Sale of reactors fast tracked

British Nuclear Fuels has suggested that the UK’s Magnox reactors should be sold off to private buyers within the next six months.
The BNFL board recommended that the disposal of the 11 ageing stations, only four of which are still producing electricity, should be fast-tracked alongside the sale of the energy consultancy division.
BNFL is also thought to have agreed to the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority’s plan to keep the operation of the Sellafield waste reprocessing site in public ownership but bring forward the date by which private-sector firms can compete for the work, to 2008.
The government’s original plan was to privatise British Nuclear Group (BNG), the division of BNFL, which encompasses everything from Sellafield and the Magnox stations to the consultancy division. The successful bidder would have been given a contract to run Sellafield until 2012. However this plan was scrapped in August this year in favour of breaking BNG into pieces and selling them separately.