Pollution ruling delays Sizewell B

THE GOVERNMENT took the surprise decision yesterday to delay opening Sizewell B, Britain's first pressurised-water reactor nuclear power station.

The move was greeted with dismay by some senior executives in the industry.

It will impose extra costs of at least pounds 30m on Nuclear Electric, owner of the pounds 2bn Suffolk plant.

It may also delay still farther the Government's long-awaited review of the nuclear industry and finally dash prospects for privatisation.

The delay has been imposed by HM Inspectorate of Pollution, which is requiring public consultations on the justification and need for the plant, because Sizewell will routinely discharge small quantities of radioactivity into the

environment.

Nuclear Electric had expected to get an authorisation for the discharges this month, allowing work to proceed in time for the plant to open in the autumn.

The state-owned company, which owns and operates nuclear power stations in England and Wales, is putting a brave face on the news and hopes that the consultations and assessment will take only a couple of months, allowing it to open the plant before Christmas.

The company estimates that every day's delay will cost it pounds 500,000 in lost electricity sales.

However, the opening of British Nuclear Fuels' Thorp reprocessing plant at Sellafield in Cumbria was delayed for nearly two years by a series of public consultations and HMIP's subsequent assessments.

The decision to seek consultations comes after a court case which the environmental lobby group Greenpeace brought against Thorp this year.

Although Greenpeace failed to prevent the plant from opening, Mr Justice Potts ruled that recent environmental protection laws required that the 'detriment' caused by radioactive discharges into the environment had to be justified in terms of demonstrable benefits which outweighed the environmental costs.

The pollution inspectorate believes that the judge's ruling sets a precedent which will also apply to Sizewell, even though its discharges are considerably smaller.

Nuclear industry sources pointed out that while the case for Thorp was examined in a public inquiry held in 1977, some 15 years before the plant was completed, the case for Sizewell was made to a public inquiry which concluded in 1988.

In the wake of the coal review, the Commons Select Committee on Trade and Industry also examined the justification for keeping the nuclear industry and concluded in January last year that Sizewell should go ahead.