That just leaves Edf.

What chance of getting 45 Gw of new Nuclear generation by 2050 as required to meet the 80% reductions in CO2 emissions by 2050 . I would wager almost NIL.

Unless the government takes the long term view that it took in 1956 when it opened the Magnox stations (try forgetting for a moment the intended production of plutonium for military purposes) and invests in Nuclear on our behalf in order to keep the lights, on we will never make all these grand targets.

Forget the Open source spreadsheets, this is a classic case of fiddling while Rome burns. Very interesting but not exactly solving the problem.

The Gov’t needs to accept that selling the ownership of Westinghouse was a short sighted mistake, and needs to address the issue of getting a new home grown nuclear designs of its own off the ground with some degree of urgency. There is plenty of information out there which would make the 3rd, or 4th generation of Nuclear reactors with in-built passive safety systems incorporated possible, perhaps using fast Thorium reactors as Actinide burners to help resolve the accumulated Plutonium, Curium and Americium stock pile problems, and in addition not generating such large amounts of long lived wastes in future. 100 year lifespans for the reactors should be the targets, with ease of de-commissioning considered from the start.

Fusion is of course always the great hope of the future, but that is what it is, a hope of the future. Fission has been proved to work (albeit with some issues). We should actually get on with it.

Alternatively accept that electricity will be very expensive and get on with building the Severn Barrage and other expensive solar PV panels and offshore wind plus a lot of pumped storage.Removing the subsides will stifle this option before it is really started.

Come on – lets have some real leadership. With investment in this type of infrastructure the gov’t can generate jobs during a recession and in reality it should accept that it would always have had to underwrite private sector involvement in Nuclear just as it has had to underwrite private sector involvement in banking or defence.

It needs a decision shortly and don’t delay it by much otherwise the lights will go out.

There is just one other thought I would like to add, with the road distribution network critical to the operation of the economy, and the price of Oil just going up, and the panic buying of petrol and Diesel with just the faint possibility of a tankers drivers strike happening now, maybe the gov’t should give some consideration to electrifying the road network with all this newly available Nuclear electricity. It would make our society a lot more robust against ‘Black swan’ events.

Yes, lets avoid anarchy, and invest for the future.