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"The autobiography of a former director of British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) is likely to reignite fears about the safety of nuclear power, as Britain prepares for a new generation of reactors, by exposing the panic that rocked the industry two decades ago when a link was suggested between radiation and childhood leukaemia. At its height, workers at Sellafield were advised not to have children, while bosses at the Cumbrian nuclear complex even proposed establishing a sperm bank or calling for "radiation volunteers" from among older workers in order to reduce levels of exposure for workers of child-bearing age."

"An estimated 5,600 tons of nickel is being relocated to prepare for the upcoming demolition of the K-33 building in Oak Ridge. LATA-Sharp of Westerville, Ohio, recently won a $51 million contract to demolish 1.4 million-square-foot building at the East Tennessee Technology Park. The large inventory of radioactive nickel is a Cold War legacy of the uranium-enrichment operations. It was extracted from equipment by BNFL Inc., which decommissioned three of the process buildings - including K-33 - as part of a late-1990s contract with the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge office. Under the original terms of the contract, BNFL was to take ownership of the nickel and other potentially valuable metals as partial payment for the cleanup work. The company planned to recycle the metals to remove the radioactive constituents and then resell the metal on the commercial market."

Individual payments of up to £1m have been handed out from the public purse as a "golden goodbye" to directors at the loss-making nuclear holding group BNFL, according to the latest set of accounts. David Bonser, executive director for human resources and a key figure in the development of BNFL's troubled Thorp reprocessing plant, received £1,046,350 compensation for ending his employment last month. That was on top of an annual salary and bonuses worth £577,112 for the 12 months to March 31, 2008. Two other directors left with well over £1m in combined salaries, bonuses and golden goodbyes as the company that once presided over a sprawling empire of nuclear assets was wound down.

MP Tim Farron will call for Sellafield's compensation scheme for radiation-linked diseases to be extended to the wider population. The nuclear industry scheme to compensate workers or their dependents for diseases which may be radiation-linked was set up by BNFL and the unions at Sellafield in 1982. Compensation is paid on a balance of possibilities (20 per cent and over) that a cancer may have been induced by occupational exposure to radiation. A total of £6.2m has so far been paid out. Many of the cases were linked to Sellafield, but the scheme has now been widened to include all nuclear radiation workers. Radiation Free Lakeland is calling for the scheme to be extended to the wider population - within at least a 5km radius of Sellafield. Mr Farron, the Liberal Democrat MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale, will ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change if he will bring forward proposals to extend the scheme for radiation-linked diseases.

The UK Atomic Weapons Establishment, which makes and maintains the warheads for Britain's nuclear missiles, has come under the control of US companies after the government sold its one-third stake. Ministers were accused last night of trying to conceal the change in ownership after failing to make an announcement to parliament. Jacobs, an engineering company with headquarters in Pasadena, California, announced late on Wednesday in the US that it had bought the government's holding in AWE. The stake was put up for sale last year after ministers decided to break up BNFL, the state-owned group, which included AWE.

An international consortium is signing a multi-billion pound contract to clean up the Sellafield nuclear plant. Nuclear Management Partners (NMP) is taking over the shares in Sellafield Ltd formerly held by BNFL. The £22bn contract, which promises improved performance and efficiency, is expected to last up to 17 years. The deal is being struck on Monday.

Nuclear bosses have been accused of trying to "bribe" Sellafield staff not to strike by threatening to withhold a £1,500 loyalty payment. British Nuclear Fuels Ltd (BNFL) staff at other UK nuclear sites have received the cash when those businesses were sold to private sector.

RADIATION is thought to have contributed to the death of the former Sellafield worker who was jailed in 2004 for a bomb hoax at the site's visitors centre. Duncan Ball, who worked in the Magnox plant for 20 years, died on July 17. He was 49. In 2007 Mr Ball was diagnosed with a bone marrow cancer (multiple myeloma) and The Whitehaven News understands he received an interim payment from the nuclear industry scheme to compensate workers or their dependents for diseases which may be radiation-linked. The scheme was set up by BNFL and the unions at Sellafield in 1982 and compensation is paid on a balance of possibilities (20 per cent and over) that a cancer may have been induced by occupational exposure to radiation.

THE "rogue" highly radioactive nuclear material which got Sellafield into hot water with Japan will be on the move - to France. This is the batch of eight Mox fuel assemblies made at Sellafield and later found to be "falsified" in its specification data after being shipped out to customers in Japan. The faked pellets scandal led to loss of business confidence in BNFL and for a time Japan refused to strike any further deals with Sellafield. The fuel, a mixture of plutonium and uranium, was sent back to Sellafield - seven years ago.

In a grand old house on the outskirts of Whitehaven in Cumbria, a small team of international managers are preparing to take on the task of cleaning up the most intricate nuclear complex in the world. Nuclear Management Partners (NMP) - a consortium representing companies from the US, France and the UK - has been awarded a multi-billion pound contract that could turn into the biggest procurement deal ever signed by the UK government. Nuclear Management Partners HQ, prior to taking charge of Sellafield Nuclear Management Partners are taking charge of Sellafield The task ahead: to sort out the mess left behind after more than half a century of nuclear energy and weapons production at Sellafield.

The government will today identify further sites around Britain that could be suitable for building a nuclear plant, as part of a scheme to fast track a new generation of reactors. Ed Miliband, the energy and climate change secretary, will unveil a series of national policy statements setting out the need for new energy infrastructure including renewables, fossil fuels and gas, as well as an overarching energy statement which will include climate change policy. A separate strategy statement on the nation's ports will also be published. Miliband will stress what the government believes to be the importance of a diverse energy supply. But the most detail will given in the nuclear policy statement, which will include a forensic assessment of the 11 sites already nominated by energy firms as well as identifying alternatives. "Because nuclear is controversial, we wanted to make it quite clear where the sites we consider suitable are," said one official.

The government will today identify further sites around Britain that could be suitable for building a nuclear plant, as part of a scheme to fast track a new generation of reactors. Ed Miliband, the energy and climate change secretary, will unveil a series of national policy statements setting out the need for new energy infrastructure including renewables, fossil fuels and gas, as well as an overarching energy statement which will include climate change policy. A separate strategy statement on the nation's ports will also be published. Miliband will stress what the government believes to be the importance of a diverse energy supply. But the most detail will given in the nuclear policy statement, which will include a forensic assessment of the 11 sites already nominated by energy firms as well as identifying alternatives. "Because nuclear is controversial, we wanted to make it quite clear where the sites we consider suitable are," said one official.