Recorded in 2015.
Berkeley Nuclear Power Station was built in 1969 and taken out of service in 1989. Because of the radioactivity still present in the reactor buildings, the site cannot be fully demolished until around 2074.
In this in‑depth investigation, Site Director Steve McNally explains that some waste will remain hazardous for up to 5,000 years and must be stored safely on site until a national geological disposal facility is created.
We hear how the two sealed reactor buildings are only entered every five years for inspection, and how the radioactive graphite cores will remain inside until a long‑term solution is found.
Simon Bedford describes the removal of fifteen giant boilers — still radioactive internally — which were shipped to Sweden for cutting up and recycling.
Paul Oswald, Head of Projects, outlines the construction of a new waste‑storage warehouse capable of holding steel‑boxed nuclear waste for up to 150 years.
Kirsty Roger explains her £270‑million project to remove 21 double‑decker‑bus loads of nuclear waste from four vaults and transfer them across the site to the new storage facility — a process expected to take eight years.
Government Consultation Extract (for information only)
Higher‑activity radioactive wastes are produced from electricity generation, nuclear fuel processing, industrial uses, medicine, research, and military programmes. As one of the pioneers of nuclear technology, the UK has accumulated a substantial legacy of such materials.
Some waste is already in safe interim storage, but much more will only become waste as older facilities are decommissioned over the next century. These wastes can remain hazardous for hundreds of thousands of years.
While modern interim storage is safe, it requires ongoing human intervention. The UK Government is committed to delivering a permanent geological disposal solution.
View the Government Consultation Document
Visit the Berkeley site information page:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/our-sites#berkeley-site
Originally broadcast 2015
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