4 hours agoShareSaveKate Stephens and Victoria GillBBC News science teamShareSaveGetty ImagesWhat about nuclear waste and security? Some experts do have concerns about nuclear waste. Scientists from the government advisory group recently said the issue of how radioactive waste from SMRs that are in the design stage “appears, with some exceptions… to have been largely ignored or at least downplayed”.The number and location of SMRs is also a security issue. With more reactors spread over a larger area, potentially built on industrial sites and closer to people, Dr Ross Peel, a researcher in civil nuclear security from Kings College London, says the security burden will be higher. Security at nuclear power stations is provided by armed police – the Civil Nuclear Constabulary. Dr Peel says the fact that existing nuclear sites generally have “miles of empty land around them” means that anyone in the vicinity arouses suspicion. If officers spot anyone they could just “look through the binoculars and ask ‘what are you doing?’,” he said. “In urban or industrial environments, suddenly you’re trying to do security in a very different [way].”
