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Nuclear Safety

Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 4 December 2012

Tuesday, 4 December 2012

Questions (425, 426, 427)

Brian Stanley

Question:

425. Deputy Brian Stanley asked the Minister for the Environment; Community and Local Government the cost in producing the report Risks to Ireland from Incidents at the Sellafield Site; and if the British Government covered any of this cost. [54577/12]

View answer

Brian Stanley

Question:

426. Deputy Brian Stanley asked the Minister for the Environment; Community and Local Government the terms of reference for those who drafted the report Risks to Ireland from Incidents at the Sellafield Site. [54578/12]

View answer

Brian Stanley

Question:

427. Deputy Brian Stanley asked the Minister for the Environment; Community and Local Government if he remains opposed to the Sellafield plant and other installations in the UK which pose a risk to our people [54579/12]

View answer

Written answers

I propose to take Questions Nos. 425 to 427, inclusive, together.

In 2008, a joint confidential technical information exchange project relating to Sellafield and its associated facilities was set up by the Irish and British Governments. The shared objective of the project was to provide an established co-operative process for sharing information and addressing any technical issues arising. This represented a significant advance in addressing Ireland’s long-standing concerns about Sellafield.

The Government engaged a team of independent technical experts that included nuclear physicists, chemists and engineers. The expert team brought specialist knowledge and expertise which is not readily available within the Irish Government system due to the absence of a nuclear power generation or reprocessing industry here. The function of the team was to conduct a comprehensive, objective and scientific assessment of the technical information on Sellafield and its associated facilities made available from the intergovernmental exchange project. The key output is a Probabilistic Risk Assessment (PRA) report of the risks to Ireland and Irish interests from incidents at the Sellafield nuclear site.

The team paid a number of site visits to Sellafield, examined various facilities, accessed extensive documentation, and conducted a number of technical exchanges with operators at the site and with UK regulators which enabled the team to develop reliable, accurate, risk models and calculations. The expert team used additional sources of information such as their own knowledge of operating history and data from similar nuclear facilities around the world to make expert judgments.

On completion of the project, the team produced a 1,000 page main report. A public summary document was released as the team recommended that the full report should not be published because to have such a substantial volume of security-sensitive information in the public domain would serve to increase the risks posed by Sellafield to both the UK and to Ireland. This 4 year project cost €4.8m gross, or €4.0m net of VAT. As the team’s brief was explicitly to assess the risks posed to Ireland from Sellafield, the UK did not meet any of these costs, though the UK would have incurred its own costs through, for example, facilitating the information exchange and hosting site visits.

My Department and others will now study the information in the report in detail and use it in the context of Government policies relating to Sellafield and the nuclear sector more broadly. Ireland must continue to be vigilant in relation to Sellafield as work to decommission the site over the lifetime of the “Sellafield Plan” continues. It is critical from an Irish perspective that the UK decommissioning of the site is undertaken safely and in accordance with best international practice. The finalisation of this report marks the improved information sharing process that has developed between the Irish and UK Governments since 2008. Particularly given our status as a non-nuclear country, Ireland looks forward to continued timely sharing of key information with the UK authorities in the future on nuclear matters, including Sellafield and the UK nuclear new-build programme.

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