Nuclear electricity is a low-carbon energy source and a relatively well-understood class of technologies. Nevertheless new nuclear build has been deemed undesirable in the 'Island Britain' model in the report for two important reasons.

The twin threats of sophisticated ideological terrorism and ‘recreational malice’ can no longer be ignored, given the terrorist atrocities of 2001 and 2005 and the widespread targeting by hackers of all categories of systems. Such risks will become even greater if there is a continued failure to address the problem of international inequality, or if social order is not maintained in the transition from high carbon technologies. A specific danger is that following a serious incident, it may be necessary to shut down a large proportion of the network’s nuclear capacity, leaving a critical gap in supply.

The costs of nuclear power also pose uncertainties and risks. Nuclear power plants are relatively cheap to run, but have high ‘front-end’ capital costs and possibly even greater ‘back-end’ costs. The full life-cycle costs, relative to the actual price of electricity paid for by customers, are vigorously disputed. Given a chain of optimistic assumptions, ‘statistically reasonable’ levels of safety and security, and risks underwritten by government, it can be made to look affordable. But with pessimistic assumptions, lack of government backup, ‘precautionary’ standards of safety, an insistence on total decommissioning and the establishment of final depositories for high-level waste, it can appear expensive relative to other options.

Since climate change is a global problem that can only be solved by coordinated action, the international dimensions of Britain’s energy policy must also be considered. Even if Britain stays within the tight carbon budget defined in this report, humanity can only avoid crossing climate change ‘tipping points’ if other countries have equally constrained caps.

If Britain or any other developed nation make new nuclear power a core component of their strategy to tackle climate change, many other rapidly developing economies will seek to follow suit. In essence, if one nation cannot meet its climate change targets without the use of nuclear power, it would be politically unfeasible to expect any other country to.

This would significantly undermine the unparalleled international diplomatic challenge posed by the need to negotiate a Contraction & Convergence framework.

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• Overview
• International Policy
• National Policy
• Energy Saving
• Buildings
• Transport
• Aviation
• Agriculture
• Renewables
• Island Britain
• TEQs
• C&C
• V2G Power