Oral Answers to Questions

Christopher Pincher Excerpts

Thursday 16th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Gregory Barker]

The Settle micro-hydro scheme is exactly the sort of scheme that we want to see more of and encourage, but my hon. Friend is absolutely right: we need to make it easier for communities to take the initiative. That is why we are making it easier to get through the planning system and providing more financial incentives; and we have also launched a website to give people the information they need.

[Christopher Pincher (Tamworth) (Con)]

20. What recent progress he has made on facilitating new nuclear power stations without public subsidies.

[The Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change (Chris Huhne)]

The Government are committed to removing any unnecessary obstacles to investment in new nuclear, and we have made good progress. We are consulting on the revised draft energy national policy statements, including the nuclear NPS; I made a decision recently, on regulatory justification in respect of the AP1000 and EPR reactors, which was subsequently approved by both Houses, with an enormous majority in this House; we laid the Nuclear Decommissioning and Waste Handling (Designated Technical Matters) Order 2010, which was subsequently approved by both Houses and published last week; there have been consultations on funded decommissioning programme guidance, and an updated waste transfer pricing methodology for the disposal of higher activity wastes; and regulators are on track to complete their assessment of the reactors going through the generic design assessment process.

[Christopher Pincher]

I am grateful for that answer. Given some of the comments from investors, can the Secretary of State confirm whether there is an appetite in the City to invest in new nuclear and whether we have the domestic skills to decommission our Magnox plants and build a new generation of new nuclear? Will he also confirm whether the planning regime is fit for purpose, so that we can ensure we meet our target of 16 GW of nuclear generating capacity?

[Chris Huhne]

From my contacts around the City, I believe that there certainly is an appetite to invest not just in new nuclear plant, but right across the range of low-carbon technologies. I hope that we will be able to describe that in greater detail in the statement later. On planning and other issues that could present obstacles, we are considering how to clear the way right across all the technologies we will need in a low-carbon future to ensure that that happens.