Energy: Civil Nuclear Power

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Thursday 9th December 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, in following the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, I am very glad that he made such a deft connection between the underlying consciousness of the dangers of nuclear war and the debate about nuclear energy. In a strange way, it has been helpful that much of the debate in the last 30 years, going back to Chernobyl and so on, has been to make sure that people can see that there are many practical questions concerning the nature of nuclear power that are very instructive when it comes to understanding the effects of radiation and so on.

I led a delegation to Chernobyl in 1987, the year after the accident. At that time, I was chairman of the world trade union nuclear set-up—part of the consultative mechanism of Hans Blix of the IAEA. I commuted between Vienna and Moscow, meeting the Soviet—as they were then—trade unions to make sure that they were on board with the need to have mandatory safety inspections of the RBMK reactors. This was a time when it was all very difficult, and that period led—many people will be surprised to hear it put this way—to the collapse of the Soviet Union as we knew it and the resignation of Mr Gorbachev.

It is very interesting to take forward the idea that the whole nuclear debate has always been global. I noticed that the very timely debate introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, refers to the United Kingdom. I think that he would be the first to acknowledge that that may be putting the cart before the horse, in the sense that we have to see how we are going on a global basis and, in that connection, follow up on Glasgow and so on. I do not know whether Whitehall and Ministers have got their act together even now on how we annually monitor where we have got to on greenhouse gases—because that requires monitoring, and the nuclear debate can feed into that.

I will give noble Lords one sentence from the excellent House of Lords Library briefing, which rather shook me—but not the noble Lord, Lord West of Spithead, because it is more or less what he said:

“If no other new nuclear power stations are built”—


after Hinkley Point C—

“the UK’s nuclear capacity in 2050 will be a third of what it is today.”

So we are sitting here, talking as if we are on a nice road map going forward, but, frankly, we are not.

The other thing that has happened in the last few years is a gradual acceptance around the world that nuclear is a safe form of electricity generation. We learned to talk about epidemiology and loss of years from life expectancy in relation to cigarette smoking but, when we said that about nuclear and Chernobyl, people thought it was the most ludicrous piece of self-delusion. But it is an essential idea that we all have to understand. At Chernobyl, 20 people were killed, but, when people talk about thousands, they are talking about loss of years from life expectancy. Of course, many medical conditions are in the same position.

So there have been some very interesting changes of subconscious feeling around the world. The final one is that China will play an enormous role, and we have to somehow reconcile a lot of irreconcilables when it comes to the leading role of China in many of these matters.

Walter Marshall was mentioned. He was chairman of the World Association of Nuclear Operators when I was on that Chernobyl mission. I introduced him to all the Russians who made return visits London. He epitomised the fact that it is not just an intergovernmental thing that you have to look to here: the world’s nuclear operators themselves have a club, and that is very valuable. I introduced Walter Marshall to the Russians, including some politburo members when they came over here. I do not know how the World Association of Nuclear Operators fits into all these questions today but, as far as I know, it still straddles the East and the West.

In conclusion, the political dilemmas that we face include educating the public on the cost of electricity. I have forgotten who it was but, 100 years ago, someone said that electricity would be more or less free. I think that was the biggest piece of self-delusion that one can imagine. However, it is a fact that, with the strike price and so on, real money is involved; £100 billion here and there soon adds up to real money. There may have to be some sort of world understanding about how we subsidise nuclear energy or else we will get ourselves into a bit of a pickle over how dangerous it is for China to have this share of the market, the US to have that share of the market, and so on.

Although we have a huge debate before us in Britain, everywhere you turn, you cannot hide away from how it fits into the global debate. In the TUC and the Labour Party, these shocks in the 1980s transformed the policy on nuclear matters. That remains the case, just as it remains the case on Brexit—but that is another story. As I understand it, legislation on the question of financing is already going through the Commons, is it not? When will the Nuclear Energy (Financing) Bill come to this House? Will the Minister give some thought to how we could be better equipped to address the issues in it when it comes here?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

I apologise for not having answered that point. I was coming on to say that I would write to the noble Lord on that specific issue because I do not have enough details to hand to give him a satisfactory answer. I will share that answer with other noble Lords.

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I raised the question of how we are going to produce annual reporting on progress towards meeting our Glasgow targets when nuclear, for example, comes in big chunks and it is hard to know how to do an annual metric. This is the only way of finding out how we are doing as we go along. Does the Minister agree that this should be studied in Whitehall, from the Treasury to the department for the environment and all the other departments, because it is the centrepiece of what we are committed to?

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

It is a point well made and I take it seriously, but I think we will get much more information coming out much more regularly than just an annual report of progress as we move forward with all these projects.

I am conscious of the time and I want to respond to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, on foreign ownership. As I have said, we welcome the role of overseas investors: we would not have EDF had we not welcomed overseas investors into the UK’s nuclear sector, but all investment involving critical infrastructure is subject to thorough scrutiny, as he will well know. Having taken the NS&I Bill through this House, we are very careful to evaluate the input of foreign interests in such critical infrastructure as nuclear.

On the noble Lord’s question about the Government’s choice of high-temperature gas reactors crowding out other advanced modular reactors, I can again confirm that we are interested in seeing all types of advanced reactor being developed. He also asked about the long-term levy to consumers. This will be determined for each project as a result of negotiations. We will protect consumers through effective due diligence on the project and, as I have said, through the role of Ofgem, and by incentives on investors to manage costs and not to have time overruns. Ultimately, the lower cost of financing achieved through the RAB should lower overall project costs for consumers. With that, I undertake to look at Hansard and, if there are any specific questions I have not answered, I will of course write to noble Lords.