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And just when British Energy was going to be sold off to the French for a tidy sum. Once again the best laid plans of mice and men. Paul Brown's report is available in PDF format here.
Shutdowns and Plunging Profits Cast Doubt on Nuclear Future - Guardian (UK) - 29 May 08
"British Energy, the nuclear power group, reported a sharp fall in profits yesterday - the same day a series of mishaps at its stations left more than 60% of its capacity out of action."
"The problems come as a report today into the failings of the UK nuclear industry casts doubt on British Energy's prospects and is likely to alarm foreign power firms preparing to launch multibillion-pound bids for it. The study, published by Friends of the Earth and written by former Guardian journalist Paul Brown, claims the company could be forced to shut down some plants because the reprocessing facility at Sellafield is running out of storage space."
"Many of the companies considering a bid, such as EDF of France, want to use the UK company's sites for constructing a new generation of plants. They insist they do not need financial help to do so. But Brown concludes: 'The economics of new nuclear power stations for the UK do not add up. It is not possible to achieve what the government says it will do - build a new generation of nuclear power stations in England without public subsidy.'
Ministers had made many promises over the past 50 years that nuclear would pay its own way, Brown says, only to see huge new liabilities develop. The government had underwritten all the debts of British Energy when it collapsed in 2001 so the company can never go bankrupt, a commitment that dwarfs that made to the nationalised bank Northern Rock."
The Many Problems of Sellafield - Guardian (UK) - 28 May 08
"It was built amid enthusiasm that atomic power would be 'too cheap to meter' and yet, 52 years on, its catalogue of failures has left it with one of the world's largest stockpiles of plutonium and a bill to the taxpayer of about £3bn a year, a new report says.
Paul Brown, author of Voodoo Economics and the Doomed Nuclear Renaissance, says: 'The nuclear dream has turned into an economic and security nightmare for the British taxpayer. The extent of the problems at Sellafield has not been fully explained to the public; nor have the potential knock-on effects for the whole nuclear industry. But research shows the situation is getting rapidly worse.'"
Sellafield's Nuclear Waste 'More Dangerous' Than Chernobyl - Irish Times - 29 May 08
"Compiled for Friends of the Earth by veteran British environmental journalist Paul Brown, the report says the 2012 deadline for closing the Magnox reprocessing facility at Sellafield has now been abandoned and that the Thorp plant will have to remain open until 2015. The study recalls that Britain's 'nuclear recycling centre' has suffered 'many near disastrous episodes in its history; but accidents and technical and management failures in the past 10 years have brought this production line of linked nuclear factories to a crisis'.
'Sellafield is the home of the world's biggest stockpile of plutonium and uranium,' writes Mr Brown. The Magnox plant - described as Sellafield's 'workhorse' - has produced an unused stockpile of 103 tonnes of plutonium and more than 30,000 tonnes of uranium."
Shutdowns and Plunging Profits Cast Doubt on Nuclear Future - Guardian (UK) - 29 May 08
"British Energy, the nuclear power group, reported a sharp fall in profits yesterday - the same day a series of mishaps at its stations left more than 60% of its capacity out of action."
"The problems come as a report today into the failings of the UK nuclear industry casts doubt on British Energy's prospects and is likely to alarm foreign power firms preparing to launch multibillion-pound bids for it. The study, published by Friends of the Earth and written by former Guardian journalist Paul Brown, claims the company could be forced to shut down some plants because the reprocessing facility at Sellafield is running out of storage space."
"Many of the companies considering a bid, such as EDF of France, want to use the UK company's sites for constructing a new generation of plants. They insist they do not need financial help to do so. But Brown concludes: 'The economics of new nuclear power stations for the UK do not add up. It is not possible to achieve what the government says it will do - build a new generation of nuclear power stations in England without public subsidy.'
Ministers had made many promises over the past 50 years that nuclear would pay its own way, Brown says, only to see huge new liabilities develop. The government had underwritten all the debts of British Energy when it collapsed in 2001 so the company can never go bankrupt, a commitment that dwarfs that made to the nationalised bank Northern Rock."
The Many Problems of Sellafield - Guardian (UK) - 28 May 08
"It was built amid enthusiasm that atomic power would be 'too cheap to meter' and yet, 52 years on, its catalogue of failures has left it with one of the world's largest stockpiles of plutonium and a bill to the taxpayer of about £3bn a year, a new report says.
Paul Brown, author of Voodoo Economics and the Doomed Nuclear Renaissance, says: 'The nuclear dream has turned into an economic and security nightmare for the British taxpayer. The extent of the problems at Sellafield has not been fully explained to the public; nor have the potential knock-on effects for the whole nuclear industry. But research shows the situation is getting rapidly worse.'"
Sellafield's Nuclear Waste 'More Dangerous' Than Chernobyl - Irish Times - 29 May 08
"Compiled for Friends of the Earth by veteran British environmental journalist Paul Brown, the report says the 2012 deadline for closing the Magnox reprocessing facility at Sellafield has now been abandoned and that the Thorp plant will have to remain open until 2015. The study recalls that Britain's 'nuclear recycling centre' has suffered 'many near disastrous episodes in its history; but accidents and technical and management failures in the past 10 years have brought this production line of linked nuclear factories to a crisis'.
'Sellafield is the home of the world's biggest stockpile of plutonium and uranium,' writes Mr Brown. The Magnox plant - described as Sellafield's 'workhorse' - has produced an unused stockpile of 103 tonnes of plutonium and more than 30,000 tonnes of uranium."
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