Source · Select Committees · Welsh Affairs Committee
Recommendation 14
14
Deferred
Paragraph: 73
New nuclear development at Wylfa remains uncertain without further concrete government commitment.
Recommendation
While we welcome what feels like small steps in the right direction towards new nuclear at Wylfa, we do still question how much further down the path we are now to seeing a successful development than we were when Hitachi withdrew from the site. There will remain risks associated with both the UK and Welsh Governments’ political commitment to nuclear power and we believe the UK Government needs 28 Nuclear energy in Wales to make further commitments within this Parliament. Our overarching view is that new nuclear at Wylfa is not certain despite progress being made and more concrete commitment is required to deliver a project at Wylfa.
Government Response Summary
The government acknowledges the need for settled policy and will develop a new National Policy Statement and consult on future nuclear siting this year, but states no decisions have been made on which technologies or sites, including Wylfa, will proceed.
Paragraph Reference:
73
Government Response
Deferred
HM Government
Deferred
The Government welcomes Hitachi’s continued stewardship of the Wylfa Newydd site and the effort taken to maintain the site in recent years. While any decision to sell the site is a commercial decision for Hitachi, we continue to have a positive relationship and strong dialogue with all nuclear site owners (as nominated under the 2011 National Policy Statement) and remain in a conversation with them about how to best enable and deliver on the Government’s ambition for up to 24GW of nuclear energy by 2050. Government has established Great British Nuclear (GBN) to drive forward the UK’s new nuclear programme. GBN will be working with Government on access to potential sites for new nuclear projects to achieve our long-term ambition. GBN will also support the Government’s consideration of further large Gigawatt-scale projects to help us deliver on our long-term ambition. However, no decisions have been taken over which technologies future projects will proceed with, or at which sites. Government recognises the desire for a settled policy for new nuclear deployment and will develop a new National Policy Statement (NPS), which will set out the planning policy for deploying new nuclear power stations beyond 2025. The new nuclear NPS will take account of changes in the nuclear landscape since the existing NPS was designated in 2011, including the potential for advanced technologies such as Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) and Advanced Modular Reactors (AMRs). Government will consult later this year on a policy for how new nuclear developments could be sited in future.