UK unveils plans for biggest nuclear power expansion in 70 years

Good luck with the British setting up a manufacturing chain for HALEU fuel because we know what will happen.

Their current nuclear industry is a fiasco - this project will be bungled and face major cost blowouts and disasters - watch!

Energy minister Claire Coutinho said the plans would mean the UK would "never again be held to ransom over energy by tyrants like Vladimir Putin

Shameless how these people invoke the Putin bogeyman to push any agenda they want. Grow up!

The new nuclear plants are not British-owned. It can't afford to build them.

Expanding the global use of high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) would potentially exacerbate proliferation and security risks because of the potentially greater attractiveness of this material for nuclear weapons compared with the low-enriched uranium used in light water reactors.

https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/26500/chapter/9#:~:text=Finding%2019%3A%20Expanding%20the%20global,used%20in%20light%20water%20reactors.

Makes sense in their case, not prone to earthquakes like Japan. Plate tectonics 101.

The projected cost of EDF’s Hinkley Point C is between 31/33 billion. Yes a projection due to present and future economic environments inflation etc.

Then add in the necessary additional associated infrastructure costs.

More upgrading over decades.

The 1980 privatization of energy security deemed necessary in a false blinkered monetary policy, Margaret Thatcher Britain, instead of investment in a skills workforce, structure programme integration simply fell away in the push for the great sell off of essential utilities.

It was so short sighted.

An ideological political reckless need to condemn UK as the sick man of Europe.

Thatcher condemned Britain to a further energy crisis which is now happening.

HopeSpringsEternal

Makes sense in their case, not prone to earthquakes like Japan. Plate tectonics 101.

Sellafield fire.

"The Windscale fire of 10 October 1957 was the worst nuclear accident in the United Kingdom's history, and one of the worst in the world ranked in severity at level 5 out of 7 on the International Nuclear Event Scale."

Basically what France and Japan thought decades ago.

No doubt nuclear has a checkered history, but mainly because the legacy corrupt industry has been so resistant to change, innovation and investment.

Lots of new players with far safer technologies. But we can all agree earthquake zones & nuclear a bad combo!

Ending fossil fuel as a primary source is the smart move. I hope the best for them however they are able to do it.

Most days the UK does not burn coal for power generation. Renewables are now a major energy.

https://gridwatch.co.uk

Cart before the horse? The government have finally admitted that their policy to push everyone to buy EVs actually probably did need some infrastructure behind it.

Two things are true, though, nuclear is never cheap and the eventual cleanup and storage problem has never been solved, only passed on to future generations.

Oh, and three, Ukraine has shown us the unthinkable, that NPPs can become pawns in wartime situations, despite the world believing that commonsense was common and that there could be no more war.

Strange that this story has not featured in any of the UK press. It seems like major news but not even the Guardian has reported it. Perhaps the short shelf-life of the current government makes any such pronouncements no more than hot air.

@Gareth Myles

Strange that this story has not featured in any of the UK press. It seems like major news but not even the Guardian has reported it. Perhaps the short shelf-life of the current government makes any such pronouncements no more than hot air.

It's on the BBC News site

but not even the Guardian has reported it

It has.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/jan/11/uk-government-sets-out-plans-for-biggest-nuclear-power-expansion-in-70-years

Iid keep the news a mite quieter too if I were the UK government.

Maybe a lot of the UK population remember Sellafield and the atrocious nuclear contamination that was released into the Irish Sea?

Be open and honest about the up front pre-construction phase of any nuclear power build programme.

Capital cost of “new nuclear” are eye watering, some 70/80% of the overall cost of power generation, due to the complexity associated with reactor pre-construction delay, all can take a decade plus, exposing the tax payers to significant risk uncertainties.

Look at HS2, cost overrun.

To build up to eight new reactors by 2050 is optimistic to say the least.

Any commitment to a 2050 net zero target is shallow/frivolous dishonesty.

The price of building a new reactor is now very high.

it's green, cheaper in the long-term

Yippee, "Energy too cheap to meter" will be back again! Ah, some of you may be too young...

Anyhoo.... I guess insurance companies will be lining up to insure these plants commercially.

Excellent news and excellent use of nature's original energy source.

The cost of EDF's new UK nuclear project rises to $40 billion.

https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/cost-edfs-new-uk-nuclear-project-soars-40-bln-2023-02-20/

How much does a nuclear reactor cost the UK?

His estimate in late 2022 was that the program was likely to cost £260 billion given the cost trends. That's £10.4 billion per reactor, an order of magnitude higher than the industry average of three years ago. Nov 19, 2023

https://cleantechnica.com/2023/11/19/uk-has-e10-billion-per-nuclear-reactor-decommissioning-bottomless-pit/#:~:text=His%20estimate%20in%20late%202022,average%20of%20three%20years%20ago.

The UK doesn't have the cash, skills or workers for this, and has locked out foreign ones. Nuclear will only be 'green' when they find away to turn the waste into sunshine and moonbeams. Although I don't suppose it matters how much nuclear waste is swilling around. Whatever life survives post-humanity, will just survive in the least radioactive bits.

This is a roadmap. Roadmaps are issued in the run up to elections to encourage people to vote for parties.

The Tories will be gone by the end of the year. Anything that isn't going to be paid for in the next six months, won't happen. Oh, and nuclear power is by far the most expensive form of power on the planet by an insane margin. And that was before Brexit made the UK one third poorer, taking down Sterling. From now on, if Nigeria can't afford it, the UK can't either.

Sellafield nuclear plant