Britain faces threat of blackouts from ‘nuclear planning paralysis’
Britain faces the risk of energy shortages because of a “planning paralysis” crippling the nuclear sector, a think tank has warned.
On Thursday, a report for Policy Exchange by former Cabinet secretary Lord Case said the UK faces growing threats from blackouts unless new nuclear power stations are granted fast-track approval to begin construction.
“The UK is barrelling toward an energy crisis – and an urgent change in policy is needed to stop costs continuing to rise, and to secure our energy security … We must put nuclear enterprise at the heart of government reform,” said the report.
No new nuclear power stations have been built in the UK for 30 years, with the report warning that demand for power will surge over the next decade, just as many ageing nuclear and gas power plants are set to shut down.
It said urgent changes were needed to “cut through the planning paralysis” or risk an energy crisis by 2035.
“Without further nuclear power, Britain risks energy shortages that will drive up industry costs and raise household electricity bills,” the report added.
Full story here.
As the Telegraph’s chart below shows, the time to start panicking was when all those coal power stations started to close, without any replacement be other dispatchable capacity:
The belief that even fast tracking nuclear will make any difference in the next decade or more is a childlike delusion.
Hinkley C is probably going to be ready in 2030, fourteen years after work began on construction. Sizewell C, which has also now entered the construction phase is unlikely to start operations much before 2040.
Any new nuclear capacity after that will take at least twenty years to materialise, given all of the planning issues involved.
As for SMR, it is still an unproven technology and will probably be at least a decade away. Currently it is believed that the first tranche to be built by Rolls Royce will be only 1400 MW.
There is only one answer to the problem of looming blackouts – begin immediately on a large scale rollout of new CCGT power stations. If we do that, of course, there is no economic value in building any further wind and solar capacity, so AR7 and future CfD rounds need to be cancelled.
source notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com
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