§ Mr. Mike Thomasasked the Secretary of State for Energy whether any British nationalised industry authority or subsidiaries for which he is sponsoring Minister have a financial interest in the development of the fast reactor programme of any other country; if so, which country or countries are involved; and what is the nature of the interest.
§ Mr. BennThe Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB) acquired in 1973 a 1.65 per cent. shareholding in the joint German / Dutch/Belgian fast reactor power station company, Schnellbrüter Kernkraftwerksgesellschaft (SBK), registered in West Germany, which had been set up to construct and operate a prototype 300 MW(E) fast reactor power station, SNR 300, and to hold interests in other companies having a similar purpose. The CEGB thereby gained the right to assign personnel to the SNR 300 project, but its contractual financial obliga-340W tion is limited to funding the 1.65 per cent. share of SBK's holdings–16 per cent. and 51 per cent. respectively—in two other companies, NERSA and ESK.
NERSA (Centrale Nucléaire Européenne à Neutrons Rapides S.A.) is the French / Italian /SBK company, registered in France, which will build a 1200 MW(E) commercial demonstration fast reactor power station, Super-Phénix, in France, ESK (Europäische Schnellbruter Kernkraft-Werksgesellschaft) is the SBK/Italian /French company, registered in West Germany, which has as its long-term objective the building of a comparable commercial demonstration power station, SNR 2, in Germany, following completion of SNR 3000.
The United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority has numerous co-operation arrangements with other countries in the field of fast reactor development but only one of these involves cash payments. These are towards the cost of a major safety project in France.