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Radioactive waste plan sparks protest

Apr 19 2009 by Phil Doherty, Sunday Sun

A US business consortium is applying for permission to turn a North landfill site into a dump for nuclear waste from all over the UK, the Sunday Sun has learned.

The Waste Recycling Group Ltd and EnergySolutions are preparing a submission to the Environment Agency to use the Lillyhall landfill site in Cumbria, and if the plans get the green light the site could start taking waste from October.

But Greenpeace said the proposal could “blight” the surrounding area, see house prices drop and open the door to further nuclear dumps at landfills.

A spokesman for the Waste Recycling Group said: “Our partners are EnergySolutions, a US company with contracts at Sellafield and extensive experience in handling such waste.

“We plan to submit our application in the next month. This will be for very low level nuclear waste from Sellafield.

“We will also be taking very low level material from the Drigg national repository, nearby.”

Since December private companies have been able to apply to take low level nuclear waste at landfill sites.

In the past all nuclear material was sent to Drigg, in Copeland, Cumbria.

But that facility was built to take intermediate and high level waste, and processing bulky low level waste at the site is expensive.

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