‘I guarded Britain’s nuclear sites – our security can’t cope with new mini reactors’

https://inews.co.uk/news/crime/i-guarded-britains-nuclear-sites-our-security-cant-cope-with-new-mini-reactors-3649782

Posted by theipaper

11 comments

  1. Sometimes he would patrol rural lanes on foot, carrying his assault rifle, looking out for any terrorists hiding in the countryside. On other assignments he would man machine guns mounted on armoured ships, watching for any sign of hostile vessels coming his way. Or he would drive in weapons-laden road convoys, monitoring potential threats from vehicles.

    While serving as an armed officer with the Civil Nuclear Constabulary (CNC), Matt Okuhara saw every aspect of how the UK’s nuclear power stations and their radioactive fuel are protected from terrorists.

    He spent years escorting the transport of uranium fuel to and from plants, which would be planned for months in advance. “Nuclear material is at its most vulnerable when it’s in transit,” he explains. “You’ve got to move it as secretly as possible.”

    Working for the specialist force, Okuhara always felt confident the country’s civil nuclear programme was in safe hands. “Any threat has been detected long before it’s been able to cause any problems,” he says.

    However, he believes the situation is “definitely more dangerous now” than when he was serving. Terrorism has become more advanced and there are new fears about so-called hybrid warfare from geopolitical adversaries including Russia.

    “You don’t have to be a James Bond super-villain to realise where the vulnerable parts of a site are. You can just look on Google Maps and say, ‘We’ll attack that bit,’ especially now we’ve got drones. The threat has really shot up.”

    With new technology also on the horizon, he believes the nuclear industry must face up to big security questions.

    The CNC currently guards just a handful of sites, all in relatively remote locations. But experts believe the Government’s [planned array of cutting-edge mini nuclear power stations](https://inews.co.uk/news/inside-labour-plan-mini-nuclear-reactors-uk-3174460?ico=in-line_link) could lead to a “proliferation” of reactors around the country, potentially much closer to towns and cities. This may also lead to their fuel being transported more often.

    Small modular reactors (SMRs) are seen as [an essential source of green energy](https://inews.co.uk/news/science/budget-2023-nuclear-reactors-energy-2212572?ico=in-line_link) for the UK in decades to come. Proponents say they will be quicker and cheaper to build than conventional plants, because they will be largely prefabricated.

    But security experts are worried about the complex implications for how SMRs will be policed and protected, [as *The i Paper* revealed this week](https://inews.co.uk/news/crime/security-fears-mini-nuclear-plant-network-police-3648464?ico=in-line_link). Analysts say that thousands more armed officers would have to be recruited, co-ordination with local police would have to be strengthened, and a new national infrastructure force may even have to be created.

  2. If only there was some sort of organisation that has centuries of experience of guarding facilities access to lots of guns and technology and personnel that could cover these sites while a force dedicated to this can be built up properly overtime.

  3. So we can’t have nuclear because we have too many potential terrorists?

  4. MI5 does a review of top vakue target sites across the UK, and advises on ways to make them more secure. These being private companies do fu k all woth the information and are then over run by greenpeacers evey frw years.

    Local, home grown terrorists must be stupid or lazy.

  5. Maybe because our Police force is underfunded like everything else. Im really worried we will have a terrorist attack in the next few years. I think MI5 is involved in protecting these sites also though right?

  6. The possible sites for these small modular reactors have either already been identified as sites for full-scale reactors (like Anglesey and Oldbury), or are already nuclear sites (Sellafield).

    Being ‘mini’ reactors doesn’t mean you’ll get one at the end of your road or that it won’t be protected.

    There are two concepts behind small modular reactors. One is that you can fit the modular reactors on existing nuclear sites, to increase their output while not having to develop a whole new site.

    The other concept is that instead of building one large reactor on a site, which requires great initial investment but won’t be up and running for twenty years, you can more quickly install one modular reactor and then add more over time to create a cluster.

    Either way, these modular reactors would be installed on the same type of site as a single large reactor, and have exactly the same requirements.

  7. Well yeah, but from the sound of it, we are going to need those small modular reactors.

    So we will need those armed officers.

    Albeit I admit, fewer and fewer people in modern UK have any prior experience with real guns.

    Best start training people up beforehand.

  8. This article seems to assume we’ll be placing SMR’s all over the country as single units.

    In practice it would be safer to group them on a few sites and transfer power where its needed.

    This would also solve the issue of dangerous fuel being transported all over the country.

  9. Have you ever met such a downbeat, negative, “no we can’t” species as the British. It’s unbelievable they conquered 20% of the world. 

  10. I’m really not buying it.

    We can just bury them. We really saying it’s beyond our capabilities to build an entrance above ground that is fortified?

    Tunnel with a bunch of airlocked blast doors and some chatgpt auto turrets!

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