A critical report into the falsification of plutonium data at British Nuclear Fuel's Sellafield plant is to be published today by the chief inspector of Britain's Nuclear Installations Inspectorate. The 40-page study will call for changes at the plant in Cumbria and a spokesman said it "would not pull any punches".
The Green Party TD, Mr Trevor Sargent, said last night that the Irish Government had to co-operate with the British government to transform Sellafield into a decommissioning plant for nuclear fuels as the first step towards its total closure. He said the expertise at the plant could be best used to clean up the legacy of the nuclear industry, as reprocessing was no longer commercially viable. He described the falsification of the records at the plant as "not just irresponsible, but alarming and unbelievable".
A Dundalk solicitor, Mr James McQuill, who acts for members of a group which is taking a case against the plant, said it underlined the need for a comprehensive disclosure of the records at the plant to his clients. Since last October five process workers have been sacked after an investigation by the NII into claims that 22 manual checks on batches of uranium and plutonium mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel rods had been falsified.
An article in the London In- dependent newspaper claimed yesterday that the report would show falsification of data on a wider scale and for longer than first believed at the MOX plant, which began operations in 1994.
A BNFL spokesman said: "We are unable to comment on an unpublished report from our regulator. However the focus at the top of the company is on learning from these events and moving forward."
He said the company's achievements included an improving safety and environmental record, the introduction of new flexible working practices and a number of significant acquisitions.
But a spokesman for the Department of Trade and Industry said the findings would be taken into consideration by the British government, which had hoped to part-privatise BNFL soon.
Last Tuesday, the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, Mr Stephen Byers, told a Commons select committee: "The events (at Sellafield) show a fundamental flaw in the management of BNFL and that has to change."
An NNI spokesman said said the report would detail how, where and why falsification happened and by whom and would outline the lessons that needed to be learned.
The NNI spokesman added that although the rods were not necessarily unsafe, "the issue of falsifying data is a serious one and we would not recommend it in any place of work, especially one dealing with potentially dangerous material".
An official from the NII visited Sellafield last year after managers reported that irregularities had been noticed by their quality control team.
It was discovered that sampling of rods was not carried out and the records which showed it had been done were copied from previous checks.
One of BNFL's largest contracts is with Japan, which is planning to run up to 18 reactors on the fuel rods by 2010.
At the time of the discovery last year, two shipments were already on the way to Japan and were not believed to be affected.
Last week, the Japanese government demanded that a shipment of MOX fuel was returned to Britain.
Mr Tom O'Flaherty, chief executive of the Radiological Protection Institute of Ireland, said he had yet to see any official report and it was too early to comment on the situation at Sellafield without having seen full document.