New Energy
UK to Ease Rules for Nuclear Plants in Bid to Boost Growth
- Will give developers more freedom on where to build stations
- Government also seeks to lower project costs, speed them up
This article is for subscribers only.
The UK will make it easier to approve and build nuclear plants, as Prime Minister Keir Starmer seeks to boost economic growth and bring down power bills, while also pursuing ambitious decarbonization targets.
An overhaul of planning rules will give developers more freedom over where they can build new plants — up to now restricted to eight government-designated sites such as Hinkley Point and Sizewell. The changes should help in the deployment of small modular reactors, as well as gigawatt-scale projects.