Britain to extend life of ageing nuclear plants to keep the lights on

Two of Britain’s oldest nuclear power plants could be kept running for an extra two years because of an acute electricity shortage in the UK.Hartlepool and Heysham 1, owned by EDF, were due to shut down in 2028, but ministers want to extend the operating licences to at least 2030 because the UK faces “a dangerous gap” in power supplies if they shut.Both have already been operating for 42 years despite being scheduled to close for safety reasons in 2008.EDF, France’s state-owned power utility, which operates all five UK nuclear stations, said it was working to keep the stations operational without compromising safety.Mark Hartley, from EDF, said: “In November, the UK Government said that the retirement of these Advanced Gas-Cooled Reactors (AGRs) risks leaving a dangerous gap in Britain’s low-carbon energy supply.“It is our ambition to generate from the remaining AGR stations for as long as it is safe and commercially viable to do so, and we will keep their lifetimes under review to assess whether further life extensions can be achieved.”EDF will invest £1.2bn in the latest extensions, which will keep enough power on the grid to power about four million homes.That power is vital to Energy Secretary Ed Miliband’s plans to decarbonise the UK’s power supplies by 2030.Last year, nuclear stations generated 12pc of the UK’s electricity. This was 12pc lower than in 2024 because of an extended outage at Hartlepool power station.Losing two nuclear stations would leave the UK dependent on imports via subsea interconnectors, but these might not always meet the nation’s needs.Sizewell B, the UK’s largest nuclear plant, is already due to operate until 2035, and EDF hopes to extend this to 2055.Two other stations, Torness and Heysham 2, were originally scheduled to close in 2023 and have been cleared to generate until March 2030 after EDF invested £8.6bn in the fleet.The fate of Heysham 1 and Hartlepool is less certain and will depend on the results of safety assessments.AGR reactors contain radioactive uranium fuel pellets surrounded by massive graphite blocks that absorb the high-energy neutrons emitted by the fuel, thereby controlling the nuclear reaction.However, over time, these blocks tend to crack due to the intense radiation and heat to which they are exposed.Such cracks have already forced the closure of several other UK power stations.EDF’s safety assessment will need to be ratified by the Office for Nuclear Regulation, which will need to approve the extensions as safe.It follows a report issued last week by energy consultancy Watt-Logic, warning that Britain risks electricity rationing by the next general election, with the risk peaking in the winter months between 2028 and 2031 due to a loss of energy production.This is also because many of the UK’s ageing gas-fired power stations are at risk of failure between now and 2030, and because Hinkley Point C, the giant nuclear station under construction in Somerset, is several years behind schedule.The UK closed its last coal-fired power station, at Ratcliffe in Yorkshire, last year.The Nuclear Minister, Lord Vallance, welcomed EDF’s move.“Nuclear is a vital component of our energy mix, providing clean homegrown power for millions of homes and supporting energy security while employing thousands of people across the country,” he said.