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When the nuclear power plant was built on the coast of Cumbria in the 1940s, nobody had

much idea about what to do with nuclear fuel once it had been spent.

Today, that place is Sellefield, engaged in Europe's largest cleanup of nuclear waste,

in what is perhaps the world's most complicated nuclear site. It's got its own police force,

his own railway station, and its own unique set of challenges, one that seemed to baffle

governments and private contractors alike. But with enough radioactive waste to keep it going for

at least 100 years, it's something the government has got to learn to get right. And if it does,

then there could be dividends to be harvested in Britain and perhaps internationally. So how best

to go about it? I'm Fraser Nelson and I'm joined by Gordon Mceren, who's professor at the University of Sussex and a nuclear power expert, by Jamie Reed from Sellefield, who was, until recently, Labour MP for Sellafield's home constituency of Copeland, and Tom Greatrex, head of the Nuclear industry association, which is kindly sponsoring this podcast.

Thank you all for joining me.

So, Jamie, let's start with you.

You've described Sellefield as one of the most complex engineering challenges on the planet.

Why?

Well, Sellerfield was established after the end of the Second World War in order to create

materials for our atomic weapons program.

As a result of doing that, other technologies presented themselves and became obvious,

which we thought at that time made a policy decision, it would be useful to exploit as a country,

nuclear power being one of them.

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