private investors to put money in and get an immediate return. i am sure the government would not say it is bribing private investors, it will be trying to make the case that it will give them a good return for their money. unlike hinkley point c, where all of the cost and time overspend is being paid for by edf and cgn, its chinese partner, sizewell c, our energy bills will start to see a nuclear tax from the day construction starts, and we will be paying that tax throughout construction, for a decade or more before a single light bulb is lit, and that is on top of the taxpayers investment going on. in response to the professor, edf has got experience at building this reactor before, it has four other disastrously late builds which were overspent, and one of the only operating once in china was offline for 12 months because of fuel failure. so this is a huge amount of money to invest in a reactor technology that hasn t really proven itself. what is your reaction to that, professor?
and as we did not invest in nuclear for many decades, what we are having to do is to re establish the supply chain, re establish the expertise in the building of the plant. so i think it is not unusual that the first of its kind in the uk takes longer and costs more, but we have already seen at hinkley point c that the second unit that is being built, that there are efficiencies from what was learnt building the first unit, and that will then play out. so i think we can have some confidence that the figures are more likely to be as stated now than they were for hinkley point. alison downes, you will know the arguments about britain becoming more energy independent, grant shapps says that the start of this project is a huge step towards that. what are your key objections to sizewell c? well, let s be clear, this is a national issue, because the only way it will get that money that grant shapps so confidently says the money will be raised, is through bribing
step towards that. what are your key objections to sizewell c? weill. objections to sizewell c? well, let s be clear, objections to sizewell c? well, let s be clear, this objections to sizewell c? well, let s be clear, this is objections to sizewell c? well, let s be clear, this is a - objections to sizewell c? well, let s be clear, this is a national issue. let s be clear, this is a national issue, because the only way it will -et issue, because the only way it will get that issue, because the only way it will get that money that grant shapps so confidently says the money will be raised. confidently says the money will be raised. is confidently says the money will be raised, is through bribing private investors raised, is through bribing private investors to put money in and get an immediate investors to put money in and get an immediate return. i am investors to put money in and get an immediate return. immediate return. i am sure the government immediate return. i
£700 million towards building a new nuclear power station at sizewell in suffolk. it ll be built by the french power company edf using the same design at the one currently under construction at hinkley point in somerset. the government says its investment in sizewell means chinese money won t be needed. the business secretary, grant shapps, says the new station will help britain achieve energy independence. this means that we will be building sizewell c, it s going to power 6 million homes, it s going to provide 10,000 jobs, perhaps immediately on site, 20,000 overall, and a lot of apprenticeships as well. so good news for britain s energy independence. it doesn t mean that, though, does it? what it means is £700 million for the development phase of sizewell c, the cost of which is believed to be around 30 billion that money still has to be found. well, certainly, money will be raised to build it, it s a combination between taxpayers money but also private investment,
alison? we have seen increasing numbers of energy models that show that very high levels of renewables, with just a small amount of nuclear that the life extension of sizewell b are the least cost option. we will see great advances in storage as well, and the government admits its own model has failures how that will roll out. our sense is that sizewell c is not only not needed, but we could be spending £30 billion on a project that, by the time it built, isn t going to contribute anything. the world s largest active volcano, hawaii s mauna loa, has erupted for the first time in almost 40 years. residents have been placed on alert and warned about the risk of falling ash, but so far no evacuation orders have been put in place. our reporter wendy