“…scientific ignorance of the subject was so great that eventually the nuclear industry was forced to admit that sea disposal, particularly in the Irish Sea, had really been an enormous experiment, but an unfortunate one. In fact, both soluble and insoluble nuclides can travel for at least several hundreds of kilometres and both are available for transport out of the sea area of their initial discharge. Deposition of suspended sediments and their associated radioactivity occurs (under the influence of a range of mechanisms) into estuarine and coastal sub tidal sediments, estuarine and coastal fringing inter-tidal mud and salt flats and offshore sub-tidal sediment deposits.
The evolving evidence now conclusively demonstrates that the original proposed model was certainly incorrect (with respect to non-soluble nuclides) and that there were, in fact several mechanisms by which non-soluble radioactive wastes discharged to sea did not remain permanently bound and immobilised to the sea bed sediments. Studies have demonstrated increased concentrations of non- soluble radionuclides in marine aerosols resulting in their transfer from sea to land.”
Cumbria Wildlife Trust’s Beached Art event encourages young children to play for hours in this same sand where there are the most dangerous radionuclides which should be kept separate from the biosphere . This sand sculpture event organised by a trusted charity is not only unethical but it is aiding and abetting the continuing tsumani of radioactive wastes being dumped into the Irish Sea.
Further reading….Correspondence with Cumbria Wildlife Trust below…
25th July 2017
Dear Peter,
Thank you for your reply to our request that your Beached Art event should at include a warning to those attending that radioactive partlcles from Sellafield discharges are routinely found at St Bees.
We do not agree with CUMBRIA WILDLIFE TRUST’s VIEW that:
“The risk relates to how often particles are washed up on the beach and how long it takes for them to be removed. The risk reduces the longer it is since a particle was last found. As you know the last known particle was removed from the beach and isn’t there anymore. So there isn’t a risk from previous particles. Data on how often particles are found on the beach would give an indication of how likely a further particle may arise on the beach. Even if further particles were to be found on the beach they are removed, thereby removing the risk. The evidence available to the Trust is that there isn’t a significant risk from radiation to people attending the event.”
SELLAFIELD’S OWN EVIDENCE
There is more than enough evidence that there is a significant risk to the public from radioactive particles on St Bees beach. This evidence is available in Sellafield’s own Particles in the Environment report for last year. In just the first half of last year 13 radioactive particles were found on St Bees beach these included Cobalt 60. Sellafield monitoring is limited in many ways, not least as the monitoring and retrieval is discontinued during the Easter, Summer and Christmas holidays in order not to scare visitors to the beach. Your assertion that “ the last known particle was removed from the beach and isn’t there anymore. So there isn’t a risk from previous particles” does not hold water. Maybe this would be true if Sellafield could with their limited and shallow monitoring, retrieve ALL the particles from the beach. This would also be reliant on there being no tides twice a day to bring the next waves of particles. This transfer of radioactive particles from seabed to land is exacerbated by storms and by recent borehole drilling off St Bees and Sellafield for new coal and new nuclear.
Radiation Free Lakeland have this month released a report we commissioned into the environmental impact of New Nuclear (Moorside). This report (enclosed) (pdf) by the Edinburgh Energy and Environment Consultancy lays bare the:
FATE AND BEHAVIOUR OF RADIOACTIVITY IN THE SEA
“…scientific ignorance of the subject was so great that eventually the nuclear industry was forced to admit that sea disposal, particularly in the Irish Sea, had really been an enormous experiment, but an unfortunate one. In fact, both soluble and insoluble nuclides can travel for at least several hundreds of kilometres and both are available for transport out of the sea area of their initial discharge. Deposition of suspended sediments and their associated radioactivity occurs (under the influence of a range of mechanisms) into estuarine and coastal sub tidal sediments, estuarine and coastal fringing inter-tidal mud and salt flats and offshore sub-tidal sediment deposits.
The evolving evidence now conclusively demonstrates that the original proposed model was certainly incorrect (with respect to non-soluble nuclides) and that there were, in fact several mechanisms by which non-soluble radioactive wastes discharged to sea did not remain permanently bound and immobilised to the sea bed sediments. Studies have demonstrated increased concentrations of non- soluble radionuclides in marine aerosols resulting in their transfer from sea to land.”
Tiny metal particles have been found to contain Cobalt 60: “A radioactive (metal) object was detected during a routine vehicle survey within the intertidal zone of St. Bees beach on 17th March 2016. Radioactivity was associated with a particle that was located within a sandy area of beach at a depth of 2 cm. The radio-analytical results demonstrated that it was categorised as a 60Co rich find.” Sellafield Annual Report 2016
Cumbria Wildlife Trust’s Beached Art event encourages young children to play for hours in this same sand. This is not only unethical but it is aiding and abetting the continuing tsumani of radioactive wastes being dumped into the Irish Sea.
We would like to award Cumbria Wildlife Trust a Beached Art Award as a reminder that radionuclides wash up on this beach. We request that at the very minimum you warn those parents attending this years event on 30th July so that they can make their own decision whether or not to attend. Then those that choose to attend can at least take care that their children are not eating radioactive particles in their sandwiches. We hope that CWT will join those working for nuclear safety instead of shoring up Cumbria’s entrenched and accelerating nuclear problem.
Yours sincerely,
Marianne Birkby
On behalf of Radiation Free Lakeland
And Close Capenhurst Campaign (Working Alliance)
Particles in the Environment: Annual Report for 2015-16sustainability.sellafieldsites.com/…/PiE-Annual-Report-2015_16-FINAL-compressed.pdf
From
Dear Marianne
……….As you know Cumbria Wildlife Trust has been holding this event on the beach at St Bees for a number of years. You have been raising the issue of safety for a number of years. The beach is considered a safe place for children to play by the relevant authorities. We have carried out a risk assessment of the event and will be holding the event again this year.
The risk relates to how often particles are washed up on the beach and how long it takes for them to be removed. The risk reduces the longer it is since a particle was last found. As you know the last known particle was removed from the beach and isn’t there anymore. So there isn’t a risk from previous particles. Data on how often particles are found on the beach would give an indication of how likely a further particle may arise on the beach. Even if further particles were to be found on the beach they are removed, thereby removing the risk. The evidence available to the Trust is that there isn’t a significant risk from radiation to people attending the event.
Best wishes
Peter Bullard
Director
Cumbria Wildlife Trust, Plumgarths, Crook Road, Kendal, Cumbria, LA8 8LX
Direct Line Tel: 01539 816314 or Reception 01539 816300
Save Cumbria’s wildlife and wild places by becoming a member today
http://www.cumbriawildlifetrust.org.uk/joinus
From: marianne Birkby
Date: 10 June 2017 at 21:53:35 BST
To: mail@cumbriawildlifetrust.org.uk
Subject: FAO Peter Bullard, Director of Cumbria Wildlife Trust.
Dear Peter,
….
I am writing on behalf of Radiation Free Lakeland once again to ask that Cumbria Wildlife Trust scrap plans for the Beached Art event at St Bees. As you know from past correspondence and the national press, increasing numbers of radioactive particles including cesium, americium and even plutonium have been found on this beach. The radioactive particles could only be from decades of Sellafield discharges, the particles drop to the seabed and there they stay until they resuspend in the seawater, coming back to shore. This resuspension increases with increased storm surges, along with the last several years of “exploratory” borehole drilling immediately offshore of St Bees for new nuclear and for new coal.
The cynical reassurances from industry and from our pronuclear government that all is well on our beaches will in time, we are sure, be seen to be a crime against humanity. CWT are complicit in bolstering this crime with “Beached Art.” This event hides the truth about radioactive particles from the public. At the very least CWT could inform their members and those attending the sand sculpture event about the radioactive particles being found in the sand at St Bees. It is very real. Of course even if children from a Beached Art event ingest radioactive particles the results will not be immediate, the leukaemia or other radiation linked diseases may take years to manifest. The parents of the child may never associate taking their child to dig for hours in sand with exposing their child to carcinogenic radioactive material. The nuclear industry rely on this uncertainty, just as surely as they rely on the complicity of CWT.
We hope that Cumbria Wildlife Trust will at least inform those taking part that, although the authorities insist there is nothing to worry about, radioactive particles including plutonium have been found on the beach at St Bees
…
Marianne
RADIATION FREE LAKELAND 
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