Nuclear Power

[hawksley]

Osborne, is going to put nuclear power in the hands of the Chinese,well done Gideon. We have all purchased goods at sometime with the label made in China ???.

[jno]

losing more of our sovereignty, are we? Curse the Eussr!

Oh no, hang on, it's China... and it's Osborne doing it... well, just fancy that.

[Gromit]

Good to see Osborne working for Industry.

Shame its French Industry :-(

[mikey4444]

My own viewpoint on nuclear power is that it is the only sustainable method of producing large amount of electricity for the future.

I know its not a universally held view but I have been a fan since I was a teenager in the 60's. I remember going on a school science trip to a nuclear power station near us in Somerset. It was all so new and exciting.

Not sure why the Chinese shouldn't be building these things for us. I am even less sure what the reference to New Labour was all about in YMB's post earlier this morning ? Just another crude attempt to hijack the debate into either the horrid Labour Party, or the horrid EU !

[Gromit]

mikey4444

The Chinese are going to build it. They are going to loan us the money to build it ourselves. Then for decades we pay back the loan and interest from profits made on our electricity bills.

[mikey4444]

Gromit...a cunning Plan ! But if the British Government were to build and fund a nuclear power station itself, where would the Treasury get the money from?

Wouldn't they borrow it from somewhere, rather than going down into the cellar at the Bank of England and picking up a few million in a wheelbarrow ?

[Gromit]

Mikey4444

How do you think the existing ones got built? They were not privately financed, they were Government funded. Governments can borrow huge amounts of money far cheaper than private companies can.

[mikey4444]

Thanks Gromit...I was aware of that. But I'm not sure what difference there is from borrowing money for infrastructure improvements from China or anywhere else. The days when British Governments built things are long over. The Second Severn Bridge was built by private companies and it now costs £6.20 to use it.

[emmie]

if would be better if Trump had never gone to Scotland, but you know he was supposed to bring jobs, prosperity or some such nonsense, he is a meglomaniac who is not used to not getting his own way. Building more golf courses in Scotland, just what they really don't need surely?

[LazyGun]

I suppose the Chinese have to do something with their humungous balance of trade surpluses. Why not buy up the rest of the world, one asset at a time? In Africa, it appears they have grown bored with that idea and are attempting to buy up whole countries at a time..

http://www.scmp.com/business/economy/article/1301343/natural-resources-oil-underwrite-chinese-investment-africa

[237SJ]

I wouldn`t care who funded it if it meant less windfarms.

[emmie]

237, agreed.

[sandyRoe]

Better Chinese than Japanese, I suppose.

[emmie]

perhaps, but quite frankly nuclear energy has been around long enough and probably, at least one hopes, far safer than it was once, and wasn't it the case of the Japanese cutting corners on safety??

[LazyGun]

Not sure. Haven't seen a full report as yet. I think it was a failure of the precautionary principle - They did not build a big enough sea wall to defend against a Tsunami formed out of a magnitude 9 earthquake under the sea just off the coast that swamped their sea defences. The rest was panic and poor decisions, mostly.

[emmie]

worth reading

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disaster

[jim360]

Also the design of the stations in Japan was somewhat old. More modern stations have far better safety features. Even then it was a pretty massive earthquake. Hard to predict something of that magnitude.

[emmie]

when watching it on the news everything seemed to get blown away by the tsunami, so i wonder no matter the size of the wall would ithave made any difference?

[LazyGun]

@emmie Well thats a valid point. I am no civil engineer or H/S type or nuclear power engineer, but it is difficult to think that it makes sense to design all buildings with sea walls that would withstand a tsunami with a 40ft high wave, unless of course they happen every other week :)

There probably are changes to design features that might help in such circumstances, which are great with hindsight - downside is the years of devastation and forced relocation that has been wrought.

[jake-the-peg]

The wall was designed to withstand a 5m Tsunami the one that hit was 14m

That earthquake was the 5th most powerful ever recorded

Not much would have survived that


To my mind there is one question above all in any nuclear plant deal

It is the reason no nuclear plant has been built in the UK for 30 years

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Who's paying the decommissioning costs?
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[jno]

I remember going on a school science trip to a nuclear power station near us in Somerset. It was all so new and exciting.

You are absolutely radiating with excitement, mikey