scholarly journals Applying for development consent during lockdown: The Sizewell C Nuclear Power Station

2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 81-84
Author(s):  
Catherine Ann Caine

The UK is currently facing unprecedented times as Covid-19 has forced the country into lockdown. However, the recent development consent application from EDF Energy for the Sizewell C Nuclear Power Station provides an opportunity for the planning sector to begin to return to normal. This opinion considers whether it is possible to achieve full public consultation on the Sizewell C Nuclear Power Station application, given the current circumstances that the UK faces due to Covid-19. It is argued that the Planning Inspectorate has not currently taken sufficient action to ensure that members of the public who do not have internet access and those who require library access to make representations are not left out of the process. It is also argued that businesses and non-governmental organisations may also struggle to make representations at a time when they are suffering from limited resources. In conclusion, it is essential that the Planning Inspectorate takes immediate action to ensure that the public consultation process is preserved for applications of this kind while Covid-19 restrictions are in place.

2016 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-98 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victoria Uren ◽  
Daniel Wright ◽  
James Scott ◽  
Yulan He ◽  
Hassan Saif

Purpose – This paper aims to address the following challenge: the push to widen participation in public consultation suggests social media as an additional mechanism through which to engage the public. Bioenergy companies need to build their capacity to communicate in these new media and to monitor the attitudes of the public and opposition organizations towards energy development projects. Design/methodology/approach – This short paper outlines the planning issues bioenergy developments face and the main methods of communication used in the public consultation process in the UK. The potential role of social media in communication with stakeholders is identified. The capacity of sentiment analysis to mine opinions from social media is summarised and illustrated using a sample of tweets containing the term “bioenergy”. Findings – Social media have the potential to improve information flows between stakeholders and developers. Sentiment analysis is a viable methodology, which bioenergy companies should be using to measure public opinion in the consultation process. Preliminary analysis shows promising results. Research limitations/implications – Analysis is preliminary and based on a small dataset. It is intended only to illustrate the potential of sentiment analysis and not to draw general conclusions about the bioenergy sector. Social implications – Social media have the potential to open access to the consultation process and help bioenergy companies to make use of waste for energy developments. Originality/value – Opinion mining, though established in marketing and political analysis, is not yet systematically applied as a planning consultation tool. This is a missed opportunity.


Subject The project to build a new nuclear power station at Hinkley Point. Significance Reports that construction of the planned nuclear power station at Hinkley Point may be postponed will raise further concerns about the project's prospects as well as the long-term direction of the UK electricity sector. The reports follow weeks of debate in the United Kingdom and France over whether construction should go ahead and over further delays in the final investment decision on the project (now scheduled for May). Impacts Depending on how the French government decides to support EDF, approval by the European Commission may be needed. The Austrian government has legally challenged the Commission's approval of UK plans to support the project. The UK government's existing plans for maintaining electricity supply -- the so-called 'capacity auctions' -- may need to be revisited.


Author(s):  
J. H. Gittus ◽  
M. R. Hayns

SynopsisRisk involves consideration both of the consequences of accidents and the frequency with which the accidents occur. Indeed formally risk is equal to the product of frequency and consequences. The important question of the perception of risk by the public and by the professional is first addressed. Two tenets are proposed as being a suitable summary of the public requirement:1. If it can happen, then it must not matter.2. If it matters, then it must not happen.A mathematical interpretation is placed upon these tenets and is shown to be consistent with various professional safety targets. The tenets do not indicate what numerical values for risk would be acceptable to the public but they do show how the consequences of accidents should diminish as the frequency or likelihood of a particular accident increases. It is argued that the best way of determining what level of risk the public accepts is to be guided by statistics for man-caused accidents. These, it transpires, pose risks which are considerably greater than those implied, for example, by the professional targets for nuclear reactors. The risk posed to the public by two energy installations is summarised. The one installation, situated on Canvey Island, exports energy in the form of gas, some of which (methane) is pumped into a national gas grid. The other installation, the Sizewell “B” Pressurised Water Reactor nuclear power station has not yet been constructed, but a comprehensive risk assessment has been undertaken, the results of which are summarised. The two installations are comparable in the sense that each exports a power of the order of a million kilowatts (in the form of gas in the one case and electricity in the other). Both have been the subject of Public Inquiries. The risks posed by the Canvey installations are accepted, since they only constitute a small fraction of the risks which the public run in any case during the course of their everyday lives. The predicted risks for the PWR are smaller still. The form taken by the risks posed by both installations corresponds broadly with the two tenets. That is to say the greater the consequences the lower should be the frequency of a particular accident.


Author(s):  
Denis Buckley

Early in 2011 Oldbury Nuclear Power station in South West England applied to the Office of Nuclear Regulation (ONR) to de-license an area of over 30 hectares of licensed land. This is the largest area of licensed land in the UK to undergo this procedure. As part of the process the site prepared a safety case to support the submission to the ONR. Also there has been a requirement to do sampling and analysis to characterise the land and show that any radioactive contamination is below the criterion for de-licensing. This has been achieved through the successful application of the Data Quality Objective (DQO) process which enabled both site and regulators to agree on the quantity of samples and the degree of analysis. The ONR has now issued the variation to Oldbury in July 2011 de-licensing approximately 32 hectares of land from regulatory control. This Paper outlines the process including the decisions and criteria that have been applied to the Sampling and Analysis at Oldbury and the Treatment and Interpretation of the data.


2014 ◽  
Vol 672-674 ◽  
pp. 418-421
Author(s):  
Yu Lan Wang

Nuclear energy as an economical, safe and clean energy is being increasingly concerned, and nuclear power stations have also been widely built in the world. However, because of the impact from nuclear events, the safety of nuclear power station has been suspected by the public. First, the development situation of the nuclear power station in the world is described. Then the nuclear power station containment is introduced. Meanwhile, the safety performance of nuclear power station containment under external events are analyzed. Some advices on guaranteeing the security work of nuclear power station containment are given.


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