Nuclear Energy

Baroness Blake of Leeds Excerpts

Thursday 7th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, for securing this important debate. I thank all noble Lords who have contributed for their well-informed and welcome efforts to explain such a complex area. The Library staff in both Houses have done an excellent job with their briefings.

We all know that our energy supply reliability and affordability are at the forefront of the thinking of many in government departments at all levels, as well as across industry and consumers. This focus is generated not only by net zero considerations, but by concern about security of supply and cost of living considerations. We now have a clear sense that the clock is ticking fast, and a focus on delivering alternatives to gas should be paramount.

Supporters of nuclear say that it can provide reliable baseload power, bolster energy security, provide industrial or domestic heat and potentially reduce the legacy of nuclear waste produced by reactors and weapons through reuse as fuel. Nuclear power is also a low-carbon power source, as the fission process produces no greenhouse gas emissions.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimated that the average full-cycle emissions of nuclear are below those of fossil fuels and, indeed, some renewables. The uncomfortable truth, as we have heard, is that the contribution of nuclear power to the total energy supply has fallen significantly since the 1990s and is set to decrease further over coming years. Numerous factors have contributed to this, as we have heard. The upfront cost of nuclear power can exceed that of other sources, leading to the need for subsidies or long contract settlements. The meltdown of Fukushima in 2011, on top of previous disasters, contributed to a weakening of global public support for nuclear power and a new series of safety measures that only added, of course, to costs and timescales. Also, the accumulation of nuclear waste continues to draw criticism due to a lack of disposal solutions; some point to renewables such as wind and solar as a cleaner alternative.

It is fair to say that it is still a politically controversial energy source, as we have heard. Some commentators have questioned the value for money of nuclear power, particularly the Hinkley C deal, following a fall in the cost of renewables such as offshore wind. One thing we have not stressed enough today is how we tackle the attitude of the public. Unless we recognise that the public are at best agnostic on this, we will continue to struggle to deliver the solutions we need. I believe that winning over public support will be key and needs to have far more of a focus.

Labour supports the development of nuclear power as an integrated element of our planning and long-term strategy to deliver our future energy needs. It is interesting to reflect back on when the Labour Government came in. As we have heard, there was an interregnum, if you like, in commitment in this area, but in 2006 Tony Blair, addressing the CBI as Prime Minister, made a very prescient comment:

“The facts are stark. By 2025, if current policy is unchanged, there will be a dramatic gap on our targets to reduce CO2 emissions; we will become heavily dependent on gas; and at the same time move from being 80/90%, self-reliant in gas to 80/90% dependent on foreign imports, mostly from the Middle East and Africa and Russia”.


How that has come home to roost.

The change happened from there. The Labour Government published the Energy Challenge review, saying that there was no one single energy solution and calling for new nuclear to be included, with a wider push for renewables and energy efficiency to achieve a low-carbon, secure and affordable supply of energy, and Gordon Brown continued this, releasing a White Paper on nuclear power. In 2011 the coalition Government, despite their difficulties, developed this and identified eight sites suitable for new nuclear reactors. All these proposed reactors are classed as generation III or generation III+ reactors.

What happened next? Conservative Governments from 2015 have continued to support new nuclear. The final go-ahead for Hinkley Point C was given by the May Government in 2016. In December 2020 the Johnson Government set out, in the Energy White Paper, the aim

“to bring at least one large-scale nuclear project to the point of Final Investment Decision by the end of this Parliament, subject to clear value for money and all relevant approvals”,

and so it has continued. However, the collapse of private sector support for a new plant at Moorside in November 2018 and the suspension of the Hitachi project at Wylfa in January 2019 cast doubt on the future of nuclear plants in the UK, and the Johnson Government did then come forward with a plan to come up with alternative financing models.

All this begs the question of where we stand today, and I hope the Minister will be able to answer some the questions that have been raised and give some much-needed clarity around future and long-term planning. First, we need an explanation of why there has been no delivery of nuclear projects over the past 13 years. I support my noble friend Lord Liddle’s comments and ask the Minister whether Great British Nuclear has a long-term, clear strategy and an investment plan. Will there be a final investment decision on Sizewell C by the end of this Parliament? Moving on from Sizewell, where is the promised announcement on developing a pipeline of new nuclear projects? Promises were made in November 2022 at the launch of Great British Nuclear that plans would be announced earlier this year. Where are those plans?

I firmly believe there is enormous private sector ambition and interest in developing nuclear to its rightful place in contributing to the mix of energy solutions. There is real interest in the thousands of jobs that will be created if the programmes go ahead, but there are serious questions for the Government to answer. First, concerning site provision and associated planning matters, how are the Government going to get these sites away? How will they work to unlock investment and, importantly, what will their contribution be? How can we move away from considering just one proposal at a time to having a long-term plan, including a whole series of proposals—the so-called “fleet deployment approach”?

We have known that successive Governments have supported nuclear power. Reactor designs have of course changed over time, from advanced gas-cooled reactors to pressurised water reactors, to European pressurised reactors and other new advanced designs, as we have heard today. The current and previous Conservative Governments have also been supportive of innovation, such as small modular reactors, fast reactors, molten salt reactors and other generation IV designs. However, I hope that at the end of the session today we will have a much clearer idea of how all this is going to be brought into play. We need certainty and a long-term plan to resolve these matters, and to enable nuclear to fulfil its potential and contribute to tackling the worsening energy and climate crisis that faces us all.