MORE bad news this week for those in the UK hoping that nuclear power will help keep global warming in check. Much of the cost of replacing the country鈥檚 12 ageing nuclear power stations will have to come out of the public purse. What鈥檚 more, the energy from new reactors will cost almost three times industry predictions.
So say two independent reports released this week 鈥� one from Oxera, an economics consultancy group in Oxford, and another from the New Economics Foundation (NEF), a London-based think tank.
Oxera says that meagre returns on the estimated 拢8.6 billion needed to replace the UK鈥檚 nuclear power stations will deter the industry from investing in nuclear energy. So the taxpayer will have to fund new reactors. And the NEF says that once realistic construction and running costs are factored in, the price of electricity rises from an estimated 3 pence per kilowatt-hour to 8.3 pence per kilowatt-hour. And that does not include the cost of managing pollution, insuring the nuclear power stations or protecting them from terrorists.
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The reports come shortly before the G8 summit in Scotland next week, at which nuclear power is on the agenda. NEF鈥檚 policy director Andrew Simms says that the answer to global warming is renewable technologies. 鈥淚n an international context [nuclear power] is a no-brainer,鈥� he says.
