Select committee: Energy Security and Net Zero Committee
Recommendation 2
4th Report - The new National Policy Statement for nuclear energy generation
Published 24 Oct 2025
Addressed to Department for Energy Security and Net Zero
Energy Security and Net Zero Committee Planning for nuclear energy generation All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
As we said in our previous Report, Gridlock or Growth, there remains a fundamental tension between the Government’s stated preference for a market-led approach to energy and the trend towards active government management. This is especially apparent in nuclear policy, where siting for gigawatt-scale plants has always required some degree of state backing. Given this reality, the Government needs to be considerably more explicit about what nuclear technologies it wants deployed and where it envisages them being located. (Recommendation, Paragraph 20)
From: Energy Security and Net Zero Committee, 4th Report - The new National Policy Statement for nuclear energy generation (HC 1212), 24 October 2025
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 19 November 2025 (deadline 24 December 2025).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government welcomes parts of the Committee's report on EN-7, declines several recommendations including changes to section 2.4 and the Semi-Urban Population Density Criterion mapping, and makes a small number of specific commitments.
- On regulatory duplication, it says it does "not share this assessment" of industry evidence, because the NSIP regime must judge project viability. On Recommendation 7 it believes the current section 2.4.5 "strikes the appropriate balance".
- On guidance, it is developing supplementary information for EN-7 and says it "will publish the supplementary information shortly" and update it as lessons are learned.
- On conditional commencement (Grampian conditions), it judges that explicit support in the NPS "is not required", but "can look at this again during future reviews of EN-7".
- On the Semi-Urban Population Density Criterion, it proposes to keep the requirement to consult the HSE rather than publish a map, and says EN-7 "will be reviewed at least every 5 years".