Recent reports of mysterious drones overflying several nuclear power plants in Sweden have illustrated just one of the possible future threats faced by Britain’s reactors that must be addressed, say the UK and Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities (NFLA).
In his letter to the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, NFLA Steering Committee Chair, Councillor David Blackburn, has identified ‘a void (of information) on the preparations in place to deter physical attacks upon nuclear facilities or the theft of nuclear materials from site’, and he has called the absence of such information in the agency’s latest Draft Business Plan for 2022-25 ‘not reassuring’.
In December 2021, the Non-Proliferation Policy Education Centre published a paper outlining the risks posed by military and terrorist strikes on nuclear facilities in the Middle East. Although the dynamic in the UK is not the same, the NFLA wants the NDA to draw from it the relevant lessons about the vulnerability of nuclear plants to strikes by missiles and drones, sophisticated technologies now increasingly available to terrorist groups as well as nation states.
On 18 January, BBC News reported sightings of drones in preceding days over the Forsmark, Ringhals, and Oskarshamn nuclear power plants. The Swedish Police appealed to the public to come forward with information, and the Swedish Security Service, Sapo, launched an investigation into the perpetrators who were suspected of ‘grave unauthorised dealing with secret information’.(1)
These recent developments have prompted the NFLA to call for the NDA to include in its final Business
Plan ‘some record of any activity or exercises, or future plans, to address these threats (subject to restrictions on the disclosure of sensitive information on grounds of security)’.
Speaking for the NFLA Steering Committee Chair, Cllr David Blackburn, said:
‘Although the NFLA welcomes the NDA’s stated commitment to participate in exercises to counter cyber attacks, it is worrying that the current draft Business Plan is silent on the preparations that the NDA and its partners has in place to counter any potential physical terrorist attack on a facility, which might be by land, air or sea, or upon nuclear waste in transit, or to prevent the theft of nuclear materials from sites. It is our hope that we can see further detail in the final version.’
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For more information please contact: Richard Outram, Secretary, NFLA email Richard.outram@manchester.gov.uk / mobile 07583 097793
Notes to Editors
The NDA draft Business Plan and the link to the consultation can be found at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/nuclear-decommissioning-authority-draft-business-plan-2022-to-2025-for-consultation
The NFLA response to the NDA’s consultation on the draft business plan in relation to Cyber Security reads:
Page 27 – Cyber Security
The NFLA welcomes the NDA proposal to participate in the cyber exercise ‘Golden Osprey’. Cyber attacks are of real and increasing concern, especially when directed against national critical infrastructure, and the procedures necessary to employ effective countermeasures to prevent a successful remote attack on a nuclear facility, which may compromise safety or, in extremis, cause a disaster, must be fully developed, practised and tested.
In the business plan, there is however a void on the preparations in place to deter physical attacks upon nuclear facilities or the theft of nuclear materials from site.
Only last month, the Non-Proliferation Policy Education Centre published a paper outlining the risks posed by military and terrorist strikes on nuclear facilities in the Middle East. Although the dynamic in the UK is not the same, there are potential lessons to be drawn from it around the vulnerability of nuclear plants to strikes by missiles and drones, technologies now increasingly (and frighteningly) available to terrorist groups as well as nation states.
The paper can be found here:
https://npolicy.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/2107-Hot-Mess-Missile-Strikes.pdf
Accordingly the NFLA hopes that the NDA and its partners has preparations in place to counter any potential physical terrorist attack on a facility, which might be by land, air or sea, or upon nuclear waste in transit, and in addition has rigorous counter-measures in place to prevent the theft of nuclear materials from sites. We would like to see in the Business Plan some record of any activity or exercises, or future plans, to address these threats (subject to restrictions on the disclosure of sensitive information on grounds of security).
The absence of such information is not reassuring.
NFLA member authorities look forward to working with the NDA and its partners on addressing emergency planning issues in the future within the Nuleaf group.