7 months ago
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In support of the Stop Sizewell C campaign, which is seeking to dissuade the money market from backing the construction of a new nuclear power station at Sizewell C in Suffolk, the UK / Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities have written to five possible investors asking them to say NON to Sizewell C.
NFLA English Forum Chair Councillor David Blackburn wrote this week to directors at Amber Investment Group, Equifix, Schroders Greencoat Capital, the Universities Superannuation Scheme, as well as the ENEC, the Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation which operates the Barakah nuclear plant.
In the letter, Councillor Blackburn outlines the many reasons why an investment in Sizewell C would be unsound and suggests to managers that:
‘It would be far wiser for your organisation to invest every available penny into the proven renewable technologies that we already have now – these would generate power and heat far more quickly and more cheaply, and generate for you a more immediate financial return, than making any investment in this monstrous nuclear boondoggle’.
This is the latest action carried out by the NFLAs in support of Stop Sizewell C’s campaign. We previously wrote to prospective investors in the Autumn of 2022 and more recently in August 2023 specifically to Centrica, the owner of British Gas.
Related articles can be found at:
NFLA Secretary Richard Outram has also sent emails protesting the possibility of investment by these investors via the Stop Sizewell C website.
Readers who oppose civil nuclear power are asked to take similar action by going to the Stop Sizewell C campaign via this link: https://action.stopsizewellc.org/ and to share with social networks, family, and friends.
Stop Sizewell C has also produced a video highlighting the impact of the plant on the Suffolk environment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9zLp1pjiB8.
Ends//… For more information please contact the NFLA Secretary Richard Outram by email at richard.outram@manchester.gov.uk
Notes to Editors
The letter sent by Councillor Blackburn to each of the investment groups reads:
Dear XXX
Please say NON to Sizewell C!
We understand that you may be considering an investment in the controversial Sizewell C nuclear power plant project in Suffolk.
I am writing to you as the Chair of the UK/Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities (NFLAs) English Forum to urge you not to do so and to explain why.
The Sizewell C project would be built by French state owned EDF, the company responsible for the construction of Hinkley Point C in Somerset.
Hinkley Point C will be delivered late and vastly over budget. There is no reason to suppose that Sizewell C would be any different.
The timescale for delivery appears to slip month to month and costs are being ratcheted ever higher.
In the never-never world of nuclear optimism, the former Chief Executive of EDF predicted that British customers would be cooking their turkeys using Hinkley Point C electricity in Christmas 2017!
Some prediction.
Over six Christmas’s later, construction at Hinkley Point C has been mired by a succession of delays and cost overruns.
The plant was expected to cost £18 billion, but that estimate has now doubled to £35 billion.
But this is an estimate based on 2015 figures. The figure in real (2024) terms would be £46 billion.
And the estimated date of final completion has now been pushed back to AT LEAST 2032. 15 years longer than first expected.
Yet there is no certainty that the project will not cost much more and take longer still, making EDF the only turkey to be truly cooked!
There is no reason to believe that Sizewell C will be delivered any more quickly or any more cheaply as the history of the construction of large nuclear power plants in the UK is a litany of projects being delivered late and vastly over budget.
Like Hinkley Point C, Sizewell C will be reliant upon an EDF-designed European / Evolutionary Power Reactor which has a poor track record for safety and reliability.
The first such installation at Taishan-1, China suffered a serious accident in the summer of 2021 caused by defective parts which led to the emission of radioactive gas. It has been since shut for significant periods of its life. The second at Olkiluoto-3, Finland only came online in April 2023, after a 17 ½ construction period, but, after only one month, power output was reduced as the cost of generation was uncompetitive compared to that of Finnish hydroelectric plants. The third at Flamanville-3, France has been 17 years in the making with commissioning expected in the Summer.
The Sizewell C site is in an area of outstanding natural beauty, being located on the Suffolk heritage coast, with habitats of scientific importance on its doorstep, particularly of birdlife. The Suffolk coast is subject to storm surges and coastal erosion, with climate change likely to increase in frequency and intensity over time. Models show that the Sizewell C site will be inundated and isolated in coming decades. Consequently, construction at the site presents significant challenges – such as the need for very deep excavations on the platform and for huge sea defences; these call into question claims that lessons learned at Hinkley Point C can be replicated at Sizewell C to achieve a faster, cheaper construction.
It is also located in a county suffering increasingly from water stress and there are real fears that the huge demands placed by the plant upon the supply of potable water will jeopardise the amount of drinking water available to the local populace. Sizewell C will also be water-cooled sucking in vast amounts of seawater which will have a hugely negative impact upon the marine environment.
Finally, as we have seen in Ukraine, nuclear power plants also represent a huge potential target for any hostile power, with Russia having previously threatened to swamp Britain’s coastline with a nuclear weapon generated tsunami.
In summary then, investment in Sizewell C would bring with it clear financial, ESG and reputational risks for your company.
Many other investors have already said they will not be dipping their financial toe into the radioactive water.
Abrdn, Arriva, BT, the BBC, NEST, Legal and General, Pearson, the People’s Pension, the Phoenix Group, and Tesco have all specifically indicated to Stop Sizewell C that they have no intention of investing.
Nigel Wilson from Legal and General succinctly expressed the sentiment of much of the UK financial market in an interview with the BBC Radio 4 Today programme in November 2022:
“We are not big fans of Sizewell C”.
The latest news about the faltering financial position of Thames Water is also challenging the trope that the Regulated Asset Based model is sound.
A recent FT article highlighted this https://www.ft.com/content/fbc40c82-c8f8-4c63-ae61-fd80f561b725.
‘Thames Water’s woes are making investors nervous that the debt underpinning the funding model, which the UK government is relying on for the building of new critical infrastructure, could be more vulnerable to losses than previously thought…”The same financial model, in which debt is raised against a “regulated asset base” agreed with regulators, is not only used at core pieces of UK infrastructure such as Heathrow airport, but is likely to be used to finance a number of new projects in future”, including Sizewell C.
Nor is Sizewell C the solution to our climate emergency or our cost-of-living crisis. It would come on stream far too late to arrest the inexorable rise of temperature, and it would represent further financial pain for hard-pressed households as the RAB will mean a nuclear levy would be added to every electricity consumer’s bill.
It would be far wiser for your organisation to invest every available penny into the proven renewable technologies that we already have now – these would generate power and heat far more quickly and more cheaply, and generate for you a more immediate financial return, than making any investment in this monstrous nuclear boondoggle.
Therefore, for the sake of our planet, the people, fauna and flora of Suffolk, and your company bottom-line, I am asking you to write back to confirm that you will say NON to EDF Energy and refuse to invest in Sizewell C.
Thank you for considering this letter. Please respond in the first instance to our NFLA Secretary Richard Outram by email to richard.outram@manchester.gov.uk
Yours sincerely,
Councillor David Blackburn,
Chair, NFLAs English Forum
