Does Scottish Labour support French energy company extending lives of unreliable, inefficient and unsafe nuclear power stations including one in Scotland?

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In the Guardian today:

EDF Energy is planning to extend the life of four nuclear power stations in the UK and step up investment in its British nuclear fleet.

The French energy company said it would make a decision on whether to extend the life of the four UK plants with advanced gas-cooled reactors (AGR) – Torness [East Lothian], Heysham 1 and 2, and Hartlepool – by the end of the year. This would require regulatory approval.

A spokesperson for the company said it would depend on inspections, adding there would not be long lifetime extensions but “incremental”.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/jan/09/edf-energy-uk-nuclear-power-plants

The Scottish station, Torness, was built in 1980.

In TuS [November 2022] Frances McKie told us:

After 70 years of blank cheques from governments throughout the world,  multi-national energy companies will not invest in nuclear power. Money talks: they know it is not a sensible, economic, safe, reliable option.

On June 16th this year, Reuters reported that in France- frequently cited by nuclear lobbyists as a successful example of nuclear investment-  at least 50% of nuclear reactors were off-line as a result of corrosion.

The same report  confirmed that the struggle to complete the construction of the now notorious  EPR reactor at Flammanville was 4 times over budget (nearly 13Billion Euros)  and over 10 years late.  Failure of materials and welding were cited as the key problems.

The implications for the UK government’s  similar project at Hinckley Point in Somerset are stark reminders of  the fundamental problems associated with  nuclear power: faulty designs,  failure of materials, containment and welding and – above all- insurmountable corrosion.  Its lethal vulnerability to natural disasters (Fukushima) , human error (Dounreay, Sellafield, Chernobyl) and missile attack (Zaporizhzhia) is a separate but very serious issue.

Nuclear protagonists also refuse to acknowledge the unimaginable costs of decommissioning and nuclear waste disposal. In 1976, Westminster accepted the findings of the “Flowers Report” that “There should be no commitment to a large programme of nuclear fission power until it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that a method exists to ensure the safe containment of long-lived highly radioactive waste  for the indefinite future” .

In 2022 the UK government still has no proven method  for safe storage of high level nuclear waste. On the contrary, highly radioactive, potentially lethal particles of nuclear spent fuel now contaminate the beaches and sea-bed around Dounreay in Caithness. According to SEPA- they are irretrievable. At Sellafield  there are leaking ponds of highly radioactive spent nuclear fuel rods for which there is still no solution. That kind of environmental destruction- for most people-  makes nuclear power an unacceptable risk.  The days of Scottish communities being nominated as expendable areas for such experiments with nuclear, fracking or any other gamble with safety- are over.

There is -indeed- an alternative, cleaner, safer and more reliable future.

In November 2022, Anas Sarwar, Labour Branch Head in Scotland, said:

Scotland should invest in nuclear energy projects in a bid to provide a long term solution to rising bills, Labour has said. 

Ahead of a visit to Glasgow on Tuesday, UK Labour leader Keir Starmer and Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said using nuclear energy could ease the cost-of-living crisis in the long term. 

It comes as plans for eight new reactors were announced in England and Wales but not in Scotland, with UK business and energy secretary Kwasi Kwarteng saying it was “a devolved affair”.

https://news.stv.tv/politics/anas-sarwar-says-scotland-should-invest-in-nuclear-energy-to-cut-bills-in-long-term

Does he have any researchers who could explain the situation to him?

7 thoughts on “Does Scottish Labour support French energy company extending lives of unreliable, inefficient and unsafe nuclear power stations including one in Scotland?”

  1. Scotland is covered in coal. Westminster refused £1Billion for a CCS project at Longannet in Fife. Westminster reneged on a promise for gas CCS project at Peterhead. Funding had already been spent by Oil Companies. Scotland is the best place for CCS. Oil sector knowledge and technology. The EU countries are doing it in the North Sea and Rotterdam. Scotland missing the boat again. Westminster poor management and policies.

    Westminster spending £13Billion on decommissioning nuclear. Over 10 years £130Billion and increasing all the time. Waste flying all over the world. Rotting contaminated subs at Rosyth. Trident a waste of monies. A naval base at Faslane would be better. To protect the coastline. Not picking missiles in the States and trailing all over the world. A wasted exercise. Most countries do not bother.

    Labour cancelled two tidal projects. One at the Humber. £9Billion because of cost. Cheaper and safer than nuclear. Wasting £Billions and years late. Westminster reneged on a tidal project in Swansea. Westminster underfunds Wales. Wales voted for Brexit and lost EU grants, funding and investment. Wales benefited from EU membership. People can live in Wales and work in London. A long commute.

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  2. Bluntly EDF have been bribed to include Torness in the framing for exploitation by the pro-nuclear lobby with their political connections to rail against SG’s refusal to consider nuclear, ie a political ploy.

    Scotland is already beyond the point of no return on renewables and has been for some considerable time…

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  3. Starmer ( and his puppet , Sarwar ) will do whatever the all-powerful Nuclear lobby tell him to do – money talks !
    If only Starmer had made a ”pledge” to go Nuclear in his bid for the Labour leadership , then, by now, it would be in the dustbin like all the others .

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  4. Check this out!!!

    https://corporatewatch.org/heat-the-rich-part-two-edf/

    Here is a snippet from it!!!

    “Over the last two decades, EDF has funded the Conservative party to the tune of £38,499.

    Most recently, last October EDF Energy Renewables Ltd donated £4,999 to the Conservative Tees Valley Mayor, Ben Houchen. And like clockwork, by March 2022, EDF announced its plan to construct a new hydrogen production centre near the former Redcar steelworks in Teeside. The centre is called Tees Green Hydrogen.

    EDF also made two £6,000 in donations to the Labour Party in October 2003 and September 2005. The timing of these donations coincided with Labour PM Tony Blair’s announcement in November 2005 that the government was looking into new nuclear for the UK’s future energy supplies. This set the ball rolling for EDF’s £18 billion government contract for the construction of Hinkley Point C power station.”

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  6. If the Tories really believed in “free” market solutions,there would be no nuclear power stations.
    People would not pay for the huge price of electricity generated from that source.
    As with most forms of energy supply,government subsidies are required in order to make them feasible.
    The latest buzz word being bandied about by some politicians is energy “security” which is just a cover for bungs continuing to be given to certain sectors.

    The cheapest form of energy generation is onshore wind but until recently was blocked by free market Tories who did not want their green and pleasant land blighted by windmills and pylons.
    That is their choice and it comes at a cost which should have been borne by the people who elected them.
    In a free market,that is how it is supposed to work.

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