10 nuclear power stations to be fast-tracked

The Government has paved the way to build 10 nuclear power stations at a cost of up to £50bn. It also hinted at future intentions to store high level radioactive waste in a new underground facility, which could cost up to £18bn.

The Government decision to earmark 10 sites signalled its increasing ambition for nuclear power as it tries to head off the threat of  power cuts in the next decade. 

It also revealled plans to raise a new levy on electricity to fund carbon capture and storage schemes from coal-fired power stations. It plans to raise £9.5bn from the levy to subsidise up to four CCS schemes.

More details about the nuclear power station building programme will be revealed in coming months, but the first new nuclear plant is likely to be built by EDF Energy at Hinkley Point, Somerset, and should come into service by the end of 2017.

New reactors at Sizewell, Suffolk, Wylfa, Anglesey, and Oldbury, Gloucestershire, are also likely to be among the first wave. Hartlepool, Co Durham, Bradwell, Essex, Heysham, Lancashire and three sites near Sellafield, West Cumbria, were also named.

Ministers have ruled out construction of a new plant at Dungeness, Kent, citing the risk it faced from rising sea levels.

Radioactive waste from a new generation of British nuclear power stations will be buried deep underground in a storage facility under plans announced by the Government.

Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, intends that construction of the stations should be quick enough to help to meet Britain’s 2050 target of reducing carbon emissions by 80 per cent while bolstering energy security as North Sea gas supplies decline.

To fast-track the build programme local authorities were recently stripped of the right of veto over new nuclear plants. Decisions will instead be taken by the Infrastructure Planning Commission, which was created to slash the period required to secure consent for energy projects from seven years to one year.

Mr Miliband said: “The current planning system is a barrier to this shift. It serves neither the interests of energy security, the interests of the low-carbon transition, nor the interests of people living in areas where infrastructure may be built.”

The reactors should meet at least a quarter of electricity demand by 2025. “New nuclear is right for energy security and climate change and will be good for jobs too,” Mr Miliband said.

None of the plants, which will cost at least £4 billion each, will be ready before 2017 — too late to replace eight coal-fired stations earmarked for closure by 2015.