TASC’S STATEMENT ON THE CHANCELLOR’S AUTUMN BUDGET, NOVEMBER 2022

 

“This government’s myopic pursuit of nuclear power at any cost is borne out by its failure to use the Chancellor’s autumn statement to cancel the Sizewell C project, choosing instead to prop up France’s failing nuclear industry with £billions of UK taxpayer and bill payer money to be ploughed into French state owned EDF’s white elephant proposals for Sizewell C.”, says a TASC spokesperson, who added,

“ There are so many reasons why the UK government should have withdrawn support for Sizewell C, not least because:-

  • We are in the midst of a climate emergency and energy dilemma both of which need immediate action and urgent solutions. The government’s own impact assessment shows that they consider Sizewell C could take up to 17 years from the date of the final investment decision to when Sizewell C might be operational, far too late to provide the rapid decarbonisation or electricity required. Alternative solutions exist, including reducing demand, such as making all buildings energy efficient, yet the Chancellor has decided to kick that can down the road to 2025. Also, there are methods of electricity generation from renewables combined with storage which are far quicker to deploy and have the added benefit of being much cheaper, do not produce radioactive waste and are not reliant on fuel sourced from foreign states.
  • The disgraced Kwasi Kwarteng, who has shown himself to be reckless with the public purse, granted DCO planning approval against the recommendation of the government’s own independent Planning Inspectorate, meaning that Sizewell C could be built but never able to operate due to the lack of sufficient mains water essential for its operation.
  • Sizewell C uses EDF’s flawed EPR reactor design which the French have stated they will not build again in France, following the unmitigated disaster of its Flamanville 3 ‘flagship’ EPR project, which is still not operational despite construction starting in 2007.
  • Sizewell C is sited on an eroding coast, storing highly radioactive waste on site for over 150 years, vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.
  • Sizewell C’s negative impact on the environment. It will be built at the heart of an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, partly built on Sizewell Marshes SSSI, harm RSPB Minsmere and various internationally and nationally designated wildlife sites. Its cooling water system will also kill hundreds of millions of fish and other marine biota each and every year during its 60 years of operation. Sizewell C is a prime example of this government’s ‘Attack on Nature’. “