Ministers welcome British Government’s decision on Sizewell C

Paris, 29 November 2022

Bruno Le Maire, Minister of the Economy, Finance and Industrial and Digital Sovereignty, and Agnès Pannier-Runacher, Minister for the Energy Transition, welcome today’s decision by the British Governement to invest £679 million in capital in the firm leading the project to build two French-technology EPR nuclear reactors at the Sizewell power station site (Sizewell C project).

The British Government will acquire a 50% stake in the project alongside EDF. EDF will retain only a minority stake of a maximum of 20% when the final investment decision is reached.

This historic decision by the British authorities will help equip the United Kingdom with new capabilities for long-term decarbonized, competitive production and play an important role in its energy transition.

Moreover, the Sizewell C project testifies to the vitality and importance of Franco-British cooperation in the civil nuclear industry. It also demonstrates the strength and expertise of our country’s nuclear industry.

The SZC project, designed as a replica of the project put forward by EDF to build two EPR reactors on the site of the Hinkley Point C power station, will in fact bring in many companies in the French nuclear industry such as EDF, Framatome and GEAST, and all their sub-contractors.

The decision comes with the French Government having announced in February 2022 its intention to build six new EPR2 reactors in France and launch studies for eight more.

The new nuclear reactor projects for export, including the Sizewell C project, will directly benefit the French programme, since they make it possible to develop skills in the industry and benefit from reciprocal economies of scale and feedback on the domestic EPR programme and future export programmes./.