London and the Thames Valley - Subregion 3

Question

Accepted Answer

The screening report hosted on this site is a technical exercise across England, Wales and Northern Ireland. No specific location in England, Wales or Northern Ireland has been identified as a potential GDF site. Any future decision on geological disposal would be subject to community agreement and planning and environmental consents.

Details

Our work shows that we may find a suitable geological setting for a GDF in most of this subregion.

London and the Thames Valley - Subregion 3

Although rock cannot generally be seen at the surface in this subregion except in man-made excavations such as quarries and road cuttings, numerous deep boreholes and geophysical investigations give us an understanding of the rocks present and their distribution.

There are various types of gaps in our understanding of geology and we deal with these gaps in a number of ways.

There are clay-rich rock layers under the whole subregion in which we may be able to site a GDF. There are also granites and similar strong rocks to the north of Milton Keynes, in which we may be able to site a GDF. These rocks have only been found in a handful of boreholes and we would need to do more work to find out whether these rocks have suitable properties and thicknesses in the depth range of interest for a GDF.

Even where individual clay-rich rock layers are found not to be thick enough to host a GDF they may support the siting of a GDF in deeper rocks as they could act as a barrier to groundwater flow from depth. This is important because movement of groundwater is one of the ways in which radioactive material could be carried back to the surface.

There are no known coal, oil, gas or metal resources in this subregion which means that it is unlikely that future generations may disturb a facility.

For further information, read the report below.