Civil Nuclear Showcase

The Central European Network  is a grouping of nine British Embassies stretching from Poland to Bulgaria, representing an area we describe as ‘High Growth Europe’. Each Ambassador in the network is charged with promoting one of our priority sectors for developing British trade, as part of UK Trade and Investment’s (UKTI) Export 2020 initiative. I have taken on the energy lead role, and in that capacity returned to the UK last week to participate in UKTI’s fourth annual Civil Nuclear Showcase, organised in concert with the Nuclear Energy Association. The event was opened by Baroness Verma, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department of Energy and Climate Change, who stressed that the UK’s nuclear energy industry offers “a world class supply chain…across the whole of the nuclear life cycle”.

The UK has been generating electricity from civil nuclear reactors continuously since 1956, and more than 300 international delegates came to London to meet a broad cross-section of representatives of the UK civil nuclear industry.

The Central European Network had invited delegates from seven countries in the region, representing both the public and private sectors. I moderated a seminar at which each was able to explain the priority nuclear projects in their countries. The presentations highlighted the wide range and diversity of civil nuclear opportunities in central Europe, including new build, life extension, decommissioning and waste management. Without exception, delegates from the region were enthusiastic about the contacts and collaboration they had already forged with the UK civil nuclear industry, and highlighted some specific attractions of working with the UK. The fact that the UK does not itself build reactors, for example, was identified as offering reassurance of the independence of UK expertise. Recent UK commercial successes were highlighted, notably a contract secured by Amec Foster Wheeler to provide the owner’s engineer tender in respect of Polish plans to construct two new nuclear power plants.

I met many British company representatives who were already very familiar with the opportunities in the region, but others who were keen to hear more, including by taking up opportunities such as the major trade mission to Romania and Bulgaria we are organising in March.