HC Deb 13 November 2001 vol 374 c656W
Mr. Sayeed

To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what estimate she has made of the cost of electricity generated by nuclear power in pence/kilowatt hour, broken down into(a) building costs, (b) running costs, (c) decommissioning costs on a discounted basis and (d) other costs, identifying the assumptions made; and if she will make a statement. [13270]

Mr. Wilson

The Department has made no recent estimates of the cost of electricity generated by nuclear power. The last study published in 1995 concluded that the levelised costs of nuclear power were around 3.9p/kWh. Studies suggest that capital costs account for about 70 per cent. of total costs, operating and maintenance costs about 20 per cent. and decommissioning and waste costs about 10 per cent.

The Department is contributing to the work of the energy review being undertaken by the Performance and Innovation Unit at the Cabinet Office, which is looking at the cost of new nuclear generation. A copy of their paper which includes estimates of nuclear generation costs can be found at http://www.cabinet-office.gov.uk/innovation/2001/energy/2050.pdf.

Mr. Stunell

To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what was the(a) total amount of electricity generated from nuclear generators in the UK and (b) proportion of all electricity used in the UK generated from (i) nuclear generation and (ii) UK-based nuclear generation, since 1990. [12788]

Mr. Wilson

[holding answer 7 November 2001]: The information requested is as follows:

Electricity supplied from nuclear sources in the UK GWh Proportion of total electricity supplied that was from UK nuclear sources(Percentage) Proportion that was nuclear from all sources1 (Percentage)
1990 58,664 20 23
1991 62,761 21 25
1992 69,135 23 27
1993 80,979 27 31
1994 79,962 26 30
1995 80,598 25 29
1996 85,820 26 30
1997 89,341 27 31
1998 90,590 26 29
1999 87,672 25 28
2000 78,334 22 25
colspan="4">1Assuming that all electricity imported from France was from French nuclear stations.

Source:

Digest of UK Energy Statistics 2001 Tables 5.11 and 5.12.