nuclear-news

UK’s new National Infrastructure Commission – first casualty may be Hinkley nuclear

The National Infrastructure Commission  nuCLEAR news No 2 nuclear power  October 15 At the Conservative Party Conference George Osborne announced the establishment of a National Infrastructure Commission (NIC). (1) It looks as though this will take control over the entire energy policy brief out of the Department for Energy and Climate Change.

Oliver Tickell, writing in the Ecologist, asks if this could be a way out of the Hinkley C debacle for the Government. (2) Osborne told the Conference that he wants the NIC and its chairman Lord Adonis to begin work immediately: “to make sure Britain has the energy supplies it needs.” Tickell says: “It was notable that in his speech on Monday Osborne had absolutely nothing to say about nuclear power or Hinkley C – even though he had only just returned from a trip to China to drum up controversial Chinese investment in Hinkley C and other nuclear power stations.

That could reflect that fact that there is still no agreement over key elements of the proposed deal. Meanwhile questions proliferate – over safety fears, ballooning costs, why the UK energy consumer should be financing the Chinese Communist Party, and the wisdom of having the very company that makes China’s nuclear weapons running nuclear plants in the UK.”

The first casualty of handing over decisions about energy to the NIC, which is answerable to the Treasury, could be Hinkley Point C. The Treasury’s information page on the NIC indicates some welcome strategic thinking on energy – something that has been almost entirely lacking in recent government policy. “The UK’s power sector has a growing problem in matching demand and supply, meaning that keeping the lights on requires a level of redundancy in the system – generation which is not always used.

The NIC will look at how to optimise solutions to this problem, including through large scale power storage – where innovation is needed to bring down costs; demand management – how to incentivise flexibility in demand so we don’t need as many power stations; and interconnection – how we best link the UK to the markets in the rest of Europe.” (3) ……..http://www.no2nuclearpower.org.uk/nuclearnews/NuClearNewsNo78.pdf

October 10, 2015 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | politics, UK