Warren Spring Laboratory

Warren Spring Laboratory was a UK government environmental science research centre that operated in Stevenage, Hertfordshire from 1958 until its closure in 1994.[1] Described by New Scientist as "Britain's leading laboratory for environmental research",[2] and by The Times as "one of Europe's most important environmental research centres",[3] it had an international reputation[4] in areas such as air and water pollution, waste management and recycling, land remediation, alternative fuel research, and chemical engineering.[5] In 1994, after some political controversy, the laboratory was closed and merged with AEA Technology to form the National Environmental Technology Centre (NETCEN).[1]

Key research

Warren Spring Laboratory was organized in six separate divisions:

  • Air Pollution
  • Pollution Abatement
  • Materials Recovery
  • Biological Treatment
  • Marine Pollution and Bulk Materials
  • Chemical Analysis

Broadly, its mission was to monitor and reduce environmental pollution and land contamination, to optimize the use of materials, and to recover useful materials, such as precious metals, from waste.[6]

History

The laboratory was originally conceived as a replacement for the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research Fuel Research Station in Greenwich.[1] However, it was deliberately given a much less specific name, based on the area in Stevenage where it was built, to reflect a wider brief than simply researching fuel.[1] It was planned by the Fuel Research Station's chief development officer, David Penny, who became the project's consulting engineer. According to The Herald , "despite a rather vague and constantly changing specification, the Warren Spring laboratory at Stevenage was completed on schedule and met all the complex technical requirements".[7] After transferring from DSIR to the Ministry of Technology in 1965, it was run by the Department of Trade and Industry (and its various successors) until 1994.[1]

Closure

In the early 1990s, Michael Heseltine, the UK government's President of the Board of Trade, announced that Warren Spring Laboratory would move to new premises in nearby Welwyn Garden City.[2][3] Later, however, following a report from the PA Consulting Group, Heseltine scrapped the plan and announced that the laboratory would merge with the Atomic Energy Authority (AEA) and transfer to Harwell, Oxfordshire instead.[3] This prompted considerable public opposition – and many of the Warren Spring staff simply refused to move, including most of its air pollution scientists.[8][9]

There was political opposition too. In May 1993, an Early Day Motion supported by 89 mostly opposition (Labour) MPs noted "with concern reports that the President of the Board of Trade now intends to go back on the agreement reached in 1992 to relocate Warren Spring Laboratory and instead to close it with the loss of 150 jobs and scientific expertise built up over many years; and calls on the President of the Board of Trade to save Warren Spring Laboratory from closure".[10] Later, opposition MP Michael Meacher highlighted what he saw as conflicts of interest and a lack of competitive tendering, arguing that the plan was essentially motivated by the government's wider privatisation agenda,[11] while Chris Smith MP called the plan "merely a fattening-up exercise for privatising AEA, which was not a particularly sellable proposition on its own".[3] In response, for the government, David Davis MP countered that the merger would "over the next five years, save the taxpayer perhaps £32 million",[12] though the eventual saving was just £8 million.[13]

The site of Warren Spring Laboratory, at Gunnels Wood Road, Stevenage, was sold to Glaxo, the pharmaceuticals company, for £25 million, and subsequently became a research and development laboratory.[13]

References
  1. "Records of the Warren Spring Laboratory". The National Archives. UK Government. Retrieved 6 February 2022.
  2. Bown, William (20 August 1993). "Forum: Fetid air over Warren Spring - William Bown peers under the public fig leaves of government double-dealing". New Scientist. Retrieved 6 February 2022.
  3. Nuttall, Nick (11 June 1993). "Heseltine to close top pollution lab - Warren Spring Laboratory, Stevenage, Hertfordshire". The Times. p. 8.
  4. "Is this gadget a driver's dream?". Leicester Mercury. 2 September 1999. p. 12. Tests were commissioned at the Department of Trade and Industry's internationally-known Warren Spring Laboratory.
  5. "Warren Spring Laboratory: Volume 199: debated on Friday 22 November 1991". Hansard. UK Parliament. 22 November 1991. Retrieved 6 February 2022.
  6. "Warren Spring Laboratory: Annual Review 1992: Technology and the Environment". Stevenage, Hertfordshire. 1992. Retrieved 12 December 2022.
  7. Mann, Iain (19 October 2005). "David Penny Distinguished consultant engineer who worked for NEL and Yarrows". Herald, The/Sunday Herald.
  8. "Key staff at Warren Spring refuse to move". New Scientist. No. 1890. 10 September 1993. Retrieved 6 February 2022. A survey of researchers at the Warren Spring Laboratory in Stevenage found that only half of those asked to move to AEA Technology's laboratories in Oxfordshire are prepared to go.
  9. Schoon, Nicholas (11 April 1994). "Car pollution unit scrapped while asthma cases soar: Six scientists quit over research merger". The Independent. p. 2. All six members of the vehicle emissions group at the Warren Spring Laboratory, the state's leading centre for research into pollution and environmental technology, are quitting. They are among nearly 100 scientists leaving the laboratory, run by the Department of Trade and Industry, because of its controversial merger with the state-owned UK Atomic Energy Authority.
  10. "WARREN SPRING LABORATORY EDM (Early Day Motion) 2078: tabled on 25 May 1993". Hansard. UK Parliament. 25 May 1993.
  11. Meacher, Michael (2 May 1994). "Letter: Cost of Government consultants". The Independent. p. 13.
  12. Davis, David (10 May 1994). "Letter: Market testing: success stories". The Independent. p. 17.
  13. "Written Answers: Warren Spring Laboratory". Hansard. UK Parliament. 22 June 1993. Retrieved 6 February 2022.

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.