UK government bets on small-scale nuclear - POLITICO Europe

UK government bets on small-scale nuclear - POLITICO

LONDON — The U.K. government has set its sights on a new generation of small-scale nuclear reactors in its bid to protect domestic energy security and hit net zero targets.

Energy Secretary Grant Shapps hailed the potential for “billions of pounds of public and private sector investment” in small modular reactors (SMRs) ahead of the long-awaited launch of Great British Nuclear (GBN) later Tuesday.

“Unlike conventional reactors, SMRs can be built inside factories, transported across the country, and then reassembled in power stations,” the government said in a statement ahead of the launch — essentially, its component parts are made in one place, moved and then bolted together somewhere else. The International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN's nuclear watchdog, has talked about the potential benefits of “prefabricated units of SMRs” as an alternative to large, fixed reactors.

GBN, an arms-length body, is tasked with making sure the government achieves its goals of generating 24 gigawatts of nuclear power by 2050, as well as securing up to a quarter of U.K. electricity from homegrown nuclear power by the same date.

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Ministers and industry leaders say SMRs will play a significant role in reaching that target because the construction process can be quicker, more flexible, and less expensive than for conventional reactors.

Developers will be able to signal their interest in bidding for funding under a GBN-run competition from today.

“There's no getting away from the fact that a large-scale nuclear plant up front is very expensive to build,” said Leon Flexman, corporate affairs director at the nuclear reactor developer X-energy.

“With the smaller plants … it's much easier to finance them, investors see less risk and therefore that overcomes that hurdle. But you can also put them in places you might not otherwise be able to put nuclear plants, and you can construct them more quickly,” he told POLITICO. “You obviously need more of them if you're going to get the same volumes of electricity, but that's perfectly doable.”

X-energy — which has already secured a federal grant in the U.S. to deploy SMR technology — plans to bid for GBN funding for its high-temperature gas reactor.

“What we don't want is further delay, but if they do what they say they're going to do, then it will give the sort of clarity that's needed,” Flexman added.

Nuclear Minister Andrew Bowie said GBN will play an “essential role” in powering Britain, while the body’s interim chair, Simon Bowen, said the competition would deliver a “real step forward” in harnessing nuclear power.

GBN was due to be launched last week but the plans were scuppered at the last minute by the government’s announcements on public sector pay.

Alongside the competition launch, the government is also set to announce up to £157 million in funding for nuclear projects. This includes up to £77.1 million for advanced nuclear business development and £58 million for the development of advanced modular reactors (AMRs) which run on higher temperatures.

David Landon, chief executive of the molten salt reactor developer MoltenFLEX — set to receive £1.2 million from the government to develop molten salt fuel — said he hoped for more clarity on potential AMR sites and called on the government to support a range of nuclear technologies, including advanced reactors.

“The government support is probably more important than the money,” Landon told POLITICO. “That has been one of our key messages to government … Whatever you announce with this competition, don't make it seem that that’s the end of it.”

Rolls Royce, another firm involved in developing modular nuclear technology, said it “welcome[d] the prioritization of SMRs” in the first phase of GBN's work.

The government will enter into negotiations with companies selected through the competition for SMRs in the autumn.

Tom Greatrex, chief executive of the Nuclear Industry Association and a former Labour shadow energy minister, said today’s launch signaled an “important statement of intent,” but warned that the government would have to deliver the technology selection process “at pace.”

“It’s good to have government talking about doing things at a more rapid pace than sometimes things have been done in the past, but actually there’s a difference between a government announcement saying they want to do something by the autumn and it happening,” he said.

“That’s the key thing really — is that we hope to be able to come away from [the launch] confident that there is a body and a process able to deliver in that timeframe,” he added.