Is it time to look again at nuclear power?

Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in February this year marked a watershed moment in the debate on energy security. How we heat our homes, power our businesses, and what needs to be done to protect those energy sources was thrust once again to the top of each European country’s agenda.

The fallout from war in Ukraine has also led to a question being asked: is it time to look again at nuclear power? This was the topic of discussion at a Spectator panel at Tory conference. Robert Buckland, Secretary of State for Wales thought so: ‘We cannot afford to lose any time in investment in nuclear.’

This was proved most painfully when rocketing energy prices quickly began to expose how vulnerable Europe’s dependence on gas made it. Germany found its long-standing strategy of buying gas from Russia, including through the Nord Stream pipeline, a huge political and economic liability. It took it several months to succumb to Western pressure to finally pull the plug on the Nord Stream 2 pipe and now faces the real possibility of winter blackouts as a result.