§ Mr. Frank Cookasked the Secretary of State for the Environment when the surveillance mechanism operated by the Nuclear Energy Agency for controlling the disposal of nuclear waste at sea will next be tested.
§ Mr. WaldegraveUnder the mechanism formal notifications are required six months and three months before the internationally designated disposal site in the north Atlantic is used, and no notifications are current at the moment. The Nuclear Energy Agency is also co-ordinating an international research and environmental surveillance programme at the disposal site, and a progress report was published recently; a copy is in the Library of the House.
§ Mr. Frank Cookasked the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will publish a table giving details of discharges from nuclear sites into the sea, by year, since 1979.
§ Mr. WaldegraveThe information requested appears in the additional tables to my Department's annual digest of environmental pollution and water statistics, which are in the Library of the House. For the period to the end of 1981, it is in additional table 34 to digest No. 5 (1981). The corresponding table for 1982 will become available shortly. The figures for 1983 have not yet been compiled.