Views sought over nuclear waste

The Harwell reactor site is being turned into a business park

Residents living near a decommissioned nuclear reactor in Oxfordshire are being consulted on plans for the disposal of nuclear waste.

Some nuclear waste is currently being stored at the decommissioned reactor at Harwell, near Didcot, the headquarters of the UK Atomic Energy Authority.

The reactor closed in 2002 and the site is to become a business park.

Residents are being invited to have their say on the disposal of waste over the next few decades.

Secret report

A nationwide consultation is being carried out by the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management (CoRWM) before it gives its recommendations for the long-term disposal of UK nuclear waste to the Department of the Environment in June 2006.

CoRWM is not considering where any potential waste disposal facilities would be situated.

Nirex, a radioactive waste consultancy advising the government, is expected to publish a list of potential sites which were considered in the 1980s but kept secret since.

The list is now being released as part of the new freedom of information legislation.

Nirex says the report is a historical document and it will not be the starting point of any strategy for deciding where waste disposal sites will be placed.