Pin the Tail on the Nuclear Donkey
- wastwater1
- Mar 18
- 3 min read
The game is afoot as the target area for the outrageous plan to dump plutonium (a whole new nasty mission creep) and high level wastes narrows down.
The area is narrowing down to ...surprise surprise the exact same spot as the failed nuclear dump in the 1990s. NIREX was the forerunner of Nuclear Waste Services and their plan for a Rock Characterisation Facility aka a Trojan Horse for a full blown nuclear dump for low and intermediate level wastes was refused as being far too dangerous. That was at Longlands Farm, Gosforth which is now the Wasdale Mountain Rescue Centre - a far better outcome for the land than a nuclear dump.
So what is the state of play now? There are three Areas of Focus two in Cumbria and one in Lincolnshire.
In Cumbria one of the two Areas of Focus, the so-called "South Copeland Community Partnership Area of Focus" is unravelling with communities within the area increasingly saying no to the plan
Jan Bridget a local historian has written "BANK HEAD SAY NO TO NUCLEAR DUMP
A ‘willing’ community is the cornerstone of government’s drive to find a Geological Disposal Facility aka nuclear dump. Simon Hughes, Nuclear Waste Services Head of Siting, has stated, “The policy surrounding our search for a safe and suitable location for a Geological Disposal Facility (GDF) in the UK is emphatic. It requires the express consent of the people who would be living alongside a GDF, and gives them influence over the pace at which discussions progress.” Residents in the two areas of South Copeland who will be living alongside the focus area, i.e. Kirksanton and Bank Head housing estate, have resoundingly said they are NOT a willing community.
In 2023 Whicham Parish Council surveyed their residents and found 76% were opposed to a GDF being sited there. Now, the other area most affected, Bank Head housing estate near HMP Haverigg, have also rejected the idea and are asking Millom Town Council, Cumberland Council and their MP Michelle Scrogham, for help to stop it.
After meeting their MP, residents of Bank Head conducted the survey at her suggestion – Millom Town Council have refused to conduct a similar survey, so residents took it into their own hands. With a return rate of 68.3%, 78.7% have said no to a GDF, 11.7% yes and 5.2% don’t know."
Meanwhile Lincolnshire has seen a vigorous and successful campaign against the plans to nuclearise their previously nuclear free county. "Lincolnshire County Council leader announces intention to withdraw from Nuclear Waste Services’ Community Partnership. This would effectively cancel the company’s consideration of the Lincolnshire coast for a Geological Disposal Facility (GDF). Cllr Martin Hill OBE, leader of Lincolnshire County Council, said: “When we took up Nuclear Waste Services’ (NWS, then called ‘Radioactive Waste Management’) invitation to join a working group in 2021, we did so with an open mind, knowing that residents themselves could make the decision as to whether it was right for the area. ...the area that NWS is considering for the entry point to the GDF has shifted to open farmland, a couple of miles up the coast and further inland. This changes the very nature of the proposal and, understandably, raised further concerns within the local community."
So it looks very much like the nuclear donkey is being lined up. The line of least resistance (unless!) is the so called Mid-Copeland Community Partnership Area of Focus which surprise surprise is the area already nuclearised and blighted by the Sellafield atomic waste sprawl This is in fact, notwithstanding the nuclear sprawl in its midst, a beautiful and ancient land which would have been known to Wordsworth, Beatrix Potter and Ruskin as the Lake District. Does the Lake District really want enormous mine shafts trundling nuclear wastes to a gargantuan sub-sea mine just a few miles from Britain's Favourite View - Wastwater? The Mid-Copeland Area of Focus includes a wealth of historic and culturally important sites such as Grey Croft Stone Circle and Viking Treasure Trove. Some of these historic sites have already been lost such as Newton Manor bought by the Nuclear Decomissioning Authority and deliberately allowed to disintegrate, finally being demolished as unsafe. It is clear that the nuclear mafia are returning to the area they think most nuclear compliant and least likely to resist - but resist we must with as much vigour as we can muster to stop this plan to dump high level (and very hot) nuclear wastes under the Irish Sea in a vast earthquake inducing mine.
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