Down in the dumps [plans to bury Britain's nuclear waste]

UK Nirex is about to issue its revised conclusions on its favoured site for a waste repository that will contain the nation's low-level and intermediate-level radioactive waste. The original conclusions, concentrating on the geology at Sellafield, Cumbria, and the likely movement of groundwater passing through the site about 800m underground, were widely rubbished. Nirex says it will have to delay its planning application for the repository until autumn 1993. It is unsure of its ability to present a convincing case for groundwater flows in the future. The National Radiological Protection Board is assessing the risk over the next 10 000 years. Longer than that is meaningless it says. (Author)