Written question asked by Colin Challen (Labour) on Monday, 17 November 2008, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 19 November 2008. It was answered by Mike O'Brien (Labour) on Monday, 24 November 2008 on behalf of the Department of Energy and Climate Change.

Uranium: Prices

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change what estimate he has made of the price of uranium during the whole lifetime of any new nuclear power station built in the UK.

Answer: The price of uranium is subject, as with other commodities, to market variances. We have therefore not made any assumptions about the future price of uranium.The Government's White Paper on Nuclear Energy, published in January 2008, acknowledged that since the price of nuclear fuel represents a much smaller part of the cost of electricity than for other technologies, even significant price increases would have only a limited effect on overall generating costs.

Secondary information