The renaissance of the nuclear sector

This morning I attended an international symposium here in Bucharest on nuclear energy which was looking at the challenges that energy faces for the future.

These are various, they relate to security and safety issues, to financing, to technological issues and also to political issues in response to public concern about nuclear safety in the wake of the Fukushima disaster.

The UK responded  to Fukushima by commissioning  a report from its own Chief Nuclear Inspector and that report was issued last week. Dr. Weightman visited Fukushima and drew lessons from it for the UK’s nuclear industry. He concluded that the current framework we have for insuring the safety of our nuclear reactors is robust, but also that we should continue to make improvements to achieve the highest standards of safety in the industry. This includes making periodic safety reviews at all our nuclear sites which is something that Romania is also doing at Cernavoda.

Dr. Weightman also concluded that there was no reason to change the UK’s strategy, which is to build 8 new nuclear power stations, a new generation of nuclear reactors to replace the ones which will be commissioned over the next couple of decades. Nuclear energy is essential to delivering UK’s ambitious target to cut emissions by 50% until 2025 and, furthermore, by 80% until 2050. We don’t see that there is a choice here between renewables and nuclear, we need both,  and this is something which affects  the whole of Europe in order to assure a low carbon future in Europe and to secure the diversity of our energy supply.

It is important that Romania and the UK work together in building this renaissance of nuclear power that we need to confront challenges in the decades ahead. I am glad that we have already had British expertise at Cernavoda through the company AMEC, which is active in the market, and we want to see more companies with British expertise involved in Romania’s nuclear sector. I am sure that we can build a strong partnership with Romania to ensure we meet the challenges lying ahead for the nuclear industry.