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A
top-secret plant at Aldermaston that makes enriched uranium components for
Britain's nuclear warheads and fuel for the Royal Navy's submarines has been
shut down because corrosion has been discovered in its "structural
steelwork", the Guardian can reveal.
The
closure has been endorsed by safety regulators who feared the building did not
conform to the appropriate standards. The nuclear safety watchdog demands that
such critical buildings are capable of withstanding "extreme weather and
seismic events", and the plant at Aldermaston failed this test.
It
has set a deadline of the end of the year for the problems to be fixed.
Although
the closed plant has not been officially named for national security reasons,
the Guardian understands it is known as A45. It makes enriched uranium
components for Trident nuclear warheads and has recently been helping to make
the uranium fuel for the Astute generation of nuclear-powered submarines.
The
Ministry of Defence insisted it had contingency plans to cover the loss of the
plant, but prolonged closure could force the government to buy materials from
the US to ensure there is no disruption to Britain's nuclear weapons programme.
The
government's safety watchdog, the Office for Nuclear Regulation has taken legal
enforcement action against AWE, the private consortium that runs the nuclear
weapons complex at Aldermaston, Berkshire, ordering that the corroded steel be
repaired.
Though
the corrosion was first found last May and the enforcement notice served in
November, the information only emerged via an ONR newsletter published online
in the past few days. This has prompted critics to accuse AWE of not being
forthcoming about a problem it detected eight months ago.
The
ONR confirmed that inspections by AWE "discovered an unexpected area of
corrosion on structural steelwork in one of their manufacturing facilities at
Aldermaston".
The
ONR launched an investigation that concluded AWE had breached a condition of
its operating licence meant to ensure safe operation. "AWE had not fully
complied with licence condition 28(1) in so far as its arrangements to examine,
maintain and inspect the structure were not adequate to prevent the degradation
of the structure, and the resulting challenge to its nuclear safety
functions," said an ONR spokesman.
AWE
is run for the Ministry of Defence by a group of three private companies:
Lockheed Martin and Jacobs Engineering Group from the US and the British
company Serco. It provides and maintains the nuclear warheads for Trident
missiles carried by four Vanguard-class submarines based on the Clyde near
Glasgow.
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