The Scottish Government will block any moves to power the giant Grangemouth chemicals refinery with a nuclear reactor.

Talks have taken place between Ineos and Rolls-Royce, and are understood to include looking at whether the sprawling plant on the Firth of Forth could be powered by a small modular power plant.

However, the SNP has a long-standing opposition to the installing of new nuclear power in the country.

A spokesman confirmed yesterday that the stance had not changed.

They told the Times: "The Scottish Government is absolutely clear in our opposition to the building of new traditional nuclear-fission energy plants in Scotland under current technologies.

"Small modular reactors, while innovative in construction and size, still generate electricity using nuclear fission and therefore the process presents the same environmental concerns as traditional nuclear power plants.

Best pathway

"We believe that significant growth in renewables, storage, hydrogen and carbon capture provides the best pathway to net-zero by 2045 and will deliver the decarbonisation we need to see across industry, heat and transport."

The Grangemouth refinery is a key part of Scotland's industrial infrastructure.

It supplies aviation fuel to Scottish airports, as well as many petrol stations across the country and some in Northern Ireland and the north of England.

  • Meanwhile, a nuclear start-up attempting to crack the "holy grail" of nuclear fusion is planning a new £500million pilot plant which will also make crucial fuel.

Oxford-based First Light Fusion is examining sites across Britain for a facility that will use fusion to produce both electricity and tritium - an isotope of hydrogen needed to fuel fusion reactions.

The facility would be used to supply First Light's commercial fusion reactor, which is still under development.

Extremely scarce

Tritium is extremely scarce and currently costs around £25,000 a gram, with much of the world's stock already earmarked for other reactors.

First Light Fusion says producing it on site would help commercialise fusion technology, which has been in development for decades.

Nick Hawker, First Light Fusion's co-founder and chief executive, told the Telegraph: "One of the major engineering challenges of fusion is being able to produce enough tritium yourself.

"With our design approach, that's quite an easy thing to do. So with this pilot plant design we will maximise that strength.

"It will be designed to over-produce tritium. That will unblock the scalability of the technology, allowing us to scale out many more power plants much more quickly.

"So this pilot plant will provide the fuel for the first generation, the first fleet of our proper commercial plants."

First Light hopes to get the 60-megawatt pilot plant up and running in the early to mid-2030s. Mr Hawker does not anticipate it will need to sell equity in First Light to fund the plant.

FTSE 100

The UK's top share index, the FTSE 100, was up 31 points at 7,505 shortly after opening this morning, following yesterday's 12-point loss.

Brent crude futures were 2.1% higher at $85.10 a barrel.

Companies reporting today

  • Full-year results: easyJet, Redrow, Shaftesbury



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