Britain's largest nuclear operator formally purchased by France's EDF
Xinhua, 2009-01-06
LONDON, Jan. 5 (Xinhua) -- British Energy, the largest electricity generator and nuclear operator in Britain, was formally purchased by France's EDF on Monday, with a cost of 12.5 billion pounds.
The purchase is a significant step in EDF's plans to build four new nuclear reactors in Britain. Completion of the purchase on Monday, following regulatory clearance with conditions by European competition authorities in December, marks the culmination of the restructuring of British Energy.
"Completion of this takeover represents not only a 12.5-billion-pound investment in the UK by EDF but, in opening the way for new nuclear build, should provide many billions of pounds more opportunity for the UK supply chain," said British Business Secretary Lord Mandelson.
In 2002, the British government stepped in to support a restructuring of the company in order to ensure the safety of nuclear power and security of electricity supplies. Since then, the challenge to tackle climate change has made the growth of new nuclear power more pressing and this transaction enables Britain to move further towards its ambition to become a low carbon economy.
"Given the challenge of climate change and energy security, it is right to embrace nuclear power as one of the technologies that can serve us in the future. Today's announcement marks an important step on the path to new nuclear power becoming a reality," said Ed Miliband, secretary of the Department of Energy and Climate Change.
The sale, which includes the 36 percent stake in the company held by the British government's Nuclear Liabilities Fund, raises approximately 4.4 billion pounds towards the cost of decommissioning British Energy's existing nuclear power stations. EDF's takeover offer was announced in September last year. The secretary said that in addition to the important investment made by EDF, Britain's ambition is to have more than one firm building and operating nuclear power stations in the country. He added that there are strong signals of interest in this from the power industry and Britain will continue to work with stakeholders to bring about the conditions that can make that possible.
British Energy currently owns and operates eight nuclear power stations in Britain, and it also owns and operates a coal-fired power station. EDF is France's historical electricity operator and has a strong position in Germany, Britain and Italy. It supplies gas, electricity and associated services to more than 38 million customer accounts worldwide including more than 28 million in France and 5.5 million in Britain.
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