Sellafield cleanup blighted by delays, high costs and toxic culture, say MPs

MPs have warned about the speed and cost of cleaning up the Sellafield nuclear waste dump and raised concerns over a "suboptimal" workplace culture at the site.

- Alex Lawson

Members of parliament's public accounts committee (PAC) urged the government and bosses at the sprawling collection of crumbling buildings in Cumbria to get a grasp on the "intolerable risks" presented by its ageing infrastructure.

In its report, the committee said Sellafield was not moving quickly enough to tackle its biggest hazards; raised the alarm over its workplace culture; and said the government was not ensuring value for money was being achieved from taxpayer funds.

In 2023, the Guardian's Nuclear Leaks investigation revealed a string of safety concerns at the site, including escalating fears over a leak of radioactive liquid from a decaying building known as the Magnox swarf storage silo (MSSS). The PAC, which heard evidence in March from Sellafield and its oversight body, the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA), found that the state-owned company had missed most of its annual targets to retrieve waste from buildings including the MSSS.

"As a result of Sellafield's underperformance [the MSSS] will likely remain extremely hazardous for longer," the MPs said.

The ultimate cost of cleaning up Sellafield, which contains waste from weapons programmes and atomic power generation, has been estimated at £136bn and could take more than 100 years.