Energy Scotland's John Proctor responds to The Herald's pro-nuclear spread
Nuclear power in Scotland - not needed, not economic, not wanted, not safe
Energy Scotland* convener John Proctor has given me permission to publish a letter he sent to The Herald in response to its series of pro-nuclear articles published at the end of June. The Herald is owned by London-based Newsquest which, in turn, is owned by US media conglomerate, Gannett. The Herald has not published his letter.
I see Joani Reid MP has joined Anas Sarwar MSP and Michael Shanks MP in the chorus calling for new nuclear energy plant in Scotland (The Herald 28th June).
Of course, Joani has no concerns about someone building one of these in her back-yard – as her back-yard is in London, but Michael Shanks was bit more bullish when he declared he would be relaxed about having a Small Modularised Reactor (SMR) erected in his constituency. I am not sure how the good people of Rutherglen feel about this.
What I find mystifying is the lack of proper scrutiny being applied to the claims made by those members of the Nuclear Energy All-Party Parliamentary Group and their well-funded nuclear lobbyists. It does not surprise me that they are unable to set out what configuration they favour, as the reactors which they claim will produce 400 MWs do not exist. They have not been manufactured, tested or installed – anywhere!
As an Engineer, I would be keen to ask the politicians if they have thought about some of the basic elements of a power plant. Do they have any ideas what the thermal capacity of the proposed reactors are? Have they understood what the cooling requirements might be? How about the status of design of the ‘core catcher’ (the system designed to prevent a Chernobyl type event)?
Be under no illusion, Ms Reid, Mr Shanks and Mr Sarwar and the Nuclear lobby are building a Potemkin village.
They of course don’t want to talk about the European Power Reactor (EPR) configuration being installed at astronomical cost at Hinkley C.
This project is forecast to cost £45,000,000,000 when it finally comes on line sometime next decade. It is not easy to get a proper sense of this sum – but it might surprise the readers of The Herald that this is the equivalent of paying £1 million every single day for 110 years – and this is just the construction cost. We have not even started talking about operational costs, asset management and asset decommissioning.
Hinkley C is the same configuration Labour have just committed to at Sizewell C. Are we really gullible enough to believe Julia Pyke (Managing Director of Sizewell C) when she assures us that the Consortium have learned the lessons from Hinkley C?
If I can be generous for a moment, and accept that they can achieve a 10% saving relative to Hinkley C, that would still indicate a £40 billion project cost – which is enough to build 80 hospitals similar to the Forth Valley Hospital.
When Ms Pyke was recently asked on BBC how the project was going, she answered airily that it is ‘on schedule and within budget’. I waited eagerly for the obvious follow up question – ‘What is the budget and schedule?’ but that question never came.
The supporters of nuclear energy tell us that we need these plants for baseload capacity. They fail to acknowledge that in Scotland, we already generate more capacity from renewables than we consume – and this surplus is only going to grow as we continue to see more investment in wind, solar, tidal and energy storage.
‘What about intermittency and lack of system inertia?’ is the nuclear advocates’ stock question when discussing the growth of renewables.
The answer is beautifully simple – we will continue to do what we do now - rely on gas fired CCGTs (Combined-Cycle Gas Turbines). Which is reassuring - as there will be no nuclear plant coming on stream anytime soon.
‘But what about Net Zero?’ might be the next question. Thankfully, there are a raft of solutions to this currently available and more coming on stream every week. For example, gas turbine manufacturers are again building on 50 years of experience of burning hydrogen in gas turbines, and they will be ready to burn hydrogen or blended hydrogen/methane as quickly as the hydrogen market can come on stream.
My prediction is that the hydrogen market will come on stream faster than any SMRs (Small Modular Reactors) can be built – and if UK politicians had a strategic bone in their body, they would be trying to beat our friends in Europe to win the hydrogen race.
However as we have seen with HS2 and the third runway at Heathrow, they will carry on with their blundering plans to build new nuclear.
This comes to the final question that is not asked of nuclear supporting friends in the English Labour and Tory parties. How will they reduce the cost of energy when they are committed to this ruinously expensive nuclear build program?
The UK Government have no answer to this – and this is why the Scottish Government must keep in place the moratorium on new nuclear in Scotland and continue their support of renewables such as tidal power and also fully commit to their Hydrogen Action Plan.
John Proctor
Convener – Energy Scotland
*Energy Scotland, a member of the Independence Forum Scotland (IFS), is an association of Scottish-based energy professionals committed to addressing Scotland’s energy challenge of building a secure, decarbonised, affordable energy system which benefits Scottish industry and consumers.
I'm going to hold my hands up and say I'm not the brightest spark in the room, and yet everyone else is completely dense. I'd like to know why no one is making a fuss about what is happening in the UK and with privatization. Why its costing the tax payer £40 billion for new nuclear power plants when its owned by the private sector and the private sector gets all the profits. As a tax payer I'm sick and tired of being a sicker with no voice, I just want people to think about this, the Scottish budget is about £45.5 billion of funding in 2024 to 2025 to run a Country and we all know that this so called £40 billion will end up being far greater for these nuclear plants.
It would be daft for the size of Scotland to have nuclear power when we are completely self sufficient on wind. We all know the SNP will sell Scotland down the swanny for the leaderships self interest, I have said this many times we can either destroy the SNP or let the SNP destroy Scotland.
Lets be honest if history has told us anything about the SNP its that Scotland isn't even at the bottom of this parties to do list, but here is where the SNP going to sell Scotland out just like has with freeports and Independence remember Ian Blackford's word Scotland will not be drag out of the EU, what a loser this is the guy who wants to be a lord. The SNP will wait until after the Holyrood election and then grant permission, I said all alone Swinney isn't FM for the SNP or the party and he's doesn't even care about Scotland he only did it for one person and we know who she is. After the Holyrood election Swinney will grant permission and then step down and here is the reason why, Scotland will have to wait until 2031 before we have another Holyrood election and freeports will be well on there way, Nuclear will be passed and the asset striping of Scotland will make it even hard for people to vote for Independence when there is no assets for vote for, job well done Britain wins and its Scots once again who did it. So we need to rid ourselves of the SNP and come up with a solid plan to do it.
Leah, we have signed the petition long time ago I even posted it on wings. The SNP has been compromised and if I was to give my opinion when Sturgeon change it was when she met Theresa May. The trouble is if someone has something on you and you agree to bow to their will that doesn't mean there not going to use it against you it just means not at the moment.
A couple of thing is happening in Scotland 1 the crown office 2 the police and 3 the media are all working hand in hand to protect this Individual and I think we all know why, but for how long.
I tried to point out about The National which is hell bent on protecting her but no one listens.
When I signed your petition I did it for Scotland but I knew the SNP would do nothing about it and they won't.
You can tell people the truth, but they'll never believe you until the event and even when they are made aware they try and justify there failure by blaming you.
There is a lot of people who claim to want Independence but the money is more important, these are the ones we need to remove and expose.