Qualla: Hinkley Point C nuclear power station

Hinkley Point C nuclear power station: Introduction

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Neil Owen, CC BY-SA 2.0. Forty-seven billion pounds. That is the upper estimate, in 2024 prices, of what it will cost to finish the two reactors taking shape on this stretch of Somerset coast. By that measure, Hinkley Point C is the most expensive object ever constructed in human history, a single project whose price tag exceeds the gross domestic product of most countries. The Severn Estuary slides past with its enormous tides. Mud flats stretch toward the Bristol Channel. And rising above the seawall, year by year, stands a concrete cathedral to baseload electricity, built by a French utility, partly financed by China, and intended to keep British lights on for sixty years.

Image: Neil Owen | CC BY-SA 2.0

Hinkley Point C nuclear power station: A Coast Already Industrial

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nick Chipchase, CC BY-SA 2.0. Hinkley Point was never pristine. The promontory has hosted nuclear generation since the 1960s, when Hinkley Point A's Magnox reactors began producing power, followed by Hinkley Point B's advanced gas-cooled reactors in 1976. Both stations are now closed or being decommissioned, ...

Image: Nick Chipchase | CC BY-SA 2.0

Hinkley Point C nuclear power station: The Crane Called Big Carl

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Roger Cornfoot, CC BY-SA 2.0. Construction at Hinkley Point C demands tools at a scale matching its ambition. The Sarens SGC-250 double ring crane, the largest of its kind in the world, dominates the site. The workers call it Big Carl. It arrived in hundreds of deliveries, assembled on rails so it can move ac...

Image: Roger Cornfoot | CC BY-SA 2.0

Hinkley Point C nuclear power station: A Strike Price and a Bet

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Mark Robinson, CC BY 2.0. The economics are what make Hinkley Point C a story about more than concrete. In October 2013 the British government agreed to pay EDF a guaranteed price of £89.50 per megawatt-hour for the electricity, indexed to inflation, for thirty-five years. At the time critics called it ec...

Image: Mark Robinson | CC BY 2.0

Hinkley Point C nuclear power station: The People Who Build It

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nick Chipchase, CC BY-SA 2.0. At its peak, the Hinkley Point C site employs around ten thousand workers. They arrive by bus from across Somerset on a fleet operated by Somerset Passenger Solutions, a joint venture set up specifically to move construction crews to and from the headland. Up to 160 buses run dur...

Image: Nick Chipchase | CC BY-SA 2.0

Hinkley Point C nuclear power station: Why Britain Built It Anyway

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Mark Robinson, CC BY 2.0. For all the criticism, the case for Hinkley Point C rests on a simple problem. Britain's older nuclear fleet is closing. Coal is gone. North Sea gas is depleting. Wind and solar are growing fast, but they do not run at night and they do not run when the wind dies. Something has t...

Image: Mark Robinson | CC BY 2.0