Public concern about the health effects of Dounreay were growing. In 1983 radioactive particles of spent fuel were found on adjacent beaches. How they got there has never been established; but investigations discovered a plume of radioactivity in the sea fanning out from the site. Late in 1985, even as the AEA was promoting a plan for a European Demonstration Reprocessing Plant for fast breeder fuel at Dounreay, the Thatcher Government cut funding for fast reactor development. Then, on 26 April 1986, came Chernobyl. The accident cast a pall over every form of nuclear activity. Public opposition erupted, even at Dounreay. Then yet another steam-generator failure shut down PFR for six months.

On 21 July 1988, minister Cecil Parkinson announced in the House of Commons that annual funding for fast breeders was to be cut from £105 million to £10 million, that funding for the PFR would cease after 1994 and for Dounreay reprocessing after 1997. It was the death knell for the U. K. fast breeder programme. After four decades of effort, and public expenditure of over £2400 million, it had proved to be a radioactive dead end.

Two decades after Parkinson’s announcement, the cleanup of Dounreay continues, as does the drain on public funds. The once all-powerful AEA, broken up and sold to private interests, is a shadow of its former self. But work at Dounreay will last for decades to come. Decommissioning the PFR, dealing with the now-notorious shaft, clearing up ponds and other facilities and decontaminating the site will last into the 2030s and beyond, at a cost as yet difficult to determine. Looming in the background is one further question. The collapse of the fast breeder program leaves the U. K. with an inventory of separated plutonium amounting to about 100 tonnes. What is to become of it? No one in Government is saying — probably because no one knows.

Endnotes

1. Margaret Gowing and Loma Arnold, Independence and Deterrence: Britain and Atomic Energy, 1945-52, 2 Vols. (London: Macmillan, 1974).