Anti-nuclear group blasts UK Gov for talks on building new power plant in Wales
An anti-nuclear group has blasted the UK Government for having talks on building another large-scale multi-billion pound nuclear power plant in Wales.
Dylan Morgan, Co-ordinator for PAWB, has reacted furiously to the discussions with US reactor manufacturer Westinghouse to build a new facility on Anglesey.
The UK Government say that the move is part of an effort to reduce the UK’s carbon emissions to net zero by 2050, but according to Morgan it isn’t an effective way to “counter climate change”.
He argues that nuclear power is “slow, dangerous and extortionately expensive”.
According to the UK Government, a new nuclear power plant at the decommissioned Wylfa site could become operational in the mid-2030s and generate power for six million homes.
Dylan Morgan said: “We have an immediate crisis now. Building huge reactors at a nuclear power station take at least 15 years.
“For example, EdF are involved in building their EPR at Olkiluoto in Finland. Comstruction started in 2005 with the boast it would be completed by 2009.
“It still hasn’t been completed in 2021. Nuclear power is slow, dangerous and extortionately expensive. It will do nothing to address the current energy crisis, neither will it be effective to counter climate change.
“The UK and Welsh governments should divert resources and support away from wasteful and outdated nuclear power projects towards developing renewable technologies that are much cheaper and can provide faster and more sustainable solutions to the energy crisis and the challenges of climate change.”
‘Rising energy prices’
The new Energy Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng is said to be keen on the idea, amid concern about rising energy prices and the fact that nuclear will only provide 8% of the UK’s energy by 2024.
The project is also being promoted by Welsh Secretary Simon Hart.
Projects over 350MW in size are reserved to Westminster and can be pushed through without the Welsh Government’s consent.
UK Government sources have told the Times that there is now “growing backing” for the idea to go ahead.
An attempt to build a nuclear plant at Wylfa with Hitachi collapsed last September.
“If our current situation shows anything it is that we need more stable home grown, low carbon generation in the UK,” the source said. “This is an important project that we’re very keen to try and get off the ground.”
A nuclear power plant at Hinkley Point in Somerset is already in the works, but has caused controversy as mud has been dumped off the coast of Cardiff.
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all this extra electricity needed for charging electric vehicles will have to come from somewhere, and who wants bloody great wind turbines and all the infrastructure required blighting the views for miles around, UK government aren’t interested in green energy, thatcher destroyed the UK coal industry, gas prices are a touch volatile and supply isn’t guaranteed, so that leaves “clean” nuclear power, never mind that they’re trying to develop a way of warning future generations of the danger of stored nuclear waste.
It’s NOT clean. 3rd highest carbon emitter after coal-fired and natural gas electricity generators. Life cycle emissions 66 grams of carbon dioxide for every kilowatt-hour. And then there’s the radioactivity unavoidably discharged from every operating reactor, putting inhalable particles of uranium into the air. And then, even we can be forced to put up with the high carbon and the health risks, there’s the long delay in bringing any of these monsters onstream. Invariably decades late. We haven’t GOT decades.
The ‘Nuclear Consulting Group’, to whose monograph I suppose you are alluding, are hardly unbiased. It’s also interesting that they praise Scotland for approaching 100% green generation while entirely ignoring the frequently mentioned surplus green electricity exported from Wales. Nuclear power is considerably more expensive than wind, tidal or solar power, but at least all the s**t is in one small place. My preference, though, is for distributed small scale generation: PV and turbine on every property. The buildings are already there; a few more structures won’t make much difference… unlike 150 m tall wind turbines (that’s nearly 500 feet… Read more »
I was alluding to Dr. Benjamin Sovacool, Professor of Energy Policy at the University of Sussex, who has looked at more than 100 studies to reach the conclusion about nuclear’s high carbon output. The s**t is NOT in one small place, as I wrote earlier in this thread. The highly radioactive stuff is in one small place until a Chernobyl or a Three Mile Island or a Fukushima or a Windscale etcetera but uranium dust goes up the pipe so we can all inhale it. The UN used to publish the data until their nuclear masters realised how embarrassing it… Read more »
Then there’s the matter of the poisonous waste it will produce being stored underground somewhere in Wales for thousands of years 😱. And the clean up costs when its decommissioned will cost around 100 billion ☹️…..costs which may fall on a future welsh govt 😱https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cumbria-26124803.amp
Why do they not invest in the use of the rivers,this is the most natural way nature picks up the water deposits it o the mountains and it flows down to the sea a natural circular motion of nature .Our Grand parents used it .Hydro in every river .?
and wave power in the seas; very short lead-in times. Why does no-one talk about Salter’s Ducks these days?
You could submit an article. Sure lots would be as interested as I am.
You’re right.
Our grandparents used coal because there’s no possibility of making enough power from hydro in the UK.
“Promoted by Hart” sums it all up. Read as…… “for England’s benefit at Welsh expense”
While Welsh labour’s acquiescence in this will sadly be a given it is frankly extraordinary, not to say worrying, that both Plaid Cymru and Yes Cymru have remained completely silent on this outrageous imposition by the uk govt 🤔☹️. Will anyone defend Wales?
The poisonous waste it will produce would be stored underground somewhere in Wales for thousands of years 😱. And the clean up costs when its decommissioned will cost around 100 billion ☹️…..costs which may fall on a future welsh govt 😱https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cumbria-26124803.amp