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Scientists commented following a court ruling that the Government’s public consultation over plans for new nuclear power plants had been inadequate.
Professor Richard Clegg, Director, Dalton Nuclear Institute, University of Manchester, said:
“The public consultation process is paramount, but while we have procedural delays the country is heading towards an energy crunch. The clock is ticking for the UK to hit its energy policy goals of ensuring security of supply and cutting carbon emissions.”
David Linsley-Hood, Renewable Energy Consultant, Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT), said:
“It is a popular misconception that new nuclear reactors require government consent. They do, however, require government financial support. This will delay new build of nuclear reactors only if they are financially unviable without government support.
“What is needed is a debate about all of the options for our nations energy supply considering all of their benefits and flaws, not considering one technology as the panacea for all of our energy supply problems.
“Our energy gap is still a real and pressing issue and this ruling re-enforces the need to review all energy supply technologies considering their full environmental costs, and to act quickly. Shoehorning the public into accepting a new nuclear programme is not the answer.”
Brian Robinson, Head of Energy, Environment and Climate Change at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, said:
“While the Government has to carry out the consultation process all over again, the IMechE welcomes all the advnatages and disadvantages of nuclear power that will be re-examined. In the mean time the Government needs to press on, now, with doing all it can to support energy effficiency programes and renewable options that engineers are involved in because we simply cannot afford to be apathetic about this and wait any longer. Whichever way we look at it, it is these options that will bridge any potential gap in the short to medium term.We cannot simply sit back and do nothing and accept the ‘science will save the world’ attitude.
“What seems particularly farcical about this is that the Government has stated, quite rightly, that any decisions to plan, develop and build new nuclear power stations must be taken by the private sector so if comapnies choose to carry out any new build they are still within their rights to do so.
“This could be a massive u-turn if the Government now decides to do othewise and take on any nuclear build themselves.”
Dr Alister Scott, spokesman for the University of Sussex Energy Group, one of the world’s largest independent energy research groups, said:
“We recognise the urgency of the need for investments in sustainable, low-carbon energy sources. However, a technology like nuclear power brings with it significant social implications that will last for thousands of years. You have to carry the public with you when making these kinds of decisions.
“What this decision shows is that public legitimacy is a key consideration in decisions around science and technology. In March last year several of us were signatories to a letter in the journal Nature that questioned the government’s approach to public consultation. The letter noted:
“An authoritative and legitimate process must be open to a range of possible outcomes, but there is a widespread perception that the government has made its mind up in favour of nuclear energy.”
Dr Ian Arbon, Chairman, Energy, Environment & Sustainability Group at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, said:
“Nuclear new build was always on a long lead time but this decision will set it back considerably. The only option left for clean power generation by 2020 seems to be to accelerate the renewables program. We are not building enough and we are already well behind on existing targets for renewables.”
Prof Andrew Palmer, Emeritus Professor of Petroleum Engineering and Fellow of Churchill College, University of Cambridge, said:
“What is the High Court doing to prepare the public for the lights going out, and for repeated rolling blackouts over a period of years?”
Dr. Mark Levy, KNOO* Consortium Research Manager, Imperial College London, said:
“The High Court ruling will likely delay any decision on new nuclear build. This is indicative of the debate in the public arena. Everyday we hear discussion from politicians and environmental groups. It is time that the nuclear industry and its supporters engage more with the public.
Nuclear power provides one of the best options for fulfilling the large baseline electricity demands of modern urban living. Distributed generation (such as renewables and co-generation) schemes are important, however are currently not at a stage to supply the bulk of the UK electricity needs
This was a comment on a political process and not of the feasibility of nuclear power. It is vital that the public should be an informed customer and that long term decisions should be made with public backing. This will only happen if all sides of the argument engage in full, frank and open.
The debate of new nuclear build still has legs, however if we continue to run away from a decision, we will become more and more reliant upon electricity imports, which is a situation that is not in our nations best interests.”
Professor Nick Pidgeon, School of Psychology, Cardiff University, said:
“Our results from a national British survey of attitudes towards climate change and nuclear power, which were published just over one year ago, demonstrated that some people might indeed accept more nuclear power if they believed it could help in the fight against climate change, but only reluctantly so, with people overwhelmingly preferring alternatives such as renewable sources or energy efficiency. We also found a high level of scepticism about the decision process and consultation, with fully 62% of the sample saying that it would not matter what ordinary people thought about nuclear power as new nuclear stations will be built in Britain anyway. Thursday’s High Court ruling can only serve to reinforce the scepticism about this issue that many already hold.”
Dr Jeremy Leggett, CEO of Solar and Century Charterhouse Fellow in Solar Energy at Oxford University’s Environmental Change Institute, said:
“This is shattering blow for the nuclear industry, and a victory for common sense. Compared to the real energy review – the 2003 one – the last review was an obvious sham: a clear fig leaf for nuclear deployed by a regime dangerously losing respect for due public process. Whatever the outcome of the High Court’s pondering, and whatever one thinks about the safety and security issues, nuclear power cannot be deployed quickly enough to help us, given the magnitude of the energy problems we have.”
Professor Stuart Haszeldine, geologist, University of Edinburgh, said:
“Trying to build new nuclear plant in the UK was always going to be difficult. The Greenpeace opposition is a taste of the risks to come for power companies and their potential bankers. It may take a long time.
“The timescale to build new nuclear was always a long shot to fill the electricity gap. Now it looks like Plan B needs to be dusted off, and quickly.
“Will that electricity gap to 2020 be filled by more cheap gas, or clean coal with carbon storage, or crossed fingers? Remember, one third of the UK electricity generation from coal will start to close from next year. It looks like we now need more coal, and quickly, if the lights are to stay on.”
Dr Peter Cole, Radiation Protection Adviser, University of Liverpool , said:
“What realistic alternatives do we have for power generation? Fossil fuelled power stations will have a major impact on the destruction of the planet via their contribution to global warming. The UK will become (if it isn’t already) heavily reliant on an expensive supply of fossil fuels from overseas. Fossil fuels will eventually begin to ‘dry up. Renewable energy technology cannot bridge the huge gap in the foreseeable future.
“The socio-economic benefit of a new nuclear build would also be tremendous. New build would be a vehicle to promote and cultivate new scientists and engineers in the UK. Scope perhaps for making the UK a great science and engineering country once again.”
Tajinder Panesor, Institute of Physics policy manager, said:
“This is disastrous news. We were all looking forward to the publication of the Energy White Paper, which was expected this March, which would pave the way for a new nuclear build programme. It is bad enough that the issue of dealing with legacy radioactive waste has prevented the government from embarking on a new build programme, but now it is likely that a new Energy Review consultation will be needed, which will further delay matters by at least another 12-18 months.
“In light of last year’s Stern review on climate change, the fact that the UK is now a net importer of gas, and that many renewables are still facing many RD&D challenges, a new build programme is vital to ensure that the UK becomes self sufficient in supplying its own electricity, and we replace our current, ageing fleet of reactors, to ensure that we don’t become over reliant on imported natural gas and subsequently increase our CO2 emissions.”