{"id":19386,"date":"2021-10-07T12:23:46","date_gmt":"2021-10-07T11:23:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ounews.co\/?p=19386"},"modified":"2021-10-07T12:23:46","modified_gmt":"2021-10-07T11:23:46","slug":"how-nuclear-energy-can-help-make-all-uk-electricity-green-by-2035","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/science-mct\/how-nuclear-energy-can-help-make-all-uk-electricity-green-by-2035\/","title":{"rendered":"How nuclear energy can help make all UK electricity green by 2035"},"content":{"rendered":"

Written by William Nuttall, Professor of Energy<\/a> at The Open University<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Boris Johnson is set to announce at the Conservative Party conference in Manchester that all of Britain\u2019s electricity will come from renewable sources by 2035, according to a recent report\u00a0in the Times<\/a>.The government suspects that the British public \u2013 tired of petrol station queues and dreading winter gas bills \u2013 will like the idea of moving away from fossil fuels. But the nature of this energy crisis, stoked by a late summer lull in wind power generation, high wholesale gas prices and Britain\u2019s meagre prospects for storing energy, demands a careful response.And what energy technology offers low-carbon credentials and a reliable base supply? The UK government\u2019s emphatic answer appears to be nuclear power.Only three years ago, UK ambitions for new nuclear power plants were in trouble. Major Japanese conglomerates Toshiba and Hitachi had pulled the plug on their separate nuclear projects in the country. But with renewed support from Boris Johnson\u2019s government, one of these now appears to be back on the table.<\/p>\n

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It was recently revealed that there are ongoing discussions between the government and American partners about US nuclear engineering firm Westinghouse building a <\/span>new nuclear power plant<\/a>\u00a0on the island of Anglesea in north Wales. There is even talk of government support for Derby-based industrial giant Rolls-Royce to develop a series of smaller modular nuclear reactors. These are, in essence, scaled-down versions of traditional power plants that will generate 470 megawatts of electricity compared with the 1,000 megawatts from their larger equivalents. Importantly, with these new designs, true factory-based manufacture becomes possible. The factories produce modules for rapid assembly on-site.<\/span><\/div>\n
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There are likely to be benefits for British businesses in the government\u2019s approach. But how would a new generation of nuclear plants help keep the lights on while cutting emissions from the energy sector?<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The nuclear option<\/h2>\n

The reactors in nuclear power stations convert the heat generated by splitting atoms (a process known as nuclear fission) to electricity, and can usually run at maximum power for months, whatever the weather. This process doesn\u2019t emit greenhouse gases \u2013 although there are likely to be emissions during the construction of the plant itself. The vapour that rises from the iconic cooling towers of a nuclear power plant is water, not carbon dioxide.<\/p>\n

Large nuclear power stations have huge turbine generators spinning at high speed. These hold their speed in the face of small national fluctuations, providing stability to the grid. A constant base supply of nuclear power could continue to meet demand when renewable generation falters because the wind isn\u2019t blowing and the Sun isn\u2019t shining.<\/div>\n
There are other ways nuclear energy can aid decarbonisation. Heat generated in nuclear reactors might be pumped into the central heating systems<\/a>\u00a0of homes and other buildings, replacing fossil gas boilers. Nuclear energy could even go towards producing hydrogen fuel \u2013 a form of stored energy with potential benefits in heating and transport. And because nuclear fuel like uranium is what\u2019s called energy-dense, even relatively small amounts can offer an ample supply. The UK also has its own\u00a0fuel factory<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0plant for enriching uranium<\/a>, allowing greater national control over the entire process.<\/div>\n
There remain concerns about the cost and safety of nuclear power. But these should now be placed in the context of climate change. Fossil fuels in power generation must end, and the stable and continuous operation of nuclear power plants is a useful complement to the varying output of renewable sources such as wind and solar. This appears to be the government\u2019s logic, favouring a boost to both nuclear and renewables investment.UK governments have pushed to rebuild British\u2019s nuclear capacity more than once in the last two decades. When Tony Blair was prime minister, he aimed for a series of very large nuclear power plants. The construction of the first of these, Hinkley Point C, is well underway. The pandemic and other problems have caused delays, but the first electricity generated from its two large reactors is expected in\u00a0the summer of 2026<\/a>.<\/div>\n
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The nuclear reactor on unit one at Hinkley Point C.\u00a0Ben Birchall\/PA Images\/Alamy Stock Photo<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Hinkley Point C is underpinned by a finance deal with China, struck by former Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne. The days when, in 2015, Osborne said \u201cBritain should run towards China\u201d are fading. So too is the rhetoric of a nuclear renaissance that coincided with a post-cold war optimism for globalisation and market liberalisation. First it became clear that competitive electricity markets struggled with the challenge of replacing old nuclear with new. Then globalisation faltered with the return of great power nationalism.<\/p>\n

Nuclear technology is back in the government\u2019s sights, but this time it will involve more British money and technology. Talk of a green future has been joined with voices on the right clamouring for a new sense of national self-reliance, free from the vicissitudes of global fossil-fuel supply. Despite such realities, and the many difficulties encountered along the way, the UK nuclear renaissance remains internationalist in outlook. It is a strength that should be defended.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Written by William Nuttall, Professor of Energy, <\/a>The Open University<\/a>.<\/em><\/div>\n
This article is republished from\u00a0The Conversation<\/a>\u00a0under a Creative Commons license. Read the\u00a0original article<\/a>.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Written by William Nuttall, Professor of Energy at The Open University. Boris Johnson is set to announce at the Conservative Party conference in Manchester that all of Britain\u2019s electricity will come from renewable sources by 2035, according to a recent report\u00a0in the Times.The government suspects that the British public \u2013 tired of petrol station queues […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":19388,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,14],"tags":[861,1525,1640,2200],"class_list":["post-19386","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science-environment","category-science-mct","tag-faculty-of-stem","tag-news-home","tag-ou-home","tag-the-conversation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19386","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19386"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19386\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}