one official must look for reductions [in greenhouse For the government, the Secretary of was quoted as saying that the DoT's "long gas emissions] to much lower levels. We State for the Environment John Gummer espoused car culture/road building line is must change the nature of the economy ... emphasised voluntarism: "No self evidently unsustainable." He warned that the usual energy government diktat will solve the It will be interesting to see over the efficiency measures may be insufficient challenge ... I urge all delegates to explore coming months whether the DoE post2000. within your own organisations the manages to win the support of the rest of A series of myths about climate change possibilities for action beyond 2000." the cabinet for its ideas. With the funding which have arisen recently were rebutted There was considerable discussion of problems of the Energy Saving Trust and by Sir John Hougbton, former director of increasing emissions from the transport the £18bn roads programme, they are not the Met Office and eo-chair of the sector, but the only mention of the failure having much success so far. a

been Carbon worries which has making extremely slow by not charging the true environmental progress over the past two years. costs [of energy] to the consumer." Speaking to government and industry Countering claims that the tax would HE European Union (EU) is in leaders in Hamburg on June 28, damage competitiveness, be argued that Tdanger of exceeding agreed future Paleocrassas warned "it is unacceptable "energy costs in industry represent only C02 emission targets, the European to continue with the present system of 2.5-4% of production costs and the Commission (EC) has warned. Figures subsidising environmental destruction average burden is thus 0.17% after for the past three years have shown a exemptions... 3.2% reduction in C02 emissions from fossil-fuel combustion, but the EC fears • A proposal for integrated resource that as Europe comes out of recession *** planning to reduce COz emissions has this trend will not continue. been made by the EC . The draft direc­ The EC's Environment Commis­ * * tive would force national governments sioner, Yannis Paleocrassas, has called to ensure that their industries take up the on Germany - which currently holds * * most rational solutions for their energy the EU's presidency - to take the lead plans, thereby promoting development in persuading the 12 member states to * * of the most efficient energy techno­ adopt the carbon/energy tax proposal, *** logies and services. a

world's biggest reinsurance companies, Global Warming UN sulphur protocol including the Swiss Reinsurance Company which endorsed the report. VER 30 countries, including the LIMATE change is already here Many reinsurance companies have gone OUK, have signed a new UN Caccording to a Greenpeace report* out of business due to the sequence of protocol on sulphur emissions, which cites a series of environmental disasters, and the trend has contributed to designed to reduce acid rain. It replaces catastrophes over the past four years. the huge losses at Lloyd's of London. the 1985 protocol for a cut of 30% from Greenpeace believes that "while no 1980 levels by the end of 1993, which one event, or sequence, or sector of • Further evidence of climate change the UK refused to sign. events, is necessarily related to the has come from the British Antarctic The new agreement sets individual national targets on the basis of 'critical enhanced greenhouse effect,.. in total its Survey. Analysis of figures from its Fa­ loads' which assess the tolerable level of catalogue of climatic experiences raday research station show a 2.5"C pollutants which can be borne by plant shows "the first signs of warming over the past forty years. a and animal life. The UK will have to cut human-induced climate change are its sulphur dioxide emissions by 80% of emerging." *"The cUmate time bomb", Greenpeace, 1980 levels by 2010, with interim targets This view is shared by some of the Canonbury Villas, London NllPN; £5. of SO% by 2000 and 70% by 2005. a

22 Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 works). CHP generation, as planned for of the energy for sorting the waste and for Waste not? the Isle of Man and already common in heat-sterilisation of the residual organics. Denmark, may boost efficiency to a Pyrolysis got a mention as a future HE Waste to Energy '94 conference nominal 70%, but the heat is generally low-temperature technology for reclaiming Tat Winchester, 19-20 May, was under-used. oils and gases from wastes, and may be first designed to promote incineration, though The one new incinerator built in recent introduced for used car tyres. some critical voices came from the years, the south-east London CHP plant, The conference culminated with audience, writes Max Wallis. is a success in public acceptance and formation of a trade association; The Department of the Environment's environmental protection terms, said 'recycling' was dropped from the fJrSt Henry Cleary gave the keynote address, SELCHP Chairman, Oerald Atkins. proposed title Recycling Waste to Energy arguing for incineration to meet the waste Handed over only last February, the plant Oroup. One critic pointed out that given disposal problem and the forthcoming is operating in a power-only mode. This the small amount of power that could be packaging Directive. Government is still was said, unconvincingly, to be forced secured - lOW or one power station - undecided on a landftlllevy, he said, and until1998 by the high NFFO premium for it is better conceived as waste disposal. A also undecided on the claims of the Royal electricity. The hot water connections for large minority agreed, voting for the title Commission (and Blueprint for a Green the steam generator are already in place; Energy from Waste. No doubt people who Economy author Prof. Pearce) that however, heating Milwall football ground favour recycling and avoidance will soon incineration gives net environmental and local high-rise blocks (7 ,500 units) as dub WEG the 'Waste of Energy Oroup•. benefit, complaining that the public proposed, will take only part of the heat and perceives the opposite. rather little in the warmer half of the year. • Plans for the world's largest A financial presentation by Andrew Anaerobic digestion can complement waste-fuelled power station, at Belvedere Brandler of Schroders pointed out that the incineration, argued Kit Strange of the on the banks of the Thames, have been Non Fossil Fuel Obligation (NFFO) 'World Resource Foundation • rejected by Michael Heseltine, President support for incineration is huge - (previously Warmer). Extracting the wet of the Board of Trade. amounting to about £1000/kW, exceeding organic fraction for digestion improves Cory Environmental, the company the capital cost of new power stations - the combustion quality of the remainder. behind the project, says it is likely to and asked why electricity consumers The digestor gas generation given for reapply for planning permission. The should bear the costs of waste disposal. Netherlands projects is low at 103-112MW plant-which was included The electrical output generated via l00-150m3/tonne, lower than from in the 1991 NFFO order - was rejected incineration was optimistically given as landfilling the organics, so does not add a by Bexley Council in 1991. The decision 500kWh per tonne of municipal waste, lot to the energy reclaim. A scheme by Michael Heseltine followed an appeal amounting to 15% of the calorific value reported as planned in Kent by WMC to the Department of Trade and industry (after deduction of power used in the Resource Recovery Ltd would use much and a public inquiry in 1992. Q

remain with British Coal, as the Coal Clean coal moves Technology Development Division, CHP NFFO off with the hope of they will be developed RGUMENTS that Combined heat IM EGGAR, the energy minister, to the point where other parties could A and power (CHP) should be included T has announced Department of progress to the pilot plant stage. A bit in the Non Fossil Fuel Obligation (NFFO) Trade and Industry (DTI) funding for 26 by bit transfer to the private sector over because its high efficiency reduces fossil fuel use have been rejected by Tim Eggar, clean coal research projects. The DTI is the next three years is envisaged. Q to put £8m towards the total cost of energy minister. Eggar says that there are legal problems £29m. This, together with 78 previously with incorporating CHP in the NFFO but has announced projects, brings the total said "I'm quite keen to identify ways that we value of the clean coal technology can bring CHP into the NFFO process, but programme to £188m. not in a way that excludes other schemes." Two-thirds of the new projects will There are now over 1,000 CHP plants in go to Coal Research Establishment, the UK with a combined output of 2,900MWe (million watts of electricity). currently part of British Coal. Some of This is almost 60 per cent of the S,OOOMW e its activities have been incorporated in target set by the government for the end of a new subsidiary, CRE Group, with the century as part of its environmental plans for a sell-off later this year. commitment to reducing C02 emissions. Large-scale R&D projects will However, little over a third of this total has been contracted since privatisation of the electricity supply industry in the early 1990s and there are doubts over whether the Spanish and German governments Solar progress S,OOOMW target will be met without further providing 18% and 9% respectively. government support. Spain now has a total of 5.4MW of • Sixteen CHP schemes, benefiting over UROPE'S largest photovoltaic installed solar energy capacity. 3,000 people, have been announced under Ecentre, near Toledo, Spain, went on • A major building on the campus of the Residential CHP Programme stream in June. With 8,000 photovoltaic Northumbria University, Newcastle, is launched in June 1993 by the Energy 2 (PV) panels covering 16,700m , the to be clad with PV panels. The £1.5m Saving Trust (EST). lMW Toledo PV park is expected to project is to get 40% of its funding from The projects -the fust under the scheme supply l.SGWh/year to the Spanish the EU Thermie programme and hopes devised by EST and the CHP Association­ national grid. to get another 9% from the UK will almost treble the take-up of CHP by housing providers in the UK. The European Union •s (EU) Thermie government. The panels will provide Grants totalling £360,000 have so far been programme provided 25% of the 10% of the building's winter energy committed to the programme, with another Ecu10in funding for the park, with the demand and 50% in the summer. a £1.5m available for further schemes. a

Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 chairperson Ian Mays, adding: "there are Engineering - an "Englishman living in Wind plans other audiences, most notably planning Scotland" - warned developers "if you officers who can use them as a yardstick go it alone and do not take Scottish ITH Scotland•s first wind when considering applications." partners you will not be successful." W fanns due to get the go-ahead at By involving environmentalists, William Craig, a lecturer in law at the end of this year, the British Wind planners and government bodies in the Aberdeen University, explained some Energy Association (BWEA) process, the BWEA hopes the guidelines, of the many differences between gathered north of the border for its expected to be published in October, will English and Scots law, highlighting annual conference in July. In recent give people outside the industry Section SO planning agreements, which years there has been a noticeable shift confidence that wind farms are being have no equivalent in England and towards delegates from industry developed responsibly. Wales. These agreements, between a rather than academia as wind power In the session on public attitudes to developer and local authority, do not has moved from theory to reality. wind power, Fiona Weightman of Friends bypass planning procedures, but bring As well as discussion of some of the of the Earth (England, Wales and the authority 'on side• allowing them to more technical aspects of wind turbines, Northern Ireland), outlined details of share the burden of the planning there were sessions on standards, safety FoE•s recently published Planning for process. It later emerged that at least one and planning; wind energy in Scotland; wind power<2>which includes a call for a such agreement has already been made, public attitudes; and reducing noise ban on siting wind farms within Sites of for a wind farm in Shetland ("Shetland emissions. Special Scientific Interest and Nature wind first", below) The so-called wind backlash was an Reserves, and the exclusion of larger (ten issue high on the agenda. While there or more turbine) wind farms in National • The Council for the Protection of Rural were criticisms of "the press" and of Parks and Areas of Outstanding Natural England has said that the "rising anxieties organisations opposing wind power, Beauty. It also proposes that developers about onshore wind generation require the many developers are taking the problem of larger projects undertake issuing of new planning guidance to local very seriously. BWEA produced a Environmental Impact Assessments and authorities and a rethinking of briefing for journalists in March and is for smaller projects environmental impact government subsidies for renewables." Its currently updating its fact sheets. (I) reports be produced. Welsh counterpart has already called for Most importantly, it has decided to "There are no easy choices in energy a moratorium on wind farms until produce 'best practice' guidelines for supply," Weightman told delegates, "but "substantial results have been achieved wind farms and has invited a wide range we need to focus on the environmental through conservation measures and wind of organisations to help in drafting imperative for renewable energy." And power generation is proved to be drawing them (including anti-wind she stressed that developers must realise cost-effective". a the importance of public acceptability. group Country Guardian which has (1) Further information from BWEA, 42 In a session looking at wind energy in refused to take part). "The objective is Kingsway, London WC2B 6EX (071-404 to produce a set of guidelines which will Scotland, several speakers stressed the 3433). act as a working document for importance for developers from outwith developers to ensure they address all the Scotland to understand the different legal (2) "Planning for wind power" by Fiona issues that may be relevant to the local and planning procedures north of the Weightman; Friends of the Earth, May community," explained BWEA border. Phillip Roberts of Ascurry 1994, £3.50.

The local authority, Shetland Islands Scotland who granted full planning Shetland wind first Council, gave the project its support in permission. obtaining planning permission in Interestingly, when the developer MONGST the many wind farm exchange for agreements on various amended the scheme to five turbines, A projects bidding for a place in the aspects of the scheme, including the requiring new planning permission, the first round of the Scottish Renewables siting of overhead cables and, if council received no objections. Obligation, due to be announced in necessary, installation of a booster to The site, at Burradale Hill, Tingwall is October, is a five-turbine proposal prevent radio signal interference. three miles north-west of Lerwick, the from Shetland Aerogenerators Ltd. It An earlier proposal for three turbines Island's capital. may well be the first renewable was made before Shetland Islands Shetland, which is not connected to the energy development to have obtained Council bad a planning policy for such Scottish grid, relies on expensive diesel a Section 50 planning agreement developments and the matter bad to be generators and would seem an ideal ("Wind plans", above). referred to the Secretary of State for candidate for wind power. a

Fossil Fuel Obligation (NFFO) unhelpful Wind down in providing a steady market for the larger Dutch go offshore machine. INDHARVESTER, one of One ex-employee told Windpower ORK has started on the ftrst WBritain's few wind turbine Monthly .. We bad potential orders for 15 W off-shore wind farm in Dutch manufacturers, was forced into machines, but they were dependent on waters with four 500kW turbines receivership in June after poor sales of NFFO which produces endless delays. A being sited 800m from the coast in the its 300kW machine. The turbine was a cash-rich company can ride out the Ijsselmeer, the country's largest development of the Howden machine troughs but smaller businesses are inland sea. If successful, the designed by Glasgow-based James penalised by the process. In our opinion, developer PEN hopes to build more Howden. Howden pulled out of wind while NFFO may be good at stimulating offshore wind farms in the deeper power in 1989, in part because of the the market for some, it does very little to waters of the North Sea. lack of a home market. stimulate any indigenous industry. In fact Denmark been operating a 3MW Though sales of WindHarvester•s it has the opposite effect. .. has lOOkW turbine to farmers and landowners It may be possible for the c.ompany to 11-turbine offshore scheme since 1991, had been reasonably successful, the be restarted in the near future if fmn and Sweden has plans to site 98 turbines company found the structure of the Non orders can be obtained. a off-shore. a

S.fe En•lfiY 101, Summer 1994 local communities and without contribution to clean, renewable and Welsh wind report destroying valued landscapes." economically viable electricity Problemswithsomeaspectsof wind farm generation, rather than as evidence of the report generally sympathetic to development to date have been due in part greed of developers for a generous A wind power development has been to the constraints of the Non Fossil Fuel subsidy," and "permission for their produced by the House of Commons Obligation, but the committee criticised the development should be as far as possible Welsh Affairs Committee. With approach of developers as "not always in the hands of the local community" one-third of the UK's wind farms sited sensitive to local concerns and on some "We anticipate that wind energy's in Wales, including the 103 turbines at occasions [giving] the impression of riding contribution to total generation will Llandinum, there has been considerable roughshod over them. This is surprising and remain modest for the foreseeable future, opposition to wind power, most notably short-sighted." but, despite that, it will be a valuable from the Campaign for the Protection of The acceptance of wind farms in the element in the totality of renewable Rural Wales ("English and Welsh countryside would depend on "the energy capacity ... in which a wide range wind", Safe Energy 98) sensitivity with which they are sited and of different technologies are employed to The committee felt that the "debate on their being seen as a genuine complement and support each other." over the place of wind generated Friends of the Earth welcomed many of electricity in the generation mix of the the committee's proposals as "a future had been hijacked by exaggerated significant step forward in the debate on and emotional claims." wind power, cutting through many While identifying a number of inaccuracies and myths." Fiona problems with wind turbines, chiefly Weightman, its renewable energy visual impact, the committee concluded campaigner, commented: "the select that "wind energy has the potential to committee has clarified that many of the make a significant contribution to potential problems and genuine concerns national energy needs. That is not to say surrounding wind farms can be that wind farms should sprout up on every satisfactorily dealt with in well sited and hill, but rather to argue that there are developed wind farms." a locations where they can be developed without causing unacceptable visual * "Wind energy", Welsh Affairs intrusion, without undue annoyance to Committee; BMS0,1994.

Dam good news? Duddon barrage study Irish renewables

ONTRARY to early indications study into the feasibility of a tidal WENTY renewable energy C ("Oabcicovo dam problems", Safe A barrage on the of the Duddon T projects have been selected for the Energy 97), the Slovakian Gabcicovo estuary in Cumbria has concluded that first round of Northern Ireland's Non hydro-electric scheme on the Danube it would not be economically viable as Fossil Fuel Obligation from a total of 4S does not seem to be causing the widely applications. an energy project financed in the private predicted ecological catastrophe. Wind power gets 12. 7MW of the The troubled scheme - originally a sector, or when identified regional and 15.6MW total with six wind farms having joint project between Czechoslovakia and environmental benefits are taken into been chosen, all of around 2MW declared Hungary - was expected to lower account. net capacity (SMW installed capacity). Nine hydro schemes with a combined groundwater levels along the Danube The study, sponsored by the affecting wildlife, crops, forests and capacity of 2.37MW and five sewage gas drinking supplies in the surrounding Department of Trade and Industry, projects totalling 0.56MW were also wetlands. Indeed, when diversion of the was undertaken and part funded by selected. bulk of the Danube along a 40km canal Balfour Beatty and Robert McAlpine The projects will receive an annual began last year the water table dropped by with Shawater Ltd. The scheme subsidy of around £2.5m for 15 years, ten metres. considered was of lOOMW capacity funded through an increase in electricity However, the Slovakians now regularly and would produce around 200 bills of around 0.5%. feed part of the diverted water back into the million kWh/year. The government aims to have45MW of wetlands, reviving 'arms' of the Danube new renewables capacity installed in which had been drying out for 30 years Using an 8% discount rate it was Northern Ireland by 2005 as part of its because of "dams built in Austria which calculated that electricity could be 1,500MW UK target. changed the hydrology of the Danube," generated at 11.8p/kWh; including according to Miroslav Liska, spokesperson regional and environmental benefits • The Republic of Ireland has introduced for VV Bratislava, the state-owned brought this down to 8. 7p/kWb. Only if a scheme for 75MW of new renewables, company which designed the project. non-energy benefits in excess of£160m waste and combined heat and power News is not so good. in Hungary where could be identified would the scheme (CHP) which it hopes to allocate in one expensive efforts are to be made to try to become viable for the private sector. round of bidding this summer. revive their wetlands using pumps to shift The Alternative Energy Requirement water from the depleted Danube. Liska A smaller scheme, producing half the will provide one-off grants totalling says: "The Hungarian part of the wetland electricity, was also considered, but this IR£15m. In addition, renewables projects could be improved just as ours has, but would still require over £80m from the will get IR£0.04/kWh and combined heat they refuse to join the project" public sector to be viable. and power JR£0.03/kWh for their Hungary pulled out of the original project electricity. Further funding through the With operating and maintenance following extensive environmental European Union's Thermie programme campaigning against the scheme and the costs of just 0.9Sp/kWh, this project may also be available. two countries are still trying to the resolve is another example of a renewable The plan is for 30MW of wind power, the resultant dispute at the International energy being stifled by high 20MW of CHP and 15MW from waste Comt of Justice in The Hague. a discount rates. a and other sources including biomass. a

Safe En•TfiY 101, Summer 1994 I REVIEWS I

Power from plants; by Wait Patterson. SCRAM REPORTS The Royal Institute of International MfairsJEarthscan; 1994, 102pp, £9.95. Renewable energy: the Cinderella option £3.85 Renewable energy: Scotland's future £5.50 Reprocessing Dounreay £2.75 From this formidable trio of gas turbine systems are author and joint publishers already being used with Scotland, Japan and the Thermal there were two things you biomass, and a number of Oxide Reprocessing Plant £3.85 could safely predict before pilot and demonstration Dry storage of nuclear waste: an opening the book: first it projects in Scandinavia, the exercise in damage limitation £2.20 would be thoroughly US, Brazil and the European researched, and second it Union are now under Climate change: policy, impacts wouldn't have an index. development. and solutions £3.30 The lack of an index is Patterson concludes that in actually far less annoying than many parts of the world in some lengthier RIIA biomass power could prove INFORMATION PACKS* publications, especially as the to be a valuable, high-quality chapters are comprehens­ energy resource-especially Nuclear pack £2.00 ively subdivided by topic. for generating electricity. But Patterson considers the success will depend on its Renewables pack £2.00 possibilities for electricity many potential beneficiaries generation, rather than promoting the measures • Selected features, news and broadsheets from Safe Energy biodiesel and other liquid necessary to foster it. fuels, believing that it "may There is a lot of useful offer more immediate information crammed be­ BROADSHEETS promise". He looks at how tween the introduction and (add SOp per order If ordered separately) modem technology could conclusions, painfully entitled Nuclear waste 1Op be used for efficient "growing interest" and Wind power 10p electricity generation from "growing importance". Bad biomass. pun headlines aside (and who Woody biomass 15p Different technologies are are we to criticise) this is a Renewable energy 15p considered at: direct firing, useful publication, furthering eo-firing with coal, gasifica­ the argument that renewables tion and pyrolysis. The last offer real potential for making These reports and leaflets are available from two of these to produce fuel a major contribution to world Scram, 11 Forth Street, Edinburgh EH1 3LE. for either gas turbines or energy needs. Overseas orders please add 1Oo/o for postage. diesel engines. Improved gasification and GRAHAM STEIN

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S.te Enttlfly 101, Summer 1flt4 REVIEWS

pared with Kew, they minimum upgrade target. Domestic Energy and Affordable Warmth; calculate. Thermal conditions The programme would cost Prof Tom Markus (Ed). in the eight million homes of an estimated £1,250m/yr, the 'fuel poor' and the value comparable to the uprating achieved for their fuel of benefits to compensate for E&FN Spon; 1994, 160pp, £39.95. expenditure are amongst the VAT on fuel, but targeted to lowest in western Europe and need, resulting in energy north America. saving rather than subsidis­ This report, edited by Prof explained Or Sonja Hunt for The report recommends ing continuing waste. Markus of Strathclyde the working group that drew energy-rating of all 'at risk' The primary target should University, marks a big step in up the report for the Watt households, to guide an not be CO:z savings, but defining the severe problems Committee on Energy. This upgrading programme over, improved welfare and living of poor housing, fuel poverty means increased mortality say, 16 years, which would be conditions, the group argues. and resultant ill-health in and illness, with the latter well justified in cost-benefit The study group drew much Britain. For 8 million house­ estimated to cost terms. Pending the up­ of its impetus from Heatwise holds, two thirds rented and 800-1000M/yr. grading, income support and Glasgow and Energy Action one third mainly elderly 'Affordable' is defined as other benefits would be scaled Scotland, but Brenda Board­ owner- occupiers, the homes no more than 10% of to allow adequate heating. man from Oxford and Marcus are badly insulated and household income to be 'Heatability' should be part of Newborough from Cranfield heating costs are high but spent on heating; the average the minimum fitness standard as well as representatives of income too low to keep spent by the poorest 30% of for dwellings. the utilities and Housing temperatures above the 16CC families is 9% and by the The working group Associations made significant comfort level. other 70% only 4%. Homes in recommended the National contributions. The study will Health problems come the north and windier parts Home Energy Rating (NHER) surely be an influential directly because of the cold require higher heating (or scheme, as taking local climate reference book. and indirectly via condensa­ thermal standard), 69% into account. They propose tion and fungal growth, higher for Lerwick com- NHER grade 8 as the MAXWALLIS

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Safe Energy 101, Summer 1994 27 LITTLE BLACK RABBIT

j Moving story designed to build up international C02 this process was Jarnes Hobson, director­ credits and avoid having to persuade its general of the UK government's Energy With the recent closure of its customers to use less electricity. Efficiency Office. Hobson sent a furious ~ .p rototype fast reactor and the letter to the organisers who replied that the mothballing of the MPs for hire paper was ill-prepared and poorly written, reprocessing plant, AEA but most important was Hobson's ( Technology at Dounreay is It is usual these days for big contention that the UK had a pretty havingP a hard time. businesses to have a friendly successful energy efficiency policy. The If new director John Baxter hadn' t Tory MP on the payrolL and referees felt there was no place at their already realised how bad things were, he the privatised electricity prestigious international conference for could have been left in no doubt when he A companies are no exception. works of fiction. found his new office. It had been stripped Phil Gallie, the MP for Ayr, is the only bare of every last item of furniture. Ayrshire MP not opposed to Scottish Wind from waste A memo has now been sent to all senior Power's plan run 65km of pylons through staff requesting that furniture be left the countryside. He is also, purely A novel variation to energy behind when they move office. coincidentally, a paid adviser to the utility. from waste is set to be Old Etonians are a popular choice with implemented in Minnesota, Long road from Rio the English electricity companies. Andrew USA. As a trade-off for being Hargreaves is paid by Midland Electric allowed to store casks of Maurice Strong was the man and Tim Rathbone by Seeboard. nuclear waste at its Prairie Island nuclear behind the Earth Summit in LBR would love to know why, apart power- station, Northern States Power Rio two years ago - an event from not being Eton educated, Ian Bruce, must install wind turbines in the state. he billed as"our last chance to Tory MP for Dorset South, appears to have In a bill signed by Governor Arne s ave the planet". The been dropped by Southern Electric. Carlson this May, permission for up to 17 conference was far from a complete waste casks is conditional on the company success, but at least Western countries Hobson · s choice operating or contracting for 425MW of wind accepted the need for them to cut their power and 125MW of biomass by 2002. A carbon dioxide emissions. The World Energy further 400MW of wind will have to be LBR wondered what Strong is up to Conference is a serious event, added if it is the leastdash for gas; the your name and addres s nnd return Ute fonn to Ute address below. absence of a national energy policy; and the- tendency for short-term contracts. But there was no attack on the economic, I would like to subacribe to the Ssfe I would hke to make a d onation to environmental and safety failings of 1 Energy Journal, and I enclose an 2 SCRAM and enclose a cheque for: nuclear power. annual subscnpt1on fee of LBR suspects the influence of Adrian 0 £10 Ham, one-time political adviser to Denis 0 £15 (mdivlduals) Healey and now chief economist at 0 £7 50 (concession) 0£25 Nuclear Electric, who managed to worm 0 £25 (suppor1tng) his way into the party's energy policy 0 £38 (orgamsatlons) 0£50 working group. Overaeas (£ sterting please): D f:1oo Nuclear revue Europe add £2.50; ~ f Outwith europe add £4.00. other£ a. As the nuclear review gets under way, Nuclear Electric and Scottish Nuclear are arguing for their industry's future. In helping to put their Name economic- cases, both companies have employed the services of Lazard Brothers Address to show that they have a viable future. This indud$l!: an_p~~ w ard that ~~:~-· "SizeItJ .q!}~~U.qur J: ~ID.~~'-1a za r Post code _____ Phone No. repor O't'CrthT . en ra rEle ct ri ~ t Gener g arCftJi.at f!~wer w "a uni ely high riliR'1ri8~'¥wi~ ma1 To: SCRAM, 11 Forth St reet, Edinburgh EH1 3LE of the inane~ "tiJeinS ~ric to I reacto~". fill&&&._"" !'.,. >_ ,_,