# Why can't Britain build it's own nuclear plants ? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 21, 2015, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338 "2015-10-21T10:14:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/21 "2015-10-21T13:51:18Z")
> [@bob\_2](#): > > As anyone who has outsourced a project will know, the big advantage is that, so long as you write the contract properly, it will be the contractor who takes the risk on delays and overruns. I think that’s part of it, and without knowing the particulars of the deal, it could be similar to the way things are done here sometimes- foreign companies invest in things for some portion of the future revenues. For example, a Spanish company (Cintra) footed the bill for a huge freeway overhaul in Dallas, which includes profit-sharing on the toll portion of the freeway for 52 years. There’s no reason that say… KBR (the Brown and Root part) or HB Zachry couldn’t have done it (Zachry was a sub for part, actually), but they didn’t work the deal that Cintra did. It’s possible that it was put out to bid, and for whatever reason, Horizon Nuclear didn’t beat out Guangdong Nuclear. (Horizon Nuclear is a British nuclear power company owned by Hitachi, FWIW). ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/22 "2015-10-21T13:58:29Z")
The British lack infrastructure and expertise, they have not built a reactor in 20 years. They could rectify that. That would take a lot of money. Which would mean that to recoup the costs either the reactor would end up producing very expensive electricity or the Government would have to swallow the excess. You can live with that if you are building a reactor to make Plutonium for your nukes. Not so, for power generation. ---
**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/23 "2015-10-21T14:04:30Z")
This has nothing to do with capability. Of course the UK could build nuclear-power plants if it had to, as could any of the advanced nations. This is about cost and politics. ---
**Author:** ![MrQwertyasd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@MrQwertyasd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrQwertyasd)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/24 "2015-10-21T14:08:01Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Re-reading the OP’s link, it doesn’t look like China will be building these plants at all, just financing construction. They’re being built by (France’s) Areva. Yesterday I read about how GCHQ are tasked with preventing the Chinese from putting backdoors in the thing, I’m sure there’s technical input from them though they will use local labour to build it. Yeah here it is [http://uk.businessinsider.com/spies-to-monitor-chinese-nuclear-tech-2015-10](http://uk.businessinsider.com/spies-to-monitor-chinese-nuclear-tech-2015-10) > [@](#): > > British spies at GCHQ will monitor computer systems at nuclear plants built by the Chinese on British soil, [according to The Times](http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/politics/article4589761.ece). The geeks are going to have some fun with this. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Bredin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@John\_Bredin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Bredin)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/25 "2015-10-21T16:45:57Z")
[QUOTE=aldiboronti] This has nothing to do with capability. Of course the UK could build nuclear-power plants if it had to, as could any of the advanced nations. This is about cost and politics. [/QUOTE] Right. Is there anything in these stories saying that the British \*can’t \*build a nuclear power plant, or is this merely the OP’s recreational outrage that a British firm isn’t doing it? I get it. I’m an American who wants improved passenger rail service, but the U.S. (Amtrak & commuter rail) ends up buying new passenger cars from foreign companies who then do the final assembly in U.S. plants to comply with the Buy American requirement for gov’t-funded projects. (We do make our own engines, though.) It sucks that there’s no U.S. passenger rail car manufacturer. However, it sucks a whole lot less than the car orders being several million dollars more expensive – possibly to the point that the project becomes politically untenable – for a less-experienced American manufacturer to learn the job, or worse no American company feels the market is big enough to be worth entering at all. Is being a proud [del]Amurrican[/del] Briton whose heart swells at seeing a can-do [del]American[/del] British firm building a big project worth the extra expense a [del]U.S.[/del] British firm would charge? As a patriot I say yes, but as a taxpayer I say no. In short, I feel the OP’s pain, but only to a point. 🙂 [QUOTE=MrQwertyasd] Hmm, nuclear safety is opaque at the best of times. Can we file FOI request to the Chinese government on their safety record? [/QUOTE] [QUOTE=Really Not All That Bright] Re-reading the OP’s link, it doesn’t look like China will be building these plants at all, just financing construction. They’re being built by (France’s) Areva. [/QUOTE] IMHO, the French (EdF/Areva/whatever) have done nuclear power right. Nearly 60 reactors making most of France’s electricity, with plenty to sell to the neighbors. (_cough_ Germany’s anti-nuclear policy. _cough_) They have the experience and the economies of scale to definitely do the job cheaper and possibly safer than a UK company. Plus isn’t the European Union supposed to be a common market, where a French company is effectively a domestic company in the UK? 😕😛 Serious, non-rhetorical question: if it wanted to (which in this case it doesn’t), can the British government legally require a gov’t financed project be contracted to a UK company to the exclusion of companies from other EU countries? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/26 "2015-10-21T17:01:24Z")
It’s a common market for tariff purposes. AIUI, the member states can limit bidding to domestic entities for things like utilities (though I could be wrong). ---
**Author:** ![RememberMe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/5fc32e/32.png) [@RememberMe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RememberMe)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/27 "2015-10-21T17:07:38Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > As for solar, with the cloudy weather in England, i don’t see it. I see what you did there ---
**Author:** ![Rick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9f8e36/32.png) [@Rick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/28 "2015-10-21T17:08:40Z")
[British car owner answer] 1. They leak oil 2. The are designed by Lucas [/BCOA] ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/29 "2015-10-21T17:17:13Z")
Yeah, but you can fix them yourself with Polyfilla. ---
**Author:** ![Kevbo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e47774/32.png) [@Kevbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kevbo)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/30 "2015-10-21T17:58:58Z")
There is a lot to be said for using an off-the -shelf design, not the least of which is that it is very likely to actually work when it is finished. I grew up not very far from the Fort Saint Vrain plant. It essentially never worked. They’d get it up for a week or three at partial power, then something would fail, and they’d dump a bunch of radioactive gas. [Fort Saint Vrain Nuclear Power Plant - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_St._Vrain_Generating_Station) With a lot of plants the same, a body of knowledge about issues and how to deal with them evolves. PWR reactors have a steam generator (heat exchanger) that wears out. The Swedes worked out how to cut a hole in the containment building to change it out and extend the life of the nuke plant…just one example. Now the world knows that it is a really bad idea to put your emergency generators in a place that might get flooded. Obvious now, but I bet it made sense to the guys who came up with that. ---
**Author:** ![Ken001](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/43a26b/32.png) [@Ken001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ken001)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/31 "2015-10-21T18:02:02Z")
> [@Rick](#): > > [British car owner answer] > > 1. They leak oil > 2. The are designed by Lucas > [/BCOA] Dang! Really? That is frightening. Lucas invented the light-sucking tech whereby your headlights faded in proportion to darkness. Scary stuff. ---
**Author:** ![MrQwertyasd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@MrQwertyasd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrQwertyasd)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/32 "2015-10-21T18:57:38Z")
> [@John\_Bredin](#): > > Plus isn’t the European Union supposed to be a common market, where a French company is effectively a domestic company in the UK? 😕😛 Serious, non-rhetorical question: if it wanted to (which in this case it doesn’t), can the British government legally require a gov’t financed project be contracted to a UK company to the exclusion of companies from other EU countries? There could be rules which say government projects have to be offered to private concerns as well as nationalised ones, as per Maastricht. Not sure, maybe someone knows. ---
**Author:** ![lisiate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f05b48/32.png) [@lisiate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lisiate)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/33 "2015-10-21T19:55:43Z")
> [@MrQwertyasd](#): > > Yesterday I read about how GCHQ are tasked with preventing the Chinese from putting backdoors in the thing, I’m sure there’s technical input from them though they will use local labour to build it. > Yeah here it is > [http://uk.businessinsider.com/spies-to-monitor-chinese-nuclear-tech-2015-10](http://uk.businessinsider.com/spies-to-monitor-chinese-nuclear-tech-2015-10) > > The geeks are going to have some fun with this. Why would the control systems for a nuclear plant even need to be connected to the internet at all? Surely it would be better from a security standpoint to isolate them entirely. ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/34 "2015-10-21T20:43:09Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Re-reading the OP’s link, it doesn’t look like China will be building these plants at all, just financing construction. They’re being built by (France’s) Areva. That’s true of Hinkley Point, but Bradwell would be Chinese technology. ---
**Author:** ![MrQwertyasd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@MrQwertyasd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrQwertyasd)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2015, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/35 "2015-10-21T23:07:06Z")
> [@lisiate](#): > > Why would the control systems for a nuclear plant even need to be connected to the internet at all? Surely it would be better from a security standpoint to isolate them entirely. I’ve no idea…(thinks back to Matthew Broderick in Wargames)… ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2015, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/36 "2015-10-22T00:52:39Z")
> [@lisiate](#): > > Why would the control systems for a nuclear plant even need to be connected to the internet at all? Surely it would be better from a security standpoint to isolate them entirely. Sure, and the most important safety/security systems at a nuclear plant are supposed to be isolated; in the U.S. this is enforced by regulations promulgated by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. However, large portions of the electrical grid itself are connected to the internet through the expansion of SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition) devices controlling the transmission of electricity. Somebody somewhere has to be monitoring and controlling all of the switches and transformers and circuits and whatnot on the electrical grid (for example, they may well need to vary the power output from the plant in response to grid conditions), and they need to make very very sure that there’s no “bleed” between the various computer networks. Back in 2004 in Arizona, an electrical fault on a transmission line 40+ miles away triggered an automatic shutdown of the three reactors at Palo Verde. I don’t know whether the sensors on the line were internet-connected or on a separate network of some sort, but in either case you want to make sure that no other device on the network can be used to launch an attack. Finally, even a lack of internet connection won’t help if the attacking software is brought into the plant on a thumbdrive or other physical media (which was the vector for the [Stuxnet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuxnet) attacks on the Iranian nuclear facilities, allegedly by the U.S and Israel). ---
**Author:** ![Rick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9f8e36/32.png) [@Rick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2015, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338/37 "2015-10-22T01:34:49Z")
> [@Ken001](#): > > Dang! Really? That is frightening. Lucas invented the light-sucking tech whereby your headlights faded in proportion to darkness. Scary stuff. The three positions on a Lucas light switch Dim Flicker Off [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-britain-build-its-own-nuclear-plants/735338.md?page=1)