The ships which will soon begin transporting 100-tonne casks containing nuclear fuel from Sellafield through the Irish Sea to Japan are designed to withstand all accidents, British Nuclear Fuels officials have insisted.
It has been confirmed an Irish Government official has been to the port of Barrow, Cumbria, England, to examine safety and security arrangements for the shipments of mixed oxide fuel (MOX).
The Minister for the Marine and Natural Resources, Dr Woods, has expressed concerns about the shipments - which are believed to be imminent - though the State is party to international agreements allowing nuclear transport.
Capt Malcolm Miller, BNFL's head of transport, accepted the highest risk was of an accident involving a collision or sinking due to a storm but the purposely-designed vessels were built of collision-resistant material, had numerous safety features and would be very difficult to sink, even if they were badly flooded.
If a ship sank, the risk to human health and the environment was "practically negligible". The casks containing the MOX fuel had been subjected to drop, fire and immersion tests, he said at a briefing in Dublin. BNFL, nonetheless, had contracts with salvage companies and the casks were "salvageable in any ocean". The cost of recovery would become more an issue the deeper the ocean. Who would pay would be a matter of "politics and finance".
The threat of piracy was "low to negligible", particularly as the MOX fuel was not readily usable for sinister purposes (it contains 5 per cent plutonium, which can be used in nuclear weapons). The ships would not travel known piracy routes in south Asia.
He said given BNFL's record of 160 round trips carrying nuclear material since 1969 without a single accident, the shipments could be considered routine.
Armed officers of the UK Atomic Energy Authority Constabulary would nonetheless be on board, while the vessels were outfitted with three 30 millimetre naval guns and other protection systems. US authorities, who oversee security arrangements for such shipments, had found there was "equivalent security" compared to plutonium shipments to Japan from Sellafield carried out from 1992-93, though a separate armed vessel accompanied all shipments then.
BNFL media affairs manager Mr Alan Hughes said two days' notice of a vessel sailing would be given, followed by details of the route. The Irish Government would get special notice.
Mr Rupert Wilcox Baker, BNFL's public affairs manager, said the UK Environment Agency, not BNFL, had concluded that if the MOX facility at Sellafield was fully commissioned the impact in terms of discharges into the Irish Sea would be "negligible" (contrary to Greenpeace claims it will lead to an escalation).
On Britain's commitment to reduce Sellafield discharges to "close to zero" by 2020, Mr Hughes said the UK government would have to show next year how this would be done. BNFL was confident this would be technically feasible.
He accepted it was impossible at present to curb technetium-99 releases. They had increased but the overall level of radioactive discharges was 1 per cent of what they were during the 1970s. "Technetium has generated the most concern in recent months. We would say needlessly so from a scientific point of view."
