Charlie StrossMay 16, 2024

UK government planning nuclear site in Scotland

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9eze1dzy5no

This is pointless: Scotland is already self-sufficient on renewables. What we need is a new grid interconnect between Scotland and England so we can export our surplus energy to the south!

It's all about the lobbyists, of course:

"Its ambitions for up to a quarter of all electricity to come from nuclear power by 2050 are being led by government-backed body Great British Nuclear." (Who?)

UK government planning nuclear site in Scotland - Alister Jack

The SNP government has effectively banned new nuclear developments north of the border.

BBC News
Show threadAdvanced Persistent TeapotMay 16, 2024
@cstross also a point to remember is that a substantial factor in the government's calculation that is never mentioned is that civil nuclear power plants are a source for nuclear weapons material. I strongly suspect that if we didn't have a weapons program, the government would be far more inclined to ditch nuclear power stations
Show threadCharlie Stross
@http_error_418 Not really true: the UK has a 50-100 tonne plutonium stockpile, held at Sellafield and/or AWRE, and enough highly enriched uranium to fuel the RN's 10-12 submarine reactors (ie. multiple naval reactor loads). Meanwhile the civil nuclear fuel cycle is monitored by international non-proliferation agencies to prevent low-enriched uranium being diverted for enrichment to weapons grade.
May 16, 2024 at 10:01amWeb
Show threadAdvanced Persistent TeapotMay 16, 2024
@cstross hm, to be fair my source for that was a thread from someone explaining the comparative costs and benefits of nuclear versus solar/wind but I never dug deeper to check references. I appreciate the correction!
Show threadRoger LipscombeMay 16, 2024

@http_error_418 @cstross

It's probably true that the desire for Plutonium fast breeder reactors for nuclear weapons material has led us to the Uranium-based nuclear power plants we have now.

If we'd not been obsessed with getting weapons-grade Pu, we might have tried some other, potentially safer, options.

Show threadCharlie StrossMay 16, 2024
@rogerlipscombe @http_error_418 Don't forget the history of the Sellafield reprocessing plant (closed, now in decommissioning). It was designed in the 70s/80s to reprocess spent fuel rods and also extract Pu for manufacturing MOX fuel rods that could be used in existing PWRs as part of a mixed fuel cycle, but demand for fuel crashed in the 80s as reactor construction stalled, and then the plant was late into service (and leaked).