The dumping ground for Britain's nuclear waste?

Romney Marsh has always had an otherworldly quality, particularly when the morning mists hang low around its ancient churches. These 100 square miles on the Kent and East Sussex coast were identified for centuries with smugglers. Malaria, or marsh fever, was eradicated only in the 19th century. Now, Dungeness nuclear power station, built on a shingle spit beyond the marshes, dominates the views to sea - and yet Romney Marsh is home to so many species of bird, plant and insect that it is one of the most important nature conservation sites in Europe.

But now this largely unspoilt corner of England, uncomfortably close to the sprawling conurbations of the home counties, could become the dumping ground for Britain's nuclear waste. The local council has sent thousands of letters to residents asking if they would be willing to let their backyard be the nation's first Nuclear Research and Disposal Facility. Building would start in 2025 at the earliest and the first "pods" of waste, vitrified as glass and coated in concrete or clay, would go underground as early as 2040, to be stored in miles of tunnels more than 3,000ft deep.

There is no doubt that some region of the UK must take on this challenge. Even without building any more nuclear power stations, we now have enough radioactive waste to fill the Royal Albert Hall five times over. The bulk of our high-level waste - the most radioactive - is kept in spent fuel ponds at existing power stations, principally Sellafield.

More than 60 years after the dawn of the nuclear age, no civil nuclear waste has yet been disposed of permanently underground anywhere in the world. Governments have struggled to find any local population willing to risk the dangers of radioactivity, though some countries are finally stepping up to the challenge. Sweden and Finland have chosen sites and started digging, while the US is looking to store civil waste in salt mines.

The Department for Energy and Climate Change asked councils to "volunteer" to store nuclear waste four years ago, following the "Managing Radioactive Waste Safely" White Paper. The request was met with silence, until three West Cumbrian councils suggested that they might be willing to store more waste around the existing Sellafield power station.

Now Shepway district council has also expressed an interest in the pounds 12 billion project. But first the local community must be persuaded, before a formal expression of interest can be put forward this September; this would be followed by a lengthy consultation and investigations into the geological viability of the area. The sweetener for the locals would be jobs: Romney Marsh has double the levels of unemployment of the rest of rural Kent and while the existing power stations Dungeness A and B currently provide employment for about 1,000, both are scheduled to close by 2023.

A new facility would be separate from Dungeness power station. Trainloads of nuclear waste would come from around the country, travelling through some of the most populated areas in the UK, twice a week. After 120 years, the site would be sealed, but it would not be safe for perhaps 100,000 years after that.

Kent county council has vowed to use "every tool in the box" to fight the development, whatever Shepway decides. Sean Morris, secretary of Nuclear Free Local Authorities, a pressure group, says that nuclear waste should be stored above ground, where it can be consistently monitored. He points out that future generations may not even understand our language, so how could they be warned that radioactive substances, still fatal to humans, are stored underground and forgotten about?

Dr Hilary Newport, director of the Kent branch of the Campaign to Protect Rural England, describes the reaction of locals as "absolute horror". There is already a battle over plans to expand nearby Lydd airport, which are being considered by the Government despite protests from its own agency, Natural England. She also questions the suitability of Romney Marsh, saying that the wetlands are already "sinking into the sea" and prone to flooding.

"Romney Marsh has a character all of its own. Yes, it is a depressed area in terms of employment but it is also one of the most tranquil areas of south-east England," she says. "It is a sensitive and very ecologically important area. It is very, very special yet the authorities are just racing towards any option for economic activity they can find without considering the environmental and social cost. It is crazy."

Andre Farrar, of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, says once-extinct bitterns are already nesting at a local reserve and purple herons have been spotted for the first time in Britain on the wetlands. Few people may care about the increasingly rare medicinal leech but it is an important species for medical history as well as the delicate ecosystem, while the Sussex Emerald Moth is found only around Dungeness.

"Time and tide have created this extraordinary shingle spit with a unique ecosystem and charming coastal history," says Mr Farrar. "Yet over the years it has been threatened by illegal housing development, gravel extraction, nuclear power, airport expansion and now a radioactive waste disposal facility. No one is in any doubt that Romney Marsh needs a positive future but it does not have to be a destructive future."

Alistair Stewart, chief executive of Shepway district council, says nuclear storage will provide jobs for generations and is confident that residents, many of whom work in the nuclear industry, will welcome the opportunity for a "conversation" about the plans.

He adds that promised investment in transport, infrastructure and jobs is not a "bribe" and the council will go ahead only if the community is keen. He points out that in Sweden two communities "fought over" which would get a similar facility. "If the community do not want to do this, the council is absolutely committed to walking away," he says.

That will only prolong the UK's problem, given that the Government wants to build up to 10 nuclear power stations in the next 20 years. If areas of high population density are ruled out for a disposal facility, that leaves unspoiled landscapes such as Romney Marsh - and which unspoilt part of Britain will not have equally vocal defenders if the spotlight turns its way?

Energy companies say that nuclear waste transported by train would be stored in special flasks that would protect it in an accident. However, protesters fear terrorist attacks, natural disasters or even simple human mistakes still risk a leak of radioactive waste.

Gregg Butler, professor of science in sustainable development at the University of Manchester, says he would be happy to have a nuclear waste storage facility in his backyard. "We are talking about something that, unless it can be engineered to an extraordinarily safe standard, will never happen," he says. Nuclear waste has not been disposed of in Britain so far, he says, for political and sociological reasons, and he points out that many of the protests so far have come from outside Romney Marsh.

"There have been huge amounts of work on the most sensible way to dispose of nuclear waste and virtually everybody agrees that the best place to put it is where there is a big geological area between the waste and the biosphere," he says. In other words, thousands of feet underground.

The nuclear industry has made many developments in the past few decades, including exploring the possibility of using recycled waste, but the problem is unavoidable, and some part of the UK will have to volunteer to deal with it. "One way or another we end up with waste," Prof Butler says. "And it needs to be disposed of."