March 17, 2014

UK GOVâ€™T SEEKS COMMENT ON STALLED REPOSITORY SITING PROCESS

By ExchangeMonitor

The UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change yesterday asked for comments to help re-start the country’s search for a permanent nuclear waste disposal site after its single promising effort was voted down by a local county council early this year. In a release May 13, the Department asked that comments—particularly from those involved in the siting process—be provided before June 10. Those comments will inform “a consultation that will follow later in the year,” the announcement states. And, the Department wrote, “The Government remains firmly committed to geological disposal as the right policy for the long-term safe and secure management of higher-activity radioactive waste, and continues to hold the view that the best means of selecting a site for a geological disposal facility is an approach based on voluntarism and partnership.” You can download the response document here.

In January, the Cumbria County Council voted to quit the process for siting a geologic disposal facility for the UK’s nuclear waste nearby, halting the search. Three local authorities had formally expressed an interest: Copeland and Allerdale Borough Councils, and Cumbria County Council. In January 2013, the three local authorities voted on whether to proceed to stage 4 of the process. The votes were the culmination of more than four years of work to identify a volunteer community to host an underground waste disposal facility to dispose of the UK’s existing and future nuclear wastes.

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