nuclear-news

Britain’s Public Accounts Committee reveals that UK’s nuclear reactors have been a poor investment

 It’s almost a year since Boris Johnson’s announcement that a new
nuclear power station will be built at Wylfa, Ynys Môn. ‘Wylfa
Newydd’ is part of the proposed new nuclear scheme, Great British Nuclear
(GBN). But GBN, if it goes ahead, will be the third generation of nuclear
reactors in the UK.

Let’s look back at the past two generations of
nuclear power stations in the UK, and see how they’ve performed, and ask
if Wylfa Newydd is really the boon for Cymru that the Tories claim it is.

As Johnson made his Wylfa announcement in April 2022, the Public Accounts
Committee (PAC) was busy finalising a report on the economic performance of
Britain’s previous, second generation of reactors. The PAC report,
entitled ‘The Future of Advanced Gas-cooled Reactors [AGRs],’ was
released just a month after Johnson’s announcement.

It revealed: hownthese retirement-age AGR reactors have been a poor investment, not serving
Britain well economically; how the estimated cost of decommissioning them
had nearly doubled since 2004, and would likely climb further; and how
these astronomical, escalating costs of decommissioning the AGR sites (now
at £23.5 billion) is being put onto UK tax-payers.

 Nation Cymru 7th March 2023 https://nation.cymru/opinion/great-english-nuclear-should-wales-be-involved/

March 9, 2023 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | business and costs, UK