Wylfa: UK Government In Talks To Buy Nuclear Site – Report
The title of this post, is the same as that as this article on the BBC.
This is the sub-heading.
The UK government is reportedly in talks to take control of a site in north Wales where a planned nuclear project was scrapped in 2019.
These paragraphs outline the story.
State-owned Great British Nuclear is “in early discussions” with Hitachi, which owns the land at Wylfa, on Anglesey, the Financial Times reported.
A government spokesman said Wylfa was one of many “potential sites” that could host nuclear projects.
Hitachi abandoned its plans there in January 2019.
An unnamed minister told the FT that “tentative negotiations” with Hitachi had already begun, but said a deal might not be reached until after a general election expected later this year.
Tom Greatrex, chief executive of the Nuclear Industry Association and Virginia Crosbie, MP for Ynys Môn both welcomed the talks.
These are my thoughts.
Where Is Wylfa?
This Google Map shows Anglesey.
Wylfa power station is near Wylfa Head at the top of the map, where they are indicated by the cluster of red arrows.
This Google Map shows the power station to a larger scale.
Note.
- The red arrow named Magnox marks the decommissioned Magnox power station.
- The topmost red arrow marks Wylfa Head.
- The rightmost red arrow marks Porth y Wylfa, which looks like a small harbour.
- On some maps the square building to the East of the power station is marked as Wylfa sub-station.
- There certainly appears to be an overhead transmission line leading South from the power station complex.
Virginia Crosbie, MP for Ynys Môn, also said this according to the BBC article.
The nuclear industry is unanimous that Wylfa is the best site in Europe for large-scale nuclear,” she said, adding that it would be “the largest inward investment” in Welsh history and “transformational” for the people of north-west Wales.
But I do wonder, if when you have cleared the Wylfa site leaving the sub-station, that it could be a site where renewables could come ashore and be fed into the grid.
Why Is Wylfa The Best Site In Europe For Large-Scale Nuclear?
Given the protests about putting new power transmission lines across Norfolk and Suffolk, I feel that Wylfa’s largest asset could be its high capacity connection to the UK’s grid.
According to the Wikipedia entry for Wylfa power station, this is said about Wylfa B.
Horizon Nuclear Power, originally an E.ON and RWE joint venture, bought by Hitachi in 2012, announced in 2009 intentions to install about 3,000 MWe of new nuclear plant at Wylfa. Horizon planned to build two advanced boiling water reactors (ABWRs) at a site to the south of the existing Wylfa station.
It would seem that the high capacity connection to the UK’s grid, is capable of handling a 3 GW power station at Wylfa, which could be very useful in the grand scheme of things.
This is also said in the Wikipedia entry for Wylfa power station.
On 4 April 2017, Horizon submitted a Site Licence Application to the Office for Nuclear Regulation. The scheme was extended to include a tunnel under the Menai Strait to carry the power cables to protect the conservation worth of the Strait and the Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
Horizon certainly seemed to try hard to get Wylfa B under construction.
As I said earlier, the Wylfa site could be an ideal site to connect offshore renewables to the grid.
The Anonymous Widower 
There’s been an awful lot of dithering over this site. The Grid connection would need upgrading, and https://www.nationalgrid.com/document/129191/download is what was proposed in 2018. RR was proposing building an SMR there, and there were schemes to combine that with some wind connections. But it’s the same problem as HS2: the infrastructure is needed, but once costs start going way over budget, it’s hard for any government to justify paying for it.
There is a developing tidal site at Morlais near S Stack, with several projects now awarded CfDs. In grid terms, this is small, but should demo how well tidal stream can work.
Comment by Peter Robins | February 15, 2024 |
French proved tidal at St.Malo best part of 60 years ago. Never know why this country seeks to reinvent the wheel in whatever industry.
Comment by Nicholas Lewis | February 15, 2024 |
Well, yes, but that’s a different tech, which, like pumped storage, is only suitable in a few locations. The Morlais projects are using tidal stream, where the turbines can essentially be used in any tidal waters. AFAIK the first was the Meygen one in the Pentland Firth, which started operation in 2016-7, and has now been given CfDs for a further 50MW. Apparently, there’s scope for 400MW at the site, so that’s comparable with one of the smaller gas turbines. Expand that around the coast, particularly places with large coastal population (unlike the Pentland Firth), and you have a sizeable proportion of your power needs. It’s not baseload, as the tide goes in and out twice a day, but unlike wind it’s totally predictable.
As you will gather, I’m a fan 🙂
Comment by Peter Robins | February 16, 2024
Morlais btw apparently has the potential for 240MW (and future turbines may well be able to improve on that). The onshore site was connected to the Grid last year.
Comment by Peter Robins | February 16, 2024
I like the idea of surrounding a nuke; large or SMR, with other forms of less constant renewables like wind, solar and tidal.
Instead of a nuke, you can use pumped storage, a large battery or even a gas-fired power station with carbon capture and use.
The result will be the same, as it will produce a more or less constant level of electricity.
If you have hydrogen storage, as on Humberside, you can also add an electrolyser and a suitably-sized hydrogen-fired power station.
Comment by AnonW | February 15, 2024 |
From this link https://openinframap.org/#6.99/53.309/-4.009 it would appear that Wylfa has a power line at the highest power level leading across north Wales to Cheshire.
Note that there used to be an aluminium smelter near Holyhead which took a lot of power from Wylfa and the siting of the smelter would probably have been linked to Wylfa being nearby.
Comment by chilterntrev | February 16, 2024 |
Thanks for that link – that map’s new to me. As the map shows, the wind farms off the N Wales coast plug into the HV cable across the N Wales, whiich Dinorwig and Trawsfynydd also link into.
The map’s not entirely uptodate, as it doesn’t mark the new substation for Morlais I mention above. Not entirely surprising, as it was only completed a couple of weeks ago. The site is visible on Google’s latest satellite imagery https://www.google.com/maps/place/Morlais+Landfall+Substation/@53.3024452,-4.6733781,1048m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x486435462aef14d3:0x831974927bde1305!8m2!3d53.3029229!4d-4.6741935!16s%2Fg%2F11kj_5xl9z?entry=ttu
Comment by Peter Robins | February 16, 2024 |
I see the budget speech included the fact that the gov has now reached agreement on buying the site https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-68490883 Though, as Labour pointed out, the devil will be in the details of who actually bids to build what.
Comment by Peter Robins | March 6, 2024 |