Britain’s nuclear revival comes with a ‘terrible’ £40bn sting

Nuclear power doesn’t come cheap. But as countries around the world race to shore up energy security following geopolitical shocks, the UK is on course to build some of the planet’s most expensive reactors. The Sizewell C project in Suffolk, with a price tag of £40bn, is a “terrible deal” for the UK taxpayer, a parliamentary committee said this week. The cost of Hinkley C, a 3.2GW nuclear power station in Somerset, has risen to nearly £49bn in current prices.

The public accounts committee said the high level of risk borne by taxpayers and consumers for Sizewell C was “extraordinary” while private investors were expected to receive significant returns. The UK government has taken a 44.9% equity stake in Sizewell C, making it the single largest shareholder in a consortium that includes the French state-owned power company EDF, Centrica and others. Consumers began paying for the project in their bills late last year, and the power station is expected to add about £19 a year to a typical household’s bill by the time it is due to open in the 2030s.

Once completed it is expected to deliver savings but, given the size of the construction project, these may not outweigh the costs to consumers for decades. Though the costs of nuclear construction in the UK appear high, other countries in the developed world have had similar experiences. Two new reactors at the Vogtle plant in the US state of Georgia cost $35bn (£26bn) to build, more than twice the original estimate, and the project was seven years late when it came online in 2024.

Related articles: North Sea fossil fuels could help bridge the gap to clean energy, says Burnham North Sea oil reversal Hinkley C is the first new nuclear plant to be built in the UK in a generation, and one of the challenges in bringing nuclear power back is restoring the supply chain while dealing with increasingly complex regulatory requirements – partly a legacy of nuclear accidents. Michael Kruse, an adviser on energy projects at the consultancy Arthur D Little said: “The nuclear sector is embedding lessons from [past] incidents into reactor designs.

This is essential to do but it also increases the technical complexities, which need to be carefully managed during project delivery.” Kruse said the industry was still struggling to coordinate different players in the “complex ecosystem” of a nuclear supply chain. South Korea has benefited from greater continuity; its 26 reactors provide just under a third of the country’s power needs. “South Korea kept industry capability while having a localised supply chain,” Kruse said.

“Basically, they can put it together because they are more used to it.” Britain generates about 15% of electricity from nuclear power, but most of this capacity is due to be retired by the end of the decade. The public accounts committee said that if Sizewell C is delivered on time and on budget it would leave the government in a much stronger position to negotiate future deals, ensuring the financial risks of future schemes can be spread more fairly.

In response to the committee’s report, Nigel Cann, the chief executive of Sizewell C said: “Recent energy price shocks have exposed the risks of being overly reliant on imported fossil fuels.” He said the power station would strengthen energy independence and support lower bills. ‘From today, the first priority of the government will be cheaper energy, and cleaner energy will be one way that we can do that’ ‘From today, the first priority of the government will be cheaper energy, and cleaner energy will be one way that we can do that’ The government has defended the need to build new nuclear power stations in order to transition away from fossil fuels and strengthen energy security.

In his speech to the Labour party conference, Andy Burnham emphasised a “massive expansion of homegrown renewables and nuclear”. Introducing his budget this week , the chancellor John Healey explicitly said that cost would be a priority over carbon emissions. “From today, the first priority of the government will be cheaper energy, and cleaner energy will be one way that we can do that,” he said. Emerging economies are at the forefront of the revival of nuclear energy, with China leading the way.

Most of the reactors under construction around the world since 2017 are either of Chinese or Russian design, according to the International Energy Agency. But European countries are also pursuing a return to nuclear alongside the expansion of renewables, notably France, where there are plans for six new nuclear reactors. Kruse said: “When you look at other European countries – the Netherlands, Poland, the Czech Republic – they are all following the line of thought that there is a benefit to embedding nuclear into the grid, because there is a value to the overall energy system.”

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