Are the stars finally aligning for the new golden age' of nuclear? | Nils Pratley

"Presidential visits, like investment summits, involve a blizzard of claims about companies set to spend squillions in the UK. Some commitments are merely extrapolations of current trends. Some can be filed under believe it when you see it. Some involve throwing everything into the mix and producing an implausibly precise number for the economic value to the UK. A few pledges are genuinely new, but scepticism should be the default setting."

"The announcement deserves attention because it was aimed at one of the biggest impediments to the new golden age of nuclear energy: the sheer time it takes to get new projects off the ground. Under the US-UK agreement, each country would recognise the other's regulatory and safety regime, which should cut duplication in the assessment phase. The idea is that the time taken for a project to get a licence would fall to two years, rather than the current three- or four-year wait."

"Centrica, the FTSE 100 company which has a slug of the UK's current nuclear fleet and has bought into Sizewell C in Suffolk, has formed a development agreement with X-Energy of the US to build up to 12 advanced modular reactors (AMRs) in Hartlepool. The aim is to be buzzing by the mid-2030s, which would count as rapid by nuclear's normal standards."

Presidential visits and investment summits often generate claims about corporate spending in the UK, many of which are extrapolations or overstated, so scepticism is warranted. A US-UK agreement would have each country recognise the other's regulatory and safety regime, cutting duplication and aiming to reduce licensing time to about two years from three to four. Centrica has formed an agreement with X-Energy to build up to 12 advanced modular reactors (AMRs) in Hartlepool, targeting operation by the mid-2030s. AMRs at 80 megawatts each are much smaller than Rolls-Royce SMRs (470 MW) and plants like Sizewell C. Faster licensing and smaller reactors could be essential for UK nuclear expansion.

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