§ Mr. JackTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will make a statement on the consultation exercises so far undertaken to evaluate the environmental impact of the proposed MOX Plant (SMP) at BNFL Sellafield. [114796]
§ Mr. MeacherIn November 1996 BNFL sought approval from the Environment Agency to bring the Sellafield MOX plant into operation. The Environment Agency consulted on issues associated with the justification of the MOX plant, including its environmental impact, between February and April 1997.
Respondents to this consultation raised a number of environmental issues and, in addition, some expressed concern about the lack of information provided by BNFL
543Won the economic case. Consequently, the Agency engaged a firm of financial consultants, PA Consulting Group, to carry out an independent assessment of BNFL's economic case for the plant.
The Environment Agency then carried out a second round of consultation between January and March 1998, based on a public domain version of the PA report—which excluded certain material on the grounds of commercial confidentiality.
The Agency issued their draft decisions on the operation of the MOX plant on 2 November 1998. By this stage, Ministers had received a number of requests for them to use their powers of `call-in' to intervene in the Agency's decisions.
In looking at the advice from the Environment Agency and the representations they had received, Ministers decided that the amount of information excluded on the grounds of commercial confidentiality from the public domain version of the PA report was more than strictly necessary, and that there had been developments in the potential market for MOX fuel which led them to consider that there should be further public scrutiny of BNFL's business case. Ministers therefore consulted again between May and June 1999 on the basis of a significantly greater disclosure of information on the economic case and were considering the responses to this consultation when data falsification at the Sellafield MOX Demonstration Facility first came to light.
The implications of the data falsification will of course be fully considered before Ministers make their final decisions.
§ Mr. JackTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions when his Department and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food expect to publish the results of their last round of consultations on the operation by BNFL of its MOX plant (SMP) at Sellafield. [114816]
§ Mr. Meacher[holding answer 20 March 2000]: Ministers will announce their decisions only when they have fully considered all responses to the consultation exercise and the implications of all recent evidence, including the data falsification incident at the Sellafield MOX Demonstration Facility.
Ministers will announce their decisions as soon as they are made. At the same time my Department will publish a decision document, setting out the reasons for their decisions in full.
§ Mr. JackTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what factors are currently preventing BNFL from operating commercially the Sellafield MOX plant (SMP). [114817]
§ Mr. Meacher[holding answer 20 March 2000]: The Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions and the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food are still considering whether to intervene in the Environment Agency's draft decisions on the Sellafield MOX plant. They will make a decision only when they have examined all the evidence before them, including the responses to the consultation exercise held by Ministers last year and the implications of the recent data falsification incident at the Sellafield MOX Demonstration Facility.
544WOnly if Ministers decide not to intervene will BNFL be free to proceed to the next stage of commissioning of the plant and its subsequent operation, subject also to licence approval by the Health and Safety Executive's Nuclear Installations Inspectorate.
§ Mr. JackTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what conclusions were reached in the PA Consultancy Group report on the BNFL proposal to operate the MOX plant (SMP) at Sellafield. [114818]
§ Mr. Meacher[holding answer 20 March 2000]: The report by PA Consulting Group on the economic case for the Sellafield MOX plant formed part of the consultation package on which comments were invited, copies of which were placed in the House of Commons Library on 11 June 1999.