Influencing Government: IMechE’s contribution to the House of Lords Report – Brexit: Energy Security

In 2017 the Institution of Mechanical Engineers released two policy statements designed to inform Government and others of the perils of leaving the European Atomic Energy Community, also known as the Euratom Treaty, as part of our decision to leave the EU.

Euratom covers four main areas of interest to the civil nuclear community, an industry that provides 21% of the UK’s electricity, but has a wider remit that includes standards, safety regulation and medical isotopes. The four areas are:

1. It enables a single market of goods and services for nuclear build, ongoing generation, research and development and decommissioning in Europe.
2. It provides funding for nuclear fusion research being undertaken by the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) at Culham in Oxfordshire and it provides access to the European R&D community.
3. It provides safeguards regime to ensure UK compliance with the non-proliferation treaty including inspection, reporting and accounting.
4. It manages and develops the Nuclear Cooperation Agreements (NCAs) with non-EU countries on behalf of Euratom members.

We were ahead of the thinking on this subject and were able to lead, inform and educate both the Government and industry. Our second release Leaving Euratom: A Framework for the Future provided clear guidance to the Government on how to manage the issues that were likely to arise from leaving Euratom. Based on this document and other media activities I was invited as an expert witness to the House of Lords European Union Committee – Brexit: Energy Security, an exciting opportunity for IMechE. As it turns out it was an all-female panel, a possible first for a House of Lords expert panel on the nuclear industry. I was accompanied by representatives from EDF and the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR).

Moving forward on 29 January this year the European Union Committee Brexit: Energy Security published their findings from across six sub-committees following a series of expert panels, inquiries and evidence submitted from across industry, academia and government. Some key areas identified by the report are:

1. Dependence on EU workers is particularly acute in the nuclear energy sector. The evidence from EDF is clear that without access to EU labour it will be very difficult to complete construction of the new nuclear power facility at Hinkley Point.
2. There is strong support across the energy industry for the UK to continue to participate in the Internal Energy Market (IEM) post-Brexit. The House of Lords is urging the Government to seek this outcome.
3. The UK’s influence on EU energy policy is likely to be severely constrained post-Brexit. The Government should conduct and publish a frank assessment of its potential degree. of influence, taking particular note of the difficulties faced by other non-EU countries such as Switzerland and Norway.

There were also wider concerns raised around how we continue to influence technology standards and manufacturing and how we ensure that the new Industrial Strategy facilitates connections that enable this.

When it comes to the nuclear question, the results of the Lords’ report agreed with the comments that I made to the Committee that there is no contingency plan, no Plan B, for if we do not leave Euratom with all our new regulatory and policy frameworks in place. Without this framework, we will experience unresolvable difficulties in delivering our civil nuclear programme in the UK. They made the following comments that are reflected by the Institution’s second Euratom publication:

1. The Euratom Treaty is currently vital to the functioning of nuclear energy generation in the UK. Failure to replace its provisions by the point of withdrawal could result in the UK being unable to import nuclear materials, and have severe consequences for the UK’s energy security.
2. The Government must ensure that its nuclear trade agreements allow the movement of nuclear material and equipment in a timely fashion and at a reasonable cost.
3. The UK’s membership of Euratom is distinct from its EU membership, and that in the Prime Minister’s Article 50 notification of the 29 March 2017 a separate notification was made in respect of the United Kingdom’s withdrawal from Euratom. This suggests that separate transitional arrangements may also be possible, if they are needed to mitigate the risk of a cliff-edge. We therefore call on the Government to review and report to Parliament on the possibility of a Euratom-specific transitional period separate from the wider Brexit process.

One thing was also apparent from the report, is that often the role of the Associate Membership of Euratom was misunderstood. Associations with Euratom are usually made, as is the Swiss case, for research and training not for the wider elements of safeguarding, the single market or shared nuclear co-operation agreements. It is possible that new bespoke Associations could be made for other areas, but this has never been done before and may have unintended consequences.

The Lords’ report backs the findings of IMechE’s Policy Statements, and also concludes that the best option is to stay in Euratom. However this is not possible without staying in the EU as no nation has ever been allowed to join the EU without joining Euratom and therefore the reverse will not be possible.

The IMechE is happy to be leading the way with this work in supporting and informing Government. But if we are to leave both treaties, the whole engineering community must pull together do everything possible to enable the transition to our new civil nuclear framework.