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摘要

On 4 June I was invited to attend the Office of Nuclear Regulation (ONR) annual conference. The keynote speaker was Gerassimos Thomas, the deputy director for energy in the European Commission. He spoke about future energy viability in the EU and was encouragingly pro-nuclear; however, one of the key aims for the conference, led by Neil Baldwin the chair of the ONR, was to prepare for the launch of the next ONR five-year corporate plan, including the national regulator's strategy and its delivery. Finance and the need to deliver the most cost-effective service to both taxpayers and licensees is clearly an important factor in ONR thinking as they shape their future direction and, by implication, that of the UK nuclear programme. Indeed, finance and budgets seem to have been a recurrent theme throughout the period The increase in emphasis on accelerating hazard reduction and decommissioning across the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) estate has delivered encouraging results but, as more programmes make good progress, the total requirement for funding across the sector threatens to exceed the NDA's budget, so hard decisions are required. We can see similar pressures at the highest levels in government, with the benefits of subsidies for long-term investment in low-carbon energy having to be balanced against short-term budgetary pressures and the need to meet taxpayers' post-election expectations. We should be in little doubt that the Comprehensive Spending Review will continue to have ramifications across the energy sector.