Cumbria’s £10bn nuclear new build will not be delivered on schedule, according to the man in charge of the company behind it. Tom Samson, the chief executive of NuGen, which has plans for a power plant in Moorside, near Sellafield, has said it will not be up and running by the 2025 target. He has also said he expects a new investor in the project in the early part of 2018 and confirmed the company has been speaking to the Government about possible support. Mr Samson made these comments in an interview with in-cumbria, where he also said he was “115 per cent” confident the scheme would go ahead. Doubts have surrounded the Moorside project – designed to supply up to seven per cent of the UK’s electricity and create up to 10,000 jobs – all year because of issues affecting NuGen’s owner, Toshiba. Toshiba has always insisted that it remains committed to the Cumbrian project though it has long term plans to sell its stake. Korea Electric Power Corporation (Kepco) and China General Nuclear Power Corporation (CGN) have both expressed an interest in buying into NuGen. Both Kepco and CGN have their own reactor designs, which would need regulatory approval if they were to be used by NuGen. Mr Samson said: “When we are in a partnership with different technologies and shareholders it is inevitable that that would change schedules. We will have a new plan which we will need to create with any new owner and that will take us beyond 2025. “It is very difficult to pin down a date but I would expect it will be operational within the 2020s.” He added that there were several “credibly buyers” but did not discuss which companies these were but did say: “There is a high likelihood that there will be a new reactor technology.” Mr Samson also said his firm had been in discussions with the Government about how it might get involved in this project. “There is a need for the Government to consider how it supports nuclear new build,” he said, adding that the firm was in “a dialogue of options”.
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Toshiba’s NuGen nuclear project in Britain expects to secure a new investor by early next year, assuring the project’s future, NuGen’s chief executive officer told Reuters in an interview. “There are multiple credible bidders and we expect to find a new buyer, and a clear way forward by early next year,” NuGen Chief Executive Tom Samson told Reuters in an interview. The timing will largely depend on which of the bidders is successful, as KEPCO and CGN are both likely to want to use their own nuclear reactor technology. Samson said the company has called on the government for support for the project. “We are exploring options for the government to participate in the project but it is just a dialogue at the moment and no policy decisions have been made,” he said.
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