According to the papers, we are finally going to get financial sign off for the first of what are supposed to be a new fleet of nuclear power stations in the autumn – albeit laced with a huge slug of state funded finance from the Chinese government: so to sum up, Hinkley C power plant, which will of course be built, it is claimed without any public subsidy or state finance (except the credibility busting sum of EDF being awarded £92.5 per megawatt hour of electricity produced for the next 35 years– about twice the current price of electricity currently) will be constructed largely with state finance from China and run by a state financed French energy company.
Amber Rudd, our new Energy Secretary of State, appears to be rather more openly on the side of the ‘subsidy admitters’ than her predecessors were – she told me two weeks ago in In an energy Select committee hearing that
‘We have to have secure baseload, so you should not be surprised…that we are prepared to pay more for that in order to make sure nuclear is part of the mix’
An admission that sounds to me very like confirming a conscious decision to subsidise new nuclear, which is of course the subject of a challenge to the EU from the Austrian Government – that the UKs nuclear programme contravenes EU state Aid rules. It quite flagrantly does, I think we will quietly have to agree, and it really now depends on whether there is a ‘policy fix’ on state aid shortly, or whether the challenge, which is by no means ‘weak’ as the Government dismissively tells us (see here for an appraisal of the Austrian challenge) is allowed to run through a proper process of examination.
So to sum up (2) – the Chinese and French state sponsored new nuclear reactor propelled towards financial close by lavish state underwriting of its eventual output may well go ahead providing it is deemed not to contravene EU state aid rules: and will simply collapse if the challenge succeeds.
So that’s our new nuclear programme sorted out, subject to these small matters? Well not really, because it is worth remembering that Hinkley C is supposed to be a part – the first part- of that new nuclear programme, the importance of which was underlined very recently in a largely unnoticed update of the Government’s ‘Low Carbon Technologies’ plans.
According to this document, ‘most nuclear power stations are due to close by 2023’, so a new fleet is needed to maintain the nuclear mix (nuclear currently supplies about 19% of electricity) It is going to be OK, however, because, as the document says, ‘Industry plans 16Gw of new nuclear power’, on five of the eight sites agreed to be suitable, and effectively given free up front planning permission, by the 2011 Nuclear National Planning document. Those would be the sites that were appraised by the planning statement as being able to be developed by 2025 –because, as we were sternly warned by the report ‘failure to develop new nuclear power stations significantly earlier than the end of 2025 would increase the risk of the UK being locked into a higher carbon energy mix for a longer period of time than is consistent with the governments ambitions to decarbonise electricity supply’.
Right then: we’ve got to get a new fleet built by 2025 to have any chance of keeping nuclear in the mix and replacing those that will inevitably close before then- and the next question, is how are we doing?
Well here’s something else worth remembering: Hinkley C was, when the nuclear policy Paper was written, supposed to be producing electricity by the spring of 2018 – planned, permissioned financed and constructed by that date. The new planning document staunchly stands by that fairytale date, more or less – ‘the aim’ it says, ‘is to have the first new nuclear power stations generating electricity from around 2019’ . That is not what ministers now say, however – in DECC questions three weeks ago, Andrea Leadson the new energy minister, told us all that ‘ we are committed to the next wave of new nuclear projects…and we hope to be able to be able to meet 35% of power needs from nuclear by 2028’ That’ll be the ‘plans’ the industry has coming to fruition by then, I would imagine – but not quite what I received as a written answer from DECC a week later when I asked about the new nuclear timetable – ‘ we expect ..these new power stations to come into operation during the 20’s and early 30’s’ signed off as answered, I might add by one Andrea Leadsom.
So to sum up (3) Hinkley C is now delayed by more than five years, and will probably be delayed further. Even assuming everything on the remaining permissions and the build goes very speedily, it is probably asking a lot for power to come out of the plant before 2025. – the date by which all the new fleet was supposed to be in place. And then, if 35% of power is to be supplied from nuclear by 2028, magically, all the other sites will have to be completed by then (which means all will have to be approved, financially closed, and commenced with building by about 2017).
So I guess we will need to hold tight and wait for the flurry of announcements about definite build programmes on Wylfa, Sizewell, Oldbury etc. over the next eighteen months.
And then finally summing up (4) not a snowballs chance in hell that all this will happen. Instead of a complete nuclear programme by 2025, the likelihood is that there will be one plant, or maybe not even that operational at that point. (The estimable Prof. Catherine Mitchell, from Exeter University has produced a highly recommended blog piece on this and other energy planning issues by the way.)
Time, you might think, for a plan B. what about filling in now almost certain low carbon generation gap, at the very least, with much more easily deployable, speedily buildable, better financeable, lower subsdisable real renewables? Oh, we’ve just taken most of those programmes out and shot them. Bit of a mess then, really.
alan's energy blog 
Agree, as usual. A witty take on government policy, but sadly detrimental to the people who suffer the pollution.
Your dry wit is well received – all is political posturing and the resources and the dirty oil/gas/coal lobby can retreat to offshore (clean) environments while the majority suffer the pollution.
Surely it would be interesting to know what was the total cost to the public purse of preparing and publishing an obvious work of fantasy like the latest update of theGovernment’s Low Carbon Technology plan?
good stuff Alan, but a plea not to let the nuclear lobby get away with the now dated figure of £92.50 per MWh as the Hinkley C headline price. That is in in 2012 prices – it is now up to around £95 per MWh in current prices – the point is that renewable alternatives are quoted in current prices, so it is very misleading to compare these current prices with the 2012 Hinkley C price which of course increases in line with the terms of the govt’s draft contract according to CPI.
Bringing about the near complete decarbonising of the UK power grid always was about building lots of nuclear power stations, the intermittent renewables industry never came up with a solution to the problem of how to keep the lights on for the days and weeks when there is little or no wind, other than keeping the existing fleet of fossil fuel fired power stations on standby to take up the slack.
Given the Tories have effectively canned the onshore wind turbine industry, all efforts are best directed to working out how to make new nuclear affordable.
The French managed to effectively decarbonise their electricity supply with 1980s nuclear reactor technology three decades ago. The UK should follow suit by building reactors to a single, standardised design, and achieve economies of scale by building them in large numbers.