Qualla: Moorside Nuclear Power Station

Moorside Nuclear Power Station: Introduction

Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Some of the most expensive infrastructure projects in British history are the ones that never get built. Moorside is a case study. For just over a decade, a 200-hectare plot of West Cumbrian farmland north of Sellafield was destined to become the largest new nuclear power station in Britain in a generation - three reactors, 3.4 gigawatts of capacity, a £2.8 billion grid connection threaded under Morecambe Bay to spare the Lake District National Park. Today, the site sits empty. The story of why is a slow-motion corporate disaster, told in press releases and quiet liquidations.

Moorside Nuclear Power Station: The Site That Wanted a Reactor

Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The land came first. In October 2009, a joint venture of Iberdrola, GdF-Suez and Scottish & Southern took an option on 190 hectares immediately north of the existing Sellafield complex - the obvious place for new nuclear in Britain, given the existing workforce, the infrastructur...

Moorside Nuclear Power Station: The Westinghouse Crash

Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

On 28 March 2017, the UK Office for Nuclear Regulation issued a Design Acceptance Confirmation for the AP1000 reactor - the formal sign-off, after years of review, that the design met British safety standards. The next day, 29 March 2017, Westinghouse filed for Chapter 11 bankrup...

Moorside Nuclear Power Station: The Korean Rescue That Wasn't

Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

In December 2017, NuGen named the Korea Electric Power Corporation (Kepco) as preferred bidder to take over the project from Toshiba. The plan, broadly: swap the troubled American AP1000 for Korea's APR-1400, a design already operating at the Shin Kori plant in South Korea and be...

Moorside Nuclear Power Station: Clean Energy Hub, or What Might Yet Happen

Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Even before the dust settled, new proposals appeared. In July 2020, an EDF-led consortium announced interest in building two EPR reactors at the site, a design already under construction at Hinkley Point in Somerset. On 30 June 2020 a separate Rolls-Royce-led UK Small Modular Rea...