British Nuclear Group court case - transcript and sentence

On 16th October 2006, British Nuclear Group, the operator of the massive Sellafield nuclear complex, was in the Crown Court in Carlisle to face sentencing over an accident that led to the shut-down of the THORP spent nuclear fuel reprocessing plant.

The case, brought by the Health and Safety Executive (North West) centred on the events that led up to 83,000 litres of highly radioactive dissolved spent fuel leaking into the area beneath a tank in the reprocessing facility.

As the case revealed, the leak - which went undetected for eight months - was the result of a succession of operator and technical failures going back to the late 1990s.

The judge sentenced British Nuclear Group to pay £500,000 in fines and costs of almost £70,000. It is the largest ever fine imposed on Bitish Nuclear Group (this was not its first prosecution).

The £2.5bn plant, which was closed in April 2005 for repairs, is not expected to re-open until January 2007 - if then. Estimates of the financial losses - due to the closure - to the government's Nuclear Decommissioned Authority, which owns THORP, stand at between £60m-£400m.

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