Extract from Lords debate to approve the draft Climate Change Act 2008 (2050 Target Amendment) Order 2019 - Jun 26

Lord Ravensdale (CB):...It is critical that the industry responds to the cost challenge set out in the nuclear sector deal. With Hinkley we are looking at bringing down the costs of nuclear from £90 to around £60 per megawatt hour. Given the doubts over whether large nuclear can deliver, we need to focus on several things to meet that cost challenge: first, small modular reactors, as a fallback and to complement large nuclear, are critical; and, secondly, advanced nuclear technology.

How will these technologies solve the cost issue with nuclear? The first way is through modularisation, which is inherent in small modular reactor design and is already used in other high safety integrity industries such as shipping and air transport. We need to look at moving the production of reactor modules and advance nuclear to factories off-site to reduce the cost of reactor technology and to bring down the capital costs of nuclear plants. There are several designs out there which are passively safe, simpler and of a much higher thermal efficiency than existing plants and will help in that regard...

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