Nuclear Site Stakeholders Group for Hinkley
Community representation on the Nuclear Site Stakeholders Group for Hinkley A and B
As a long standing community based environment group WSGF, formerly Forum 21, has a voting representative on the Hinkley SSG which meets three times a year and includes local councillors and other groups. Hinkley C is not in the remit of the group as it is still under construction.
Both A and B plants are now being decommissioned so no electricity is being generated and will not be until HPC is commissioned at the currently expected date of 2027. The agenda of the meetings includes reports from the managers of the two sites, and regulators, including Office of Nuclear Regulation, Environment Agency, Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, and Magnox, the government owned company managing the sites.
Discussion with the attendees includes technical information, especially on management of high, medium and low level waste, local traffic problems, socioeconomic issues, Health and Safety, including occasional non-nuclear accidents, and details of the decommissioning process. With Hinkley A having been built in the 60s with little planning for decommissioning, this has been difficult with many unforeseen issues and asbestos being the main one. The contractor, Flour Cavendish subsequently withdrew, and Magnox has reformed into a company which carries out decommissioning “in house”.
An indication of the complexity and length of the decommissioning process is that the Hinkley A site will not be completed and handed over for possible industrial use until 2085.
Hinkley B stopped generating in August 2022 and the initial defueling will take 3 years with the high level waste travelling to Sellafield by lorry and train 3 times a week. Medium and low-level waste will be stored in a facility at A site until the planned Deep Geological Disposal Site is constructed at an, as yet undecided, location.
WSGF’s current representative is board member Maureen Smith. The task involves very complex information but, as Maureen was a district councillor when Hinkley C was being planned, she is already familiar with the issues involved. She was fortunate when at school in Bristol in the 1960’s to have had an enlightened teacher (a nun and physicist also called Maureen) who gave the entire sixth form lessons in nuclear physics – possibly because Berkely, the first UK civil reactor, was being built nearby. The teacher also covered the problems that came with nuclear production including radiation, waste, Hiroshima and nuclear war. Maureen notes that the Cuban Missile crisis occurred at this time, which concentrated the mind!
Forum 21 and therefore WSGF, is currently neutral on the issue of nuclear energy. Information on the issues is available on website of fellow SSG member www.stophinkley.org. Whatever the future holds there is need to ensure that the community understands the process of managing the existing nuclear generation sites and their heritage so far and WSGF welcomes the opportunity to be part of this process.
For more information contact Maureen on rismoch@hotmail.com.