nuclear-news

Cost of Sizewell C nuclear project expected to reach close to £40bn

“Nuclear is too expensive, too slow — and very expensive to contain at the end of its life.”

Final price tag for building new power plant is likely to be double 2020 estimate

Jim Pickard, Rachel Millard and Gill Plimmer , January 14 2025

The final price tag for building the planned Sizewell C nuclear power station in Suffolk is likely to reach close to £40bn, according to people close to the negotiations over the flagship energy scheme. 

The sum is double the £20bn estimate given by developer EDF and the UK government for the project in 2020, reflecting surging construction costs as well as the implications of delays and cost overruns at sister site Hinkley Point C. 

The higher estimate is likely to raise questions over the government’s strategy for a nuclear power revival, at a time of stretched government finances and cost of living concerns. 

EDF says that once up and running, Sizewell C should be able to supply low carbon electricity to the equivalent of about 6mn homes for 60 years.  

The Treasury is due to decide whether to go ahead with the project in this year’s multiyear spending review, according to officials. 

The UK government and French energy group EDF were the initial backers of Sizewell C, but they are trying to raise billions of pounds from new investors, a process that is dragging on longer than planned.  

Earlier this month the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (Desnz) said it could not reveal the current cost estimate for the project as it was “commercially sensitive”. …………………

Alison Downes, executive director of campaign group Stop Sizewell C, urged the government to “come clean” on the “massive true cost” of the project given that households would be paying upfront for its construction via a levy on energy bills. “This secrecy around Sizewell C is inexcusable.”

Dale Vince, a big Labour party donor and founder of green energy company Ecotricity, has written to the government’s new Office for Value for Money warning that the construction of Sizewell “will saddle consumers with higher bills long before it delivers a single unit of electricity”. 

But one senior government figure and two well-placed industry sources said a reasonable assumption for the cost of building Sizewell C would be about £40bn in 2025 prices.

The government has already awarded £3.7bn of state funding to the project. Ministers had planned to reach a final investment decision by the end of 2024 but were forced to delay this until spring 2025. Now there is industry speculation that any deal could slip beyond the autumn.

Speaking to the Financial Times, he added: “Nuclear is too expensive, too slow — and very expensive to contain at the end of its life”…………………………….

all but one of Britain’s current ageing fleet of plants is due to close by March 2030, potentially sooner if planned life extensions cannot go ahead. 

Only one new nuclear power station, Hinkley Point C in Somerset, is at present being built in the UK but it is delayed and over budget.

The project is due to start generating in 2029 at the earliest, and cost up to £46bn. That compares with initial expectations from 2016 that it would start at the end of 2025 and cost £18bn. …………………….

there is scepticism inside government about how much lower Sizewell C’s price tag would be compared with Hinkley Point C………………………………

January 16, 2025 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | 1, business and costs, UK