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Nuclear clean-up costs
I wonder why Professor Stephen Salter (Letters, 9 October) mischievously persists in associating the cost of operating nuclear power stations, especially those owned and operated by British Energy, with the "clean-up" cost faced by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA). The latter may eventually supervise decommissioning at British Energy's sites, but at present it is only dealing with the decommissioning at 21 former UKAEA and BNFL sites. These include all the Magnox power station sites, together with Sellafield and Dounreay.
More than half the NDA's decommissioning cost is allocated to decommissioning the Sellafield site.
British Energy is not responsible for any sites except its own; it regularly contributes to a fund intended to cover the cost of decommissioning its sites and the disposal of its radioactive waste.
Prof Salter mentions a cost of £73 billion, but the NDA's website gives an estimated total lifetime cost across all the 21 sites, discounted at 2.2 per cent per year, of just over £37 billion. Costs are offset somewhat by income still being generated from some of Magnox sites, by Sellafield and by the Springfields fuel manufacturing plant.
However, this estimated total cost assumes the Thorp reprocessing and vitrification plant will cease operation in 2011, that the Mox (fuel) plant will cease production in 2016 and that the Springfields fuel manufacturing plant will close in 2022. If new stations are built, these may need to operate for much longer and may never be decommissioned (just upgraded). The NDA could also benefit from the sale of some of its sites to new nuclear operators.
STEUART CAMPBELL Dovecot Loan Edinburgh
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