Extended British Energy loan will drain tax-payer

05 December 2002

Ecotricity, the UK's pioneering green energy company, has condemned the extension of the emergency loan to British Energy (BE) and the restructuring plan that makes taxpayers liable for its multi-billion pound nuclear clean-up costs.

Dale Vince, managing director Ecotricity comments, "It is incredible that the Government continues to keep British Energy afloat when there are already safer, cleaner alternative sources of energy which could provide all the UK's energy needs."

Commenting on the Government's plans for BE, Emma Gibson of Greenpeace said: "The decision comes at a time when the electricity market is over-producing, which is bound to negatively affect the development of clean green energy like offshore wind. Unlike nuclear power, these technologies could meet our electricity demand ten times over and create tens of thousands of jobs. This bailout proves once and for all that nuclear power is so uneconomic that its survival depends on billions of pounds of taxpayers' money. It is unacceptable that the Government has also agreed to underwrite the huge costs for dealing with British Energy's wastes. The current shortfall stands at billions and will get worse for every year that British Energy continues creating radioactive waste. What a waste of much needed public cash."

The public will have to shell out between £150 and £200 million a year for the next 10 years to keep the loss making privatised producer of a fifth of their electricity afloat. This money could build enough onshore wind energy to power 50% of the country for the next ten years.

BE ran into trouble this summer after wholesale power prices tumbled below its production costs. It has been surviving on Government money since September. Ecotricity and Greenpeace recently won a case for a Judicial Review of the Government's £650 million bailout of failed private nuclear generator BE.