THE Minister of State for Energy urged the British government to abandon plans to build an underground nuclear waste dump at Sellafield in the interests of Angloirish relations as he submitted further objections to the Department of the Environment in London yesterday.
Although Mr Emmet Stagg said he hoped the Environment Secretary, Mr John Gummer, would immediately consider his 14 page submission, he predicted that the final decision on the future of the £1.8 billion dump, planned by Nirex, would not be taken until after the British general election.
However, Mr Stagg warned that if the proposals for the dump - 1,000 metres below Sellafield - went ahead it would be a "bone of contention" between the two countries for years to come.
"It is a potential source of conflict. It is permanent and irreversible, unlike other plants at Sellafield, which can be decommissioned after they have been put in place. This will be a bone of contention between these islands which share a common boundary, the Irish Sea," he said.
After describing the evidence against the plant as "overwhelming", Mr Stagg said the Government was examining the possibility of a legal challenge and had asked the European Commission to consider the case.
"I am determined to do everything possible to prevent a permanent storage or disposal site for nuclear waste material being built so close to the Irish Sea," he added.
Mr Stagg said this latest submission was prompted by new scientific evidence, which had been leaked to the British media, questioning the plant's safety regulations. "The most worrying aspect is the fact that an internal Nirex memorandum by its Director of Science, Dry John Holmes, is at variance with Nirex's previous public statements," he added.
Dr Holmes's memo predicted that Nirex would "struggle" to make a case for the plant's development. In his report, Mr Stagg suggested these comments showed the "grave doubts about the site evaluation and lack of confidence in the heart of Nirex's own scientific division."
He also said he was "most perturbed and disturbed" by independent scientific advice which suggested that the actual building of the underground rock laboratory would weaken and degrade the site.
However, a spokeswoman for Nirex insisted the Government's, report contained nothing new and said the company was still optimistic that Mr Gummer would grant planning permission for the plant.