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The Future of Nuclear Power: The role of nuclear power in a low carbon economy

Name of participant: Mr. Roger HELMER, The Freedom Association.
These are the recorded submissions. Only sections to which responses have been recorded are listed below.

Document section - Our energy challenge: climate change and energy security

Question: 1. To what extent do you believe that tackling climate change and ensuring the security of energy supplies are critical challenges for the UK that require significant action in the near term and a sustained strategy between now and 2050?

Your response:
There is a widespread view among members of TFA that climate change has been over-rated as a threat. Anticipated changes in atmospheric CO2 will have little impact on global temperatures. Sea level is rising no faster than it has for centuries. The 1930s were arguably hotter than the 1990s, and temperatures seem to be static or declining since 1998. Long-term temperature records indicate that while CO2 and temperature are certainly correlated, CO2 levels lag temperature changes by hundreds of years, suggesting that temperature drives CO, rather than vice versa. Cyclical models of global temperature fit observations rather better than the CO2 hypothesis.

We have similar reservations about the Stern Report. It uncritically accepts the alarmist scenario on climate change. It then tots up all the imagined costs and down-sides of higher temperatures, without considering the upsides (for example, more people in Britain die of cold than of heat, so increased temperatures would reduce mortality). Then it applies a wholly unrealistic discount rate to calculate the net present value of future costs. Recent studies by other reputed scientists and economists suggest that the costs of Kyoto-style measures would outweigh benefits by a factor of two to three times.

Over the medium to long term, oil and gas will get scarcer, and more expensive, leading to the development of alternative energy technologies. So market mechanisms will limit the use of fossil fuels (except perhaps coal) over time.

However TFA members are very concerned indeed about energy security. We see President Putin with his hand on the gas-tap. Our oil mostly comes from politically volatile areas -- the Middle East, Nigeria, Venezuela. Clearly there is benefit in developing alternative and renewable energy sources, but these have their own problems, and renewables will never deliver more than a small fraction of UK energy requirements.

Therefore we support a sustained strategy to reduce dependence on imported fossil fuels. We believe that nuclear power must be at the heart of that strategy.

Document section - Nuclear power and carbon emissions

Question: 2. Do you agree or disagree with the Government's views on carbon emissions from new nuclear power stations? What are your reasons? Are there any significant considerations that you believe are missing? If so, what are they?

Your response:
In this case the government's analysis is correct. Nuclear is for all practical purposes carbon-free, or at least as carbon-free as wind, and much lower carbon than bio-fuels. The environmental footprint (in terms of land area, countryside, wildlife habitat and impact etc) of nuclear is much lower than equivalent capacity of wind, tidal barrage or bio-fuels. Above all, nuclear can provide the consistent, reliable base-load power we need to drive a growing economy. Renewables (especially wind) cannot do this. They are intermittent and unpredictable.

However (and referring to the previous page), the EU's policies in this area, and especially its Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), are simply farcical. Studies by the think-tank Open Europe, and others, show that ETS has wholly failed to have any impact on EU emissions (which will now fail to achieve Kyoto targets), but has imposed huge and disproportionate costs and bureaucracy on industry. It is a typical EU bureaucrat's non-solution, and should be abandoned.

Document section - Security of supply benefits of nuclear power

Question: 3. Do you agree or disagree with the Government's views on the security of supply impact of new nuclear power stations? What are your reasons? Are there any significant considerations that you believe are missing? If so, what are they?

Your response:
The government has this one right. The TFA (as noted previously) is primarily concerned about energy security, and the way in which our independence as a country could be undermined by energy-blackmail. Nuclear provides protection against energy blackmail. It also provides a prospect of price stability over the long term (we see the benefits to the French economy from its extensive nuclear capacity). The government is especially right to point to the problem of our ageing nuclear fleet. We must move fast merely to maintain the nuclear capacity we have. In our view, we should be looking to increase the percentage supplied by nuclear from the current 18% to perhaps double that figure.

Perhaps the Climate Protesters at Heathrow airport in August 2007 would have done better to camp in Whitehall and demand more nuclear power stations.

Document section - Economics of nuclear power

Question: 4. Do you agree or disagree with the Government's views on the economics of new nuclear power stations? What are your reasons? Are there any significant considerations that you believe are missing? If so, what are they?

Your response:
The government's analysis is again correct. At current and anticipated oil and gas prices, nuclear becomes competitive even after allowing for waste disposal and decommissioning costs. While it is right that commercial risk should be borne by private sector energy companies (Point 52), there is one demand that the power companies can reasonably make. Because of the exceptionally long investment and pay-back cycle on nuclear power, investors can reasonably ask the government for some kind of long-term assurance that they will be protected from future regulatory changes which could have the effect of undermining their investment plans.

Document section - The value of having low carbon electricity generation: nuclear power and the alternatives

Question: 5. Do you agree or disagree with the Government's views on the value of having nuclear power as an option? What are your reasons? Are there any significant considerations that you believe are missing? If so, what are they?

Your response:
As noted previously, TFA is unimpressed by climate hysteria, and doubtful whether CO2 is a major factor. We are even more doubtful that anything we in the UK may do will have a significant effect on atmospheric CO2 levels in the foreseeable future. We take the view that both of the targets referred to -- the 20% CO2 reduction by 2020, and the 60% reduction by 2050 -- would be extraordinarily difficult to achieve, and that the attempt to achieve them would be hugely damaging to our wealth, prosperity and competitiveness. Recent news reports suggest that the government may well have recognised that the 2020 target, at least, is unachievable in the UK -- and very few of today's political leaders will be around to worry whether the 2050 target is achieved.

Nevertheless, we take the view that the government's points on security of supply, and on power costs, are broadly correct. While agreeing that these should be private sector decisions taken by power companies, we would urge the government to do everything in its power, especially in terms of planning consent, to allow very fast and positive decisions to be made on new nuclear capacity.

Document section - Safety and security of nuclear power

Question: 6. Do you agree or disagree with the Government's views on the safety, security, health and non-proliferation issues? What are your reasons? Are there any significant considerations that you believe are missing? If so, what are they?

Your response:
Absolutely right. As noted previously, nuclear technology is not merely safe. It is actually the safest mainstream power generation technology by far. It is sadly no longer true, as a US bumper-sticker once claimed, that "More people have died in Ted Kennedy's car than in nuclear power accidents". But it is true, sadly, that more people have died in coal mining accidents in the last few weeks than died in the Chernobyl event. The largest peace-time explosion in the UK was not a nuclear event. It was the Buncefield oil storage disaster.

We cannot stress too often that you cannot compare Chernobyl, a 1960s-style Soviet reactor, with a modern nuclear plant. You might as well compare an East German Trabant with a new BMW.

Document section - Transport of nuclear materials

Question: 7. Do you agree or disagree with the Government's views on the transport of nuclear materials? What are your reasons? Are there any significant considerations that you believe are missing? If so, what are they?

Your response:
The government is right. The risks are small. The regulatory framework appears to be robust. Ever since man invented fire, all power technologies have involved some risk. The evidence and experience show that the risks associated with the nuclear industry are limited and containable.

Document section - Waste and decommissioning

Question: 8. Do you agree or disagree with the Government's views on waste and decommissioning ? What are your reasons? Are there any significant considerations that you believe are missing? If so, what are they?

Your response:
Again, the government is right.

We should seek to move away from the presumption that all communities will fight tooth and nail against nuclear waste facilities. If the benefits of these facilities, including jobs, investment and infrastructure, are properly set out, it should be possible to have communities and local authorities competing for the investment, rather than marching in the streets in protest.

Question: 9. What are the implications for the management of existing nuclear waste of taking a decision to allow energy companies to build new nuclear power stations?

Your response:
Presumably the creation of additional nuclear facilities will involve new thinking and new plans for waste disposal. These new plans may offer synergistic benefits in dealing with existing waste.

Question: 10. What do you think are the ethical considerations related to a decision to allow new nuclear power stations to be built? And how should these be balanced against the need to address climate change?

Your response:
There is only one ethical consideration, and that is to ensure that everything that can be done to ensure safety, is done. Beyond that, the government is right to stand back and let the industry make commercial decisions. It will be the government's duty to facilitate those decisions, and, so far as it can, to remove unnecessary barriers.

TFA considers that energy security is the key issue, along with a free market in energy and the greatest possible efficiency in the industry -- since power is a major cost for most businesses, and therefore an efficient power supply industry is a vital pre-condition for Britain's continuing prosperity and competitiveness (we are falling behind the French in this area). We do not rate the climate change issue, and therefore do not think it should be a consideration. But for those who do buy the CO2/global warming scenario, that is just one more reason to go nuclear.

Document section - Environmental impacts of nuclear power

Question: 11. Do you agree or disagree with the Government's views on environmental issues? What are your reasons? Are there any significant considerations that you believe are missing? If so, what are they?

Your response:
The government's position is broadly right. It is critical that nuclear power stations should not be looked at in isolation, but in comparison with alternatives. Take an example: there is much talk of a Severn estuary barrage. It would be a great engineering feat, and it would develop a great deal of power. But it would also have a profound impact on the ecology of the region. It would destroy one of the best wetland habitats in Europe. It would wholly alter the geography of the region, and it might well have unforeseen effects (compare for example the disasters caused in Egypt by the High Aswan dam, or in China with the Three Gorges).

The same power as the Severn barrage would provide, could come from three to five small modular nuclear power stations. They might not be pretty, but they would have a relatively tiny footprint, and they would leave a vast and important wild-life habitat unscathed.

Similarly the visual and landscape damage associated with wind farms (never mind the network of roads and cables they require) is hugely greater than that of an equivalent nuclear power station.

Document section - The supply of nuclear fuel

Question: 12. Do you agree or disagree with the Government's views on the supply of nuclear fuel? What are your reasons? Are there any significant considerations that you believe are missing? If so, what are they?

Your response:
Yes.

Document section - Supply chain and skills capacity

Question: 13. Do you agree or disagree with the Government's views on the supply chain and skills capacity? What are your reasons? Are there any significant considerations that you believe are missing? If so, what are they?

Your response:
Yes but .... we have a crisis in nuclear engineering training in the UK, and successive governments have failed to provide a clear future for the industry which would encourage engineers to work in the field. We will be forced to depend on international expertise initially, but we need to resurrect nuclear engineering education in the UK. Urgently.

Document section - Reprocessing of spent fuel

Question: 14. Do you agree or disagree with the Government's views on reprocessing? What are your reasons? Are there any significant considerations that you believe are missing? If so, what are they?

Your response:
This is a technical question on which we do not take a view.

Document section - Other considerations

Question: 15. Are there any other issues or information that you believe need to be considered before taking a decision on giving energy companies the option of investing in nuclear power stations? And why?

Your response:
The key issue is energy security.

Document section - Our proposals on nuclear power

Question: 16. In the context of tackling climate change and ensuring energy security, do you agree or disagree that it would be in the public interest to give energy companies the option of investing in new nuclear power stations?

Your response:
Agree

Question: 17. Are there other conditions that you believe should be put in place before giving energy companies the option of investing in new nuclear power stations? (for example, restricting build to the vicinity of existing sites, or restricting build to approximately replacing the existing capacity)

Your response:
We need a planning process, and we have to take account of the views of local residents. But we must not countenance a planning process that enables ideological anti-nuclear objectors to engage in guerrilla warfare, delaying decisions for years. This is a difficult balance to strike, but we must strike it or the lights will go out.

Document section - Our proposals for facilitative action

Question: 18. Do you think these are the right facilitative actions to reduce the regulatory and planning risks associated with such investments? Are there any other measures that you think the Government should consider?

Your response:
These are complex matters which are difficult to summarise in a few words. But the process set out above seems to be headed the right way.

TFA believes that these are decisions for the UK, and that little weight should be given to EU law in these matters.

The devolution aspect raises an alternative version of the West Lothian question. Can Scotland deny planning permission, but then rely on supply through the National Grid from English power stations? Will we see power companies building nuclear power stations hard against the Scottish border to route power to Glasgow? This aspect needs to be considered.