Nuclear Installations Act 1965
| Jurisdiction | UK Non-devolved |
| Citation | 1965 c. 57 |
Nuclear InstallationsAct 1965
1965 CHAPTER 57
An Act to consolidate the Nuclear Installations Acts 1959 and 1965
[5th August 1965]
B e it enacted by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:—
Control of certain nuclear installations and operations
1 Restriction of certain nuclear installations to licensed sites.
(1) Without prejudice to the requirements of any other Act, no person other than the Authority shall use any site for the purpose of installing or operating—
( a ) any nuclear reactor (other than such a reactor comprised in a means of transport, whether by land, water or air); or
( b ) subject to subsection (2) of this section, any other installation of such class or description as may be prescribed, being an installation designed or adapted for—
(i) the production or use of atomic energy; or
(ii) the carrying out of any process which is preparatory or ancillary to the production or use of atomic energy and which involves or is capable of causing the emission of ionising radiations; or
unless a licence so to do (in this Act referred to as a ‘nuclear site licence’) has been granted in respect of that site by the Minister and is for the time being in force.
(2) Regulations made by virtue of paragraph ( b ) of the foregoing subsection may exempt, or make provision for exempting, from the requirements of that subsection, either unconditionally or subject to prescribed conditions, any installation which the Minister is satisfied is not, or if the prescribed conditions were complied with would not be, a relevant installation.
(3) Any person who contravenes subsection (1) of this section shall be guilty of an offence and be liable—
( a ) on summary conviction, to a fine not exceeding one hundred pounds, or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, or to both;
( b ) on conviction on indictment, to a fine not exceeding five hundred pounds, or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years, or to both.
2 Prohibition of certain operations except under permit.
(1) Notwithstanding that a nuclear site licence is for the time being in force or is not for the time being required in respect thereof, no person other than the Authority shall use any site—
( a ) for any treatment of irradiated matter which involves the extraction therefrom of plutonium or uranium; or
( b ) for any treatment of uranium such as to increase the proportion of the isotope 235 contained therein,
except under, and in accordance with the terms of, a permit in writing for such a use of the site for purposes of research or development granted by the Authority or a government department; and any fissile material produced under such a permit shall be disposed of only in such manner as may be approved by the authority by whom the permit was granted.
(2) Any person who contravenes the foregoing subsection shall be guilty of an offence and be liable—
( a ) on summary conviction, to a fine not exceeding one hundred pounds, or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, or to both;
( b ) on conviction on indictment, to a fine not exceeding five hundred pounds, or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years, or to both.
Nuclear site licences
3 Grant and variation of nuclear site licences.
(1) A nuclear site licence shall not be granted to any person other than a body corporate and shall not be transferable.
(2) Two or more installations in the vicinity of one another may, if the Minister thinks fit, be treated for the purposes of the grant of a nuclear site licence as being on the same site.
(3) Subject to subsection (4) of this section, where it appears to the Minister appropriate so to do in the case of any application for a nuclear site licence in respect of any site, he may direct the applicant to serve on such bodies of any of the following descriptions as may be specified in the direction, that is to say—
( a ) any local authority;
( b ) any river authority, any local fisheries committee and any statutory water undertakers within the meaning of the Water Acts 1945 and 1948;
( c ) any river purification board within the meaning of the Rivers (Prevention of Pollution) (Scotland) Act 1951 , any district board constituted under the Salmon Fisheries (Scotland) Acts 1828 to 1868, the board of commissioners appointed under the Tweed Fisheries Act 1857 , and any local water authority within the meaning of the Water (Scotland) Acts 1946 and 1949; and
( d ) any other body which is a public or local authority,
notice that the application has been made, giving such particulars as may be so specified with respect to the use proposed to be made of the site under the licence, and stating that representations with respect thereto may be made to the Minister by the body upon whom the notice is served at any time within three months of the date of service; and where such a direction has been given, the Minister shall not grant the licence unless he is satisfied that three months have elapsed since the service of the last of the notices required thereby nor until after he has considered any representations made in accordance with any of those notices.
(4) Subsection (3) of this section shall not apply in relation to an application in respect of a site for a generating station made by an electricity board within the meaning of the Electricity Acts 1947 to 1961 or of the Electricity (Scotland) Acts 1943 to 1957 or by any authorised undertakers within the meaning of the Electricity (Supply) Acts (Northern Ireland) 1882 to 1959.
(5) A nuclear site licence may include provision with respect to the time from which section 19(1) of this Act is to apply in relation to the licensed site, and where such provision is so included the said section 19(1) shall not apply until that time or the first occasion after the grant of the licence on which any person uses the site for the operation of a nuclear installation, whichever is the earlier.
(6) The Minister may from time to time vary any nuclear site licence by excluding therefrom any part of the licensed site—
( a ) which the licensee no longer needs for any use requiring such a licence; and
( b ) with respect to which the Minister is satisfied that there is no danger from ionising radiations from anything on that part of the site.
4 Attachment of conditions to licences.
(1) The Minister by instrument in writing shall on granting any nuclear site licence, and may from time to time thereafter, attach to the licence such conditions as may appear to the Minister to be necessary or desirable in the interests of safety, whether in normal circumstances or in the event of any accident or other emergency on the site, which conditions may in particular include provision—
( a ) for securing the maintenance of an efficient system for detecting and recording the presence and intensity of any ionising radiations from time to time emitted from anything on the site or from anything discharged on or from the site;
( b ) with respect to the design, siting, construction, installation, operation, modification and maintenance of any plant or other installation on, or to be installed on, the site;
( c ) with respect to preparations for dealing with, and measures to be taken on the happening of, any accident or other emergency on the site;
( d ) without prejudice to sections 6 and 8 of the Radioactive Substances Act 1960 , with respect to the discharge of any substance on or from the site.
(2) The Minister may at any time by instrument in writing attach to a nuclear site...
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