Hinkley radioactive mud: brief to Senedd Petitions Committee 17 April 2018

Petition P-05-785 Suspend Marine License 12/45/ML

Comments on NRW response of 27 March, from Friends of the Earth, Barry&Vale. 

We formulated a briefing earlier, on the basis of our FoI request to NRW for all documents relating to this license application held by them.  We are therefore confident that we have viewed most of the background material.  We enclose that briefing for use of the Committee and add the following re the latest NRW letter to you.

Contrary to NRW we see the Sampling of sediment as not primarily for public reassurance, as stated, but to meet licensing requirements.  Sampling at depth, as the Committee requested, is likewise needed to meet licensing requirements: Licence Condition 9.5 requires satisfying NRW that the material is suitable for deposit at the site.

1. The applicant’s refusal of deep samples is unacceptable.  

It depends on NRW’s statement “there is no scientific basis for any additional sampling” which is false.  The Committee were wrongly told earlier there is no scientific evidence of higher radioactivity in deeper sediments in the Hinkley Point area. (as on the NRW website).  The evidence is clear in the 2009 data for U238 and Radium, as in the reduced Table below: the numbers show 3 out of the 5 samples were significantly higher at depth (up to 3x for Radium - Ra). 

2. No specialist/expert assessment by Welsh authorities

   "we consulted Public Health Wales and NRW’s own internal expert in relation to the dose analysis results" 
 No report is provided (no transparency); this sentence refers only to the radiological dose, not to the chemical constituents.

3. The de minimis criteria are for disposal at sea. 

The IAEA-TECDOC-1375 defines this to include well-mixed near-coastal waters

“The disposal is assumed to take place a few kilometres off the coast so the actual shape of the coastline does not influence the dispersion significantly.”

The Severn Estuary site is not “sea” , but estuarial water with distinct circulation and ecology, which does not satisfy the IAEA criterion. 

4. Disposal in the Estuary requires information on dispersal of the radioactivity and use of a habits survey to calculate collective dose.  Cefas use a habits survey from the Cumbrian shore for sea-food consumption and beach-combers/recreation. The Severn Estuary is very different and sea-land transfer potentially much stronger.

5. the NRW letter does not cover the chemical contaminants, though they are required to assess their impacts.  Their Website says: Chemical contaminants were assessed against Cefas Action Levels[2]   UK guidelines to assess dredged material and its suitability for disposal to sea.   Several metal and organic contaminants were measured as above Action Level-1, yet no assessment has been made by NRW.

6. CEFAS say Dredged material with contaminant levels between Action Levels 1 and 2 requires further consideration and testing before a decision can be made.

The documents show no further assessment – which of course must be against the characteristics of the dump site and conducted under criteria relevant to it.  For this European “Special Area of Conservation”, criteria from biodiversity/Habitat legislation obviously come in, but none have been considered.  The end-fate of the contaminants must also enter, requiring consideration of the cited studies on deposition on the estuarial mud flats and transfer to marine life and to the land.

7. The Licence conditions 9.5, 9.11 require that the sediments are suitable for deposit and that dispersal via re-suspension should be avoided.  It’s not shown how this could be done in practice.  Discharge is planned by dropping from the barge, but the only way to ensure “deposit” of the bulk of the material is to discharge via pipe to the sea bottom at tidal extremes and minimising re-suspension requires cover with heavy material before inter-tidal currents become strong.

9.5. The Licence Holder must ensure that no material is deposited after 4th March 2016 without written confirmation from NRW, acting on behalf of the Licensing Authority, that they are satisfied the material is suitable for deposit at site LU110.

9.11. The Licence Holder must ensure that best practice is used to minimise re-suspension of sediment during these works.

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Data for U238 and Radium in 2009 samples taken at depth

3 out of the 5 samples were significantly higher at depth (up to 3x for Radium - Ra).  The NRW failure to require deep samples means only the 2009 data are representative of the bulk of the material to be dredged.  As there are so few data, the maximum plus a safety factor has to be adopted.  This raises CEFAS’s 5.8 μSv/yr calculated level, potentially to above the 10 μSv/yr limit.

Table B.15  Uranium-238 and Radium-226 concentrations for Vibro core samples  (also in [1] Appx B)

FUGRO survey of five locations in vicinity of intake, outfall and jetty, on 9/11 and 15/11 2009

Sample          U: surface/deep    Ra: surface/deep    depth           Date

1230/1231      48.73 / 46.13     25.25 / 27.65     4.35-4.42m      9/11

1232/1233      43.98 / 71.23     24.46 / 71.25     3.0-3.08m        9/11

1234/1235      39.46 / 41.25     22.43 / 30.30     4.7-4.8m          15/11

1236.1237      30.83 / 50.9       15.56 / 29.10     1.94-2.16m      15/11

1238/1239      50.65 / 68.56     25.29 / 73.57     3.0-4.12m        15/11

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Restart to our Webpage

WE are re-starting posting on this Webpage, to cover the many issues from Tidal Lagoons to Air Pollution.  

The incinerator campaign is covered primarily on the Facebook page: Stop the Barry Town Incinerator - where we have just won the NRW to accept full public consultation -  meeting at Castleland Community Centre 13th Feb.

Next meeting of Barry&Vale Friends of the Earth is 

              Tuesday  7th February, at 7-30 in the Castle Hotel, Jewel Street, Barry.

Several members attended the Aberthaw Power Station demonstration on Saturday, called by 'Reclaim the Power' to close down this highly polluting plant. We need Green Energy projects which make use of our tides, winds and the sun.

We are setting up air pollution (NO2) monitoring test tubes in Barry and the eastern Vale to expose the heaviest polluted areas.

At the latest LDP session, we put a strong case against the Cosmeston Green Field costal housing development.

We also appeared at the Five Mile Lane CPO Inquiry into converting this to a 60mph road through archaeological sites, SINCs and SSSI woodland.  This disrupts local farmers taking animals and equipment between fields. They include a much needed path/cycleway to the Hawking Centre, but refused to consider an alternative low-impact path from Waycock's Cross. 

The Group were pleased to see Councillors challenging the 'steamroller' of the Planning Department at their 5th January Planning Meeting, when the Northcliffe Lodge development (Penarth) and the United Reform Church development (Windsor Rd, Barry west end) were rejected.   We hope the Councillors will continue voting to protect the environment and rejecting crammed development. 

Note that the Planners struck back** after their defeat and tried to get a tight new "protocol" against Cllrs challenging their recommendations - but the non-Labour councillors combined to vote it down.

Keith Stockdale

Barry&Vale Friends of the Earth Coordinator

** AFTER NORTHCLIFF – THE VALE COUNCIL’S PLANNING EMPIRE STRIKES BACK

https://penarthnews.wordpress.com/2017/01/30/northcliff-lodge-defeat-has-changed-vale-planners-attitude-council-is-told/

Cardiff Incinerator challenge by CATI in High Court

NEWS FROM HIGH COURT    17-18th Dec.

The barrister Alex Goodman' case explained why Cardiff Council’s repeated delay to enforce against Viridor’s unlawful building work and failing to require retrospective permission was unique in British law.  Then Cardiff Council’s lawyer took 80 minutes, making brash assertions, some obviously in error. Viridor's barrister came in on Cardiff's side, claiming nothing wrong with starting building 8 months before permission, despite the Council telling them it was unlawful. There followed detailed argument on case law (Whitley Principles) then judge Wyn Wuilliams reserved his decision till later in January.

Cardiff council attacked over city incinerator

www.walesonline.co.uk

Cardiff council must “quash” decisions that allowed work to construct an incinerator to begin because they were taken unlawfully, Cardiff High Court heard today (17 December).

In an action brought by Cardiff Against The Incinerator campaigner Pauline Ellaway, barrister Alex Goodman told Judge Wyn Williams the authority had flouted regulations and allowed waste management firm Viridor to build in Splott when it should not have done so.

Dubbing the council’s actions “procedurally inept” he claimed the authority’s reports and consultation process were flawed and that it failed to stop work when it should have.

Mr Goodman insisted CATI’s “submissions fell on deaf ears because work was allowed to proceed.”

“No robust action was being taken in respect of development that was continuning apace,” Mr Goodman said.

Construction of the £185m plant started in July 2012 before planning conditions had been met.

Developers must “obtain consent and then commence works,” Mr Goodman insisted. “It is a simple sequence,” he said.

CATI’s solicitors repeatedly sent letters requesting enforcement be taken.

“Throughout the claimant has taken considerable action to encourage the council to take action,” Mr Goodman said.

“The council has always acknowledged it was unlawful and that the development was at risk.”

Despite this Mr Goodman said the authority allowed work to go ahead.

Petitions Committee acts over Waste Incineration policy

The National Assembly Petitions Committee held its 3rd oral session on petitions against incineration on Tuesday 29th, taking evidence over video-link from Prof. Vyvyan Howard of Ulster Univ. and Fellow of Royal College of Pathologists.

After questioning Prof. Howard, the committee agreed to:

• Issue a report on the issue of incineration of waste, and request a Plenary debate.
• Write to the Minister for Environment and Sustainable Development to ask him to consider the weight of support for this petition when considering the committee's letter calling for the Cardiff Incinerator plans to be called in.
• Write to those who have given evidence to Committee on this subject to seek their views on the modeling used to inform decisions in relation to Incinerators".

You can find Professor Howard's evidence on the Petitions Committee webpages (Item 2 of 29 May: P-04-341 Waste and Incineration) and see him answering questions from the Committee on the Senedd TV archive – click on 29th May.

His central argument was that official estimates of 'risk' from incinerator pollutants are flawed, giving single numbers when there is a wide envelope of uncertainty. The government relies on epidemiology, which is a "very blunt instrument". The research has not been carried out – both the hazard characterisation and exposures are very uncertain.  Those who present "unparameterised" modelling express an "opinion dressed up in numbers".  He explained exposures may be 100 times higher than estimates by comparing the Viridor claim for Cardiff of 0.24% of PM2.5 expected to come from their incinerator with the 17-32% actually measured in a small Swedish town due to a modern incinerator (meeting Euro-standards). The hazard of average incinerator PM2.5 may be many times worse than a power station's because of the toxic chemicals in waste and produced in burning. The very smallest (nanoparticles) fraction of PM2.5 are a worry as little can be done to filter them out and the volumes of emissions are very large.
[PM2.5 means particles smaller than 2.5micrometres, or 2500 nanometres, which humans breathe into their lungs. 
Nanoparticles means particles in the 10-100 nanometre range]

Llandow Fracking Inquiry 22-23 May

Friends of the Earth were well represented, with a statement from FoE Cymru's Director, Gareth Clubb and written plus verbal statements from Barry & Vale FoE - see Fracking Inquiry page.  Coastal Oil & Gas and the Vale Council discussed it as simply a test drilling operation, with CO&G claiming they were seeking ordinary coal-measure gas with no intentions for high-pressure fracking. They convinced no-one.  FoE argued the test drilling was part of a staged application for fracking and therefore needs full environmental impact assessment.  The Council had failed to 'screen' it for EIA, despite the Minister mentioning this in his letter declining to call-in the proposal.

FoE quoted the First Minister's letter of 29 Sept. to the Vale Council:

•  A “precautionary approach should be taken” and “additional environmental considerations” should be included. It referred to Minerals Planning Policy Wales (MPPW) which specifies “an environmentally acceptable way” of operation and being “consistent with the principles of sustainable development” for unconventional gas development.

The Vale Council officers had ignored this at the Planning Committee and did not argue for any 'additional' environmental precautions at this Inquiry.

There was a lengthy exchange about a Condition to be set on noise levels if the application was permitted. The Inspector first proposed noise guidance levels used for opencast mining and quarrying. FoE said no - to use the policy for industrial areas close to homes, with non-disturbing night-time levels in accord with WHO guidance.  The Vale officers failed to support FoE's approach, even though this was used at the Sunrise wood-burner inquiry.  So the issue is left to the Inspector's decision.  Whose side are the Vale officers on?

Scrap the Vale’s draft LDP (Local Development Plan)

The LDP is wrong not only for devoting huge greenfield areas for housing – a house-builders charter – but also

a) for suppressing all ideas of a Green Belt to the west of Cardiff.

FoE argued strongly for this at the 1999 Public Inquiry and won the argument against the Vale planners and won the Inspector’s support.  He recommended including all the eastern Vale up to Five-Mile-Lane, but the then Vale Council disregarded his arguments.  A Green Belt is the best way to resist developer pressures that would make the eastern Vale into residential suburbs for Cardiff.  Regional planning should meet more of Cardiff’s housing needs in Valley communities that want regeneration and have many brown-field sites waiting.  The LDP fails from the start in refusing to face these issues and going for quite ‘unsustainable’ development in sacrificing huge green-field areas.   

b) for allocating Barry dock for waste incinerators, with no full waste management plan as is required.

The Tory Cabinet and officers want to justify their past approvals of incinerators of waste wood and domestic waste amidst the light-industry businesses and close to housing on Dock View Road. They ignored waste-transporting lorry traffic, the high noise levels of power plant, the vast tonnages of potentially toxic ash that needs on-site processing, the probability of accidental fire and the inevitable emissions of toxic gases and dusts, all considerations for competent planning.

In addition to these obvious reasons, general policy says to site such plant adjacent to industrial heat users, as heat is the majority of the energy output. Barry's chemical complex has empty ex-industrial sites, and Dow Corning did express interest in the heat. Yet the LDP goes for incinerators (masquerading as 'waste management facilities') rather than devoting the half-empty dockland to mixed development with housing in accord with declared 'aspirations'.

The LDP has by law to include principles for an integrated waste plan and Friends of the Earth have put in a strong case that this one doesn't. It needs facilities for reclaiming waste materials including maximising recycling.  It has to justify incinerating household waste rather than previous policy for mechanical and bio-treatment after maximising recycling. It needs to show integration, including facilities for processing the ash from any incinerators. It's not acceptable to plan to send vast quantities of toxic ash for dumping in English landfills.

So Barry & Vale FoE wants Labour's scrapping the LDP to extend to scrapping its awful planning for waste and to addressing the Green Belt idea.

Wales Coast Path far from 'continuous' at Barry and Penarth

Barry and Vale FoE are very disappointed and critical of the lack of effort to implement the continuous coastal path within the Vale of Glamorgan. There's a huge gap east of Barry Island and another gap from Penarth Esplanade to the Cardiff Bay barrage.

This shows failure by officials to implement the declared concept of a "continuous" coast path. We raised this in March, the CCW official gave excuses (Countryside Council for Wales, see letter below) and CCW now talk of a "linked path". The local FoE group have asked the AM, Vaughan Gething to take up the particular gap in Penarth as well as the general failure.

1. Huge gap from Ty Hafan east of Sully to Barry Island, even omitting a km-stretch of the existing coast path to the Bendricks rocks.

As the Vale Council owns the Atlantic Trading Estate, the way from HMS Cambria to the lock at the mouth of Barry Dock has few problems.  Yet the CCW officials made no attempt to re-open the route across the lock to Barry Island, which the public used to use before ABP took over. The section of path from Ty Hafan hospice to the Bendricks rocks at the mouth of the Cadoxton river has been excluded, on the illegitimate excuse that the path and foreshore are owned by the hospice. Thus, we're given a huge diversion around Barry's chemical complex, along the main road through Cadoxton to the Docks Office and on further roads to Barry Island.

2. Failure to consider path around the base of Penarth Head, from the Barrage to Penarth Esplanade

The construction of this path was a commitment in the Cardiff Bay Barrage Act. The Vale of Glamorgan Council conceived a fancy, highly costly scheme (~£20million) that had to be cancelled.  But now, CCW are shielding the Welsh Government from this coast-path obligation. WAG did allocate £7.5 million to it in the Barrage Settlement, well over the Council estimate (£3million) for its cost at the time, to allow for costs in stabilising the cliff as coastal protection. FoE have asked the AM to put down a marker on this issue.

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CCW letter of  2/3/2012  relevant text extracts:

from Sue Rice, Access Programmes Manager                                 Ein cyf/Our ref:ATI 799

In respect of your recent enquiry 22 February 2012 for information (ATI 799) in which you

requested clarification on a number of points relating to the Wales Coast Path (WCP) in the Vale of Glamorgan, the route of which is shown on the attached plan.

Taking your points in order:

 

· Big gap between Bendricks rocks and Hayes Wood and public paths in the western dock

The WCP is routed around Barry Docks for a number of reasons. Firstly we wanted to ensure that the path was available 24/7, something that we could not guarantee if it was routed through the docks. Secondly it was felt that given the state of repair of much of the road surface in this area, and the considerable costs required to create a suitable path, the health and safety implications of using this route were unacceptable. When considering the route to the east of this area, regard was paid to the presence of Ty Hafan and I’m sure you would agree that it would be inappropriate to route the path through the grounds of this children’s hospice. As a result the route is as shown on the attached plan.

· No path around Penarth Headland to the Barrage

Whilst I appreciate that there have been plans in the past to create a route around Penarth headland to the Barrage, this has never formed part of the WCP. The costs of the proposed plan were far beyond the capabilities of our budgets, and it was felt that the health and safety implications related to rock falls and cliff erosion in this area made the creation of a path at the base of the cliffs impracticable. However, as a result the WCP does pass close to the centre of Penarth, ensuring that the town can take advantage of the economic benefits of the path.