SHIPPING (NUCLEAR PROPULSION) (Hansard, 15 December 1961)

§ Mr. Simon Wingfield Digby (Dorset, West)

I make no apology, even at this hour, for raising a subject which I believe is very important to an island and a sea-faring nation like ours. There is a new form of propulsion for ships which merits our attention. To say that it is a new form of propulsion perhaps goes too far, because it is really a new method of providing heat and motive power to conventional machinery. Nevertheless, as the premier shipbuilding nation of the world we must take this matter very seriously.

It is perhaps appropriate that today the leading article in The Times deals with the subject of industrial research. If industrial research in general is necessary, it is very much more necessary in an industry like shipbuilding, where we have traditionally led the world. We read in the newspapers today about a working party being set up on the future of the shipbuilding industry in an attempt to bring both sides of the industry together so that we can face our foreign competitors better.

898 I apologise to the House for the technical nature of this subject, and I confess at once that I am ill-qualified to deal with these technicalities. But it seems to me as a layman that there are tremendous possibilities of development in the nuclear propulsion of ships, whether they be naval or merchant ships. There are many possibilities for different types of moderator and different types of coolant, and above all for different types of nuclear fuel.

I suppose research into these matters is only in its infancy, but my anxiety is that we should not be left behind. Up to five years ago I was responsible under the First Lord of the Admiralty for shipbuilding and marine engineering. I can look back on what was being said then. I am a little disturbed at the progress which appears to have been made since then. I very much hope that my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary for Science will be able to reassure me on some of these matters.

Whatever may or may not have happened in these islands, things have been happening abroad in nuclear propulsion, particularly in the United States of America. Russia built the first surface nuclear-powered ship in the icebreaker "Lenin". We do not know very much about her. Meanwhile, what has been happening in America is quite striking. The Americans already have no less than 21 nuclear-powered submarines in operation, whereas we have none. They have launched and are fitting out six. The keels are laid and under construction for 14 more. Seventeen more are assigned to shipyards and 3 are authorised, making a total of 61 nuclear-powered submarines. As regards surface vessels, the Americans already have in operation a nuclear-powered cruiser. They have an aircraft carrier about ready for trials. They have launched and being fitted out one frigate with nuclear power, and they have authorised a further one. They have, therefore, a lot of experience in these matters. In addition, in 1959, they launched a nuclear merchant ship called the "Savannah" of about 20,000 tons. They already have two years' experience in this field.

If one looks at the results of the 1958 Geneva Conference one finds that many other countries are making researches into the use of nuclear propulsion for 899 merchant ships. It was clear at the time of that conference that America and Russia had a lead in this field, but other shipbuilding nations have done enough study to put them in a position where they might achieve a break through. For example, Japan has produced plans for a 30,000 ton deadweight submersible tanker and other plans for a 20,000 ton immigrant ship. The French and Germans also have plans.

The Germans recently held a conference on nuclear ship propulsion which 750 delegates attended. We must, therefore, protect ourselves, for we are a little astern of station when we consider what is going on abroad. On 8th November last my right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport, when replying to a Question, announced that for the time being the Government were not going to build a nuclear-powered merchant ship in this country. He said—and this after about two years of considering tenders for such a vessel—that instead there was to be a vigorous research programme.

I put down a Question on this subject on 28th November and the Parliamentary Secretary told me that he was unable to give details of that vigorous research because they had not been decided. He was also unable to say what funds would be made available by the Government for that purpose. It seems that very little has happened and I hope that some of my fears will be allayed this afternoon and that we shall be told that the Government have set aside a reasonable amount of money for this purpose.

In his answer, the Minister of Transport spoke of the fact that nuclear machinery is uneconomic for merchant ships. That is well known and the great question is whether it will remain so. That is what we must find out. It is worth recalling that in the early days of steam there were sceptics as well. When Samuel Cunard came over from Halifax, Nova Scotia, to this country he tried to establish steamships to run across the Atlantic. He met with great scepticism. Had he had to rely on passenger traffic to establish that route he would not have succeeded. Fortunately the Admiralty, which at that time placed Post Office contracts, placed a mail contract with 900 him. The beginning of the Cunard services across the North Atlantic took place in that way.

So it is that the pioneers of new techniques often gain real advantages. I have pointed out that the American Navy has done a great deal of pioneering work in getting all this experience with all these ships at sea. Unfortunately, in this country we cannot rely on that kind of pioneering by the Royal Navy. It does not have the resources and it has only two of these ships on the way, both of which will contain American-type reactors.

The programme is also too big to expect the shipbuilding industry to tackle it from its own resources. We need to discover what the possibilities are. It was possible in the old days for the Royal Navy to develop, for instance, the gas turbine, which was not nearly as big a task as this one. In the last 100 years or so nothing as revolutionary as this has happened in shipbuilding. But this is an immense project to which a great deal of money is being devoted abroad.

We have got so used to the preeminence of British shipbuilding, because a British-built ship is really the Rolls-Royce of the seas, that we are apt to take it too much for granted. But I do not believe that we can afford to lag behind in new developments even though they may appear uneconomic at present. It is well-known to the House that the merchant fleet of this country, although it has been rebuilt to a large extent since the last war, is an ever-decreasing percentage of world tonnage. In shipbuilding our foreign orders are not perhaps all that we would hope, and in the latest figures that I have been able to obtain, up to the end of September this year, we have taken second place in building. Japan launched 1.6 million gross tons, we launched 1.3 million gross tons and West Germany launched 1 million gross tons. Compared with Japan, the ships we built were of higher quality in the sense that there were more passenger ships among them.

The Government have for some years given a great deal of help to the aircraft industry—a new industry—and it is difficult to arrive at the extent of that help. In answer to a Question recently, I was told that £7¼ million are spent 901 directly on transport aircraft and just over £1 million on municipal airports. In addition, the Government spend over £200 million a year on aircraft production, according to the Minister of Aviation in answer to a Question the other day.

Government help for the shipping industry is small, because it has not been seriously needed until recently. Government help at present to the shipbuilding research associations is £130,000 and to the National Physical Laboratory for shipbuilding research £285,000. To that can be added Board of Trade loans under the Local Employment Act which come to over £600,000. On harbours, Government expenditure is £262,000. It will be seen, therefore, that help to the shipping industry up to now has been very small compared with that given to the aircraft industry. I believe that faced with possible changes like this the time has come when the Government, if they wish to retain our place in shipbuilding, must do very much more about it. Sums of this kind are obviously totally inadequate to finance a proper programme of research into the type of reactor that would be suitable for propelling merchant ships.

Turning to the past experience of the marine engineering industry, we can take the example of Charles Parsons who developed the modern turbine largely from his own resources. That is a thing of the past. It could not be done in present conditions. There is also the example of the development of the famous Doxford engine. That project began as long ago as 1906 but it was not until 1913–14 that the first single-cylinder 450 h.p. engine was produced and it was not until 1921 that the first Doxford motorship was launched. In the matter of diesel engines there was enormous experience on land from which to draw. Therefore, the argument that one must go on experimenting on land before one can build for the sea falls down at once when we look at these figures. As we know, the Doxford engine has gone on from strength to strength and the latest version is as fine a job as ever. But there are limits to land experience, and to the special problem of applying different type of reactor to marine use is a very important one.

902 I want to hear, in the time which the Parliamentary Secretary has at his disposal, a little more about the programme. What types of reactor are the Government going to look at? How much are they looking at the question of fuel, to which I will come a little later? Above all, what Treasury help is there going to be? Will it be enough for a full-scale programme on a par with the kind of thing that is taking place elsewhere? I believe that this is a matter of urgency.

For example, there are at the present moment, I think, in nearly all the American submarines—the other ships to which I have referred also have them—pressurised water reactors, but there is a widespread feeling that boiling water reactors would be more efficient for this purpose. Is there to be research into that, or is there to be research into other types of reactor—into an organic moderated reactor, for example?

Again, we come to the question of "know-how" about shielding. Obviously, safety is very important. The shielding devices which those who have built these ships up to now have had to use have been very costly and very heavy indeed. It seems to me that, until we have actually built a ship, there will be a great many things that we do not know about shielding.

I now turn to the question of nuclear fuel. I gather that up to now thoughts have been fairly unanimous that ordinary uranium enriched with U 235 is the best fuel, but there are those who today think that civil plutonium might be very useful for this purpose and have considerable advantages. Towards the end of the 60s or the beginning of the 70s there should be available in this country a good deal of civil plutonium, and it may be that this would give us just the assistance which we need to make these reactors more worth while for propelling ships.

An estimate has been made, I think by Professor Richards, that this plutonium will be sold at about £5 per gramme. If that is so, it would be equivalent to 54s. per ton for fuel oil, against a present price for fuel oil of 120s. per ton. It may be that that calculation is wrong. The development is some way ahead and it is difficult to foresee the demand for civil plutonium 903 as far ahead as that. However, if the calculation is anything like right, it obviously has very great possibilities in reducing the costs of reactors to drive merchant ships.

I think I have probably said enough to indicate some of the possibilities that there are of an early break-through. My anxiety is that that break-through might be achieved by our competitors and not by ourselves. I should like to quote from the American magazine "Business Week", referring to the "Savannah", the United States' first nuclear merchant ship. It said that it … proves a lot of things that need proving. Safety and engineering feasibility are the most important of these. Again, it is a training ship for seamen for later, more economic nuclear ships. If we cannot follow the Americans in building one and getting this information for ourselves, I believe that there is no time to be lost in doing research into the most likely forms of reactor so that at the earliest moment we can go forward and get that practical experience. For many years the name of this country has been a by-word on the high seas, and I believe that when we are faced with a totally new form of propulsion like this and it is very difficult to see into the future, we must be prepared to match our foreign competitors.

§ The Parliamentary Secretary for Science (Mr. Denzil Freeth)

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, West (Mr. Wingfield Digby) for raising so important a topic on the Motion for the Adjournment today. As he reminded the House, on 8th November, my right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport announced the Government's decision not to proceed with the construction of a nuclear-powered merchant ship, the construction of such a ship being, of course, the responsibility of his Department. My right hon. Friend added, however, that the Government had decided that the right course was to authorise a vigorous programme of research aimed at a reactor system which would be economically attractive to a wide range of shipping. It is because nuclear research is the responsibility of my noble Friend the Minister 904 for Science that I am replying to this debate.

Criticisms have been made in the Press and elsewhere, and were echoed by my hon. Friend this afternoon, of the so-called dilatory way in which the Government are approaching the problem of nuclear propulsion for ships. This is certainly not true of the research programme, which we are determined should be pressed ahead vigorously and on as wide a front as possible.

The main responsibility for the programme must, of course, rest with the Atomic Energy Authority, which has set up a threefold organisation to carry out the programme. The first branch will deal with research into reactor design and experimental engineering, the second with associated research in nuclear physics, and, thirdly, a team is being set up to investigate the special problems of nuclear ship design, construction and application. In order to strengthen and increase the power of this team, staff of the British Shipbuilding Research Association, soon to be merged into the British Ship Research Association, will be seconded to the team in order that investigation may go forward on a comprehensive basis into the many problems posed by the use of a reactor in a ship. These include, for example, the form of the hull, containment of the reactor, including the biological shielding, and precautions against collision damage and other aspects of safe running.

I should mention that the British Ship Research Association has had a team composed of its own employees, naval architects and marine engineers seconded from member firms for several years now. This team has always worked in close co-operation with the A.E.A. and has been housed at the Authority's establishments. The British Ship Research Association tells me that it is most willing to expand its own team further as occasion demands.

The reactor design branch and the team on special problems will be at the Authority's establishment at Risley. The nuclear physics branch will be at Win-frith Heath. In this research programme we want to ensure that industry as well as the Authority takes a full share, and therefore, an appreciable part of the 905 programme will be carried out by suitable nuclear engineering firms under contract to the Authority.

I regret that I was not able to give my hon. Friend a full Answer to his Question on 28th November. It was an unfortunate day that he chose to put it down, because, as he knows, on 29th November it was announced that a high-level working group, responsible to my noble Friend and my right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport, had been set up in order to ensure that all those with interests in this research programme were brought fully into the picture and would be able to contribute to it. The working group's terms of reference are: To advise and make recommendations on a programme of research required to advance nuclear propulsion for merchant ships. Its chairman is the Permanent Secretary to the Ministry of Transport and its members include Sir William Cook of the Atomic Energy Authority, Sir Victor Shepheard of the British Shipbuilding Research Association, Mr. Logan of the General Council of British Shipping, Mr. H. M. Pemberton of Lloyds Register of Shipping, and Professor Diamond of Manchester University. There will also be representatives of the Office of the Minister for Science, the Admiralty and the Ministry of Transport.

It is noteworthy that, so great has been the determination on the part of everybody to see that this programme is carried out vigorously and without delay, within three weeks of my right hon. Friend's announcement of the decision to undertake a research programme, the working group had already approved the general lines of a programme of research worked out and submitted by the Atomic Energy Authority. This programme will involve the spending of about £3 million spread over about three years. It is worthwhile mentioning that the Euratom Commission has allocated, over roughly the same period, the expenditure of roughly the same amount of money divided among four nuclear marine research and development projects. The sum of money which we are proposing to spend is for research. Development costs, if undertaken, would be very much greater, but as yet we are some way from that stage.

906 The difficulties which face the research workers are primarily twofold. First, they have to design a reactor which is sufficiently robust to be capable of being operated under those conditions of violent motion which, we all know to our acute discomfort arise not infrequently at sea. Allied with these problems are those engineering and metallurgical problems which are concomitants of any nuclear reactor research project.

Secondly—and I emphasise this—we have to construct reactors of relatively small size and with sufficiently low capital and running costs to make them more attractive as propulsion units than those driven by conventional fuels, after allowing for further developments in the efficiency of such conventional methods of propulsion, and those developments over the years may well be great. In any case, both capital costs and running costs have to be considered when we are dealing with reactors for merchant shipping.

The present intention—and this answers another point my hon. Friend raised—is to study four reactor systems: first, a modified version of the pressurised water reactor; secondly, the steam-cooled heavy water system, where some work has already been done by private industry in this country; thirdly, a steam generating heavy water system which the Atomic Energy Authority is already developing at Risley; fourthly, a high temperature reactor system which might be developed from the Dragon reactor now being built as an international project at Winfrith Heath in Dorset.

My hon. Friend referred to research in fuels and the possibility, as quoted in The Times, of using plutonium, which, it has been suggested, would be an economic fuel some time in the 1970s. This forecast was made on a number of assumptions which may or may not prove to be correct. A good deal of work is going on into the use of plutonium as a reactor fuel, but I am advised that its commercial use, whether on land or at sea, is still a long way off. The present price of plutonium is somewhat artificial as there is no free market in the metal.

907 I would emphasise that the whole programme of research must be kept very flexible and close watch must be kept on all other reactor systems which are being developed anywhere in the world and which may at any time be considered suitable for economic marine propulsion. Equally, if a particular line of development does not fulfil its initial promise, it will, without hesitation, be brought to a stop. It is almost impossible to draw up a short list of possible winners, although spotting winners is really what this research team is setting out to do. In essence, its job consists of preparing the design for what look like the most promising of the reactor concepts now envisaged.

908 As my hon. Friend said, the Americans already have the "Savannah" nuclear merchant ship, but the pressurised water reactor used in this vessel is unlikely to provide an economic reactor system. Similarly, when one is designing a submarine or other naval vessel, the prime consideration is not economic running, but the fulfilling of a military commitment or a military job.