Michael LaBelle  0:01  
Talking nuclear listening lessons for all net zero technologies. Interview with Adrian bowl, Episode 50. Welcome to the My energy 2050 podcast where we speak to the people building a clean energy system by 2050. I'm your host, Michael LaBelle. This week we speak with Adrian Boll, who is the chair of nuclear energy and society at the University of Manchester, and has been at the British Nuclear Laboratory for more than 20 years, wanted to have Adrian on to discuss the potential upswing in support for nuclear power. This is seen in the European Commission's proposal that nuclear power is considered green power. Also, in my interpretation, the rapid price increasing gas, maybe leading governments to look for long term power solutions such as nuclear, however, agents responses telling, he reflects back on a 10 year social media post where he was projecting that the last decade would be a new nuclear era. Well, I don't think that happened really. Anyways, I always consider nuclear a special case. First, it is extremely divisive. I've hosted I would thought we're going to be discussions on the issue at the university and they turned into shouting matches. So I know firsthand the the deep seated both professional divisions and I would say divisions overall in society we often hear about, but But where does that all stem from? Well, it provides essentially carbon free electricity. So if they're climate change debates right now, this is really important. However, it's always countered by long term radioactivity of nuclear waste, that safety issues. So there's a lot of channel challenges. Second, new nuclear power plants are extremely expensive upfront. And as we discuss it requires government financial support in one way or another. And finally, the projected lifetime from building to decommissioning is decades and decades, nuclear requires serious social and political support and decline. The shutting down of viable nuclear power plants, for example, in Germany demonstrates what happens when there's a loss of political and social support. I'll just put a link in here to my co authored paper on German nuclear and Spanish solar, and why things were shut down in Germany. Okay, the focus of this interview, and the key takeaways are not the technical issues around nuclear, rather, is about understanding the social aspects of nuclear power. We explore how the nuclear industry is interacting with society. And if you think the nuclear sector is unique, you'll be surprised how our discussion develops, I was the lessons learned from nuclear power and public engagement can easily definitely be applied to other energy generation projects, like wind and solar farms, regardless of your opinion on nuclear power. Our discussion is around public engagement, risk management. And towards the end of the interview, scientific knowledge engagement in the media, how to make this happen, and what are some good practices. As Adrienne describes the history of nuclear power is not about the failure of the technology, but rather about the financing communication of it. The perception of the public and policymakers shapes the energy system. This observation is highly relevant when we speak of the energy transition and how to make it happen. In some countries, nuclear power will have a role for others, absolutely not. But regardless of the technology, the issues of financing risk perception, each shape the energy system in a country. My final suggestion is when you listen to this episode, to keep a broader frame of the whole energy system in mind, we delve into considerations of the generation technology and an energy mix in the energy mix. Because if you're not using nuclear, what are you using? And, you know, particularly what are you going to use the next couple decades, particularly if if in some countries, many countries nuclear is phased out that current power plants are decommissioned? What's going to replace that. And finally in some endnotes, for frequent listeners, I updated the website over the holiday period, it was a lot of fun. We are growing our episode lists and now we have a better search function, and more and more categories to organize the episodes. This helps me even when I want to go back and look at previous episodes. You can also now subscribe, subscribe to the podcast and more podcast apps as well. And finally on the website, you can sign up for episode updates and the forthcoming newsletter. Don't hold your breath. But I'm going to get there one day, the podcast listener community continues to grow. And I'm just amazed by this it's so rewarding to see the impact that the podcast is having more and more people listening over time, and even past episodes that are there. They're evergreen episodes, so feel free to share the episodes and think about using them as a resource for teaching and research. I certainly do. I'm looking forward to this winter term. When I forced my students to listen to these episodes. The intent of the my energy 2050 podcast is to spread the knowledge about how the energy system can assist our transition towards a greener future. And now for this week's episode.

This week we speak with Adrian Boll, who is the chair of the nuclear energy and society at the University of Manchester, and was at the British Nuclear Laboratory for more than 20 years, or still is actually is also a member of the Northwest Regional Council for the Confederation of British Industry, along with being awarded an MBE MBE by the British crown. Adrian, welcome to the My energy 2050 podcast.

Adrian Bull  5:45  
Thank you. And thank you for inviting me to speak to you today. It's a pleasure.

Michael LaBelle  5:49  
It's great. I'm really happy to have you on and I'm really happy that Bartok mutual acquaintance introduced us as well. My first question to you is, how did you get so interested in nuclear energy, you've really developed your whole career around nuclear energy and devoted your life to this field. And so I'm really interested to find out what interests you the most, and why did you pursue this track.

Adrian Bull  6:16  
It was almost not my decision, Michael, actually, that my father worked in the nuclear industry for 25 years. Before I got involved, he served with the UK Atomic Energy Authority, and then with with with British nuclear fuels, when that was formed in the early 1970s. And he served 25 years before he actually retired with with health problems while I was a teenager. So he was there from the very start, but nuclear and nuclear energy was always kind of a part of my life when I was growing up. And although he wasn't well, when I came to the end of my school days, and was looking for university and thinking about careers beyond, beyond my education, he still had a number of contacts from his work, who came and visited the house. And one of them mentioned, the British nuclear fuel sponsor, people who are maybe looking at going into science or engineering or maths qualification, they fund them through university, not not funding their education fully, but they give them a like a support grant through university and then maybe they're on the radar for potential careers and interviews when they come to the end of their their university education. So that sounded like free money to me, at the time, maybe 40 years off once they got their money back, probably one way or another. But I applied, I was sponsored by British nuclear fuels through university. And then because I was on their radar. They were interviewing when I was coming up to doing my university finals. So I was able to get employment secured, while some of my friends were still chasing around looking for who was going to pay them once they graduated. And I figured if I, if I don't like the nuclear industry, I can always go and do something else. After six months, or a year or so. And 1440 years later, almost, um, I'm still here. So maybe I keep thinking I should probably get a proper job one day and do and make my own career choice rather than just following my dad's footsteps. But I've had a fascinating and varied career in in nuclear starting as an engineer, and then moving into more sort of policy and strategy and latterly, for the latter half of my career in more kind of communications and outward facing roles. So I enjoy meeting people and I enjoy talking about the industry and its and its role in wider society. And I guess that's much of what we're going to talk about today.

Michael LaBelle  8:42  
Yeah, exactly. And I'm quite interested, both I mean, to get out of this interview, both your your career arch I would say over time, and and how you've changed. And you get into the societal perspective, which you which you're focusing on now, which is very interesting for me, but also how the industry itself has evolved over time. And maybe maybe we'll get into some quick questions that I was gonna hold off on later. But but really, at that time, when you're looking to go into the nuclear industry when you got this bursary for it, what what was the perception of the nuclear sector at that time?

Adrian Bull  9:21  
I think to be fair, it wasn't great. It had been a lot greater. So we're looking at the time, just after Three Mile Island, because I went to university in 1983 Mile Island was 79. So you know, the kind of bubble had burst on nuclear as being the great white hope. There was a lot of confusion and blurring of the lines, I think, between civil nuclear power generation to make electricity and the nuclear weapons program and there was a lot of anti nuclear weapons at the time with with fears over in a cold war between the West and the youth. So nuclear was, I think, for many people was After that they went into almost as a last resort if they couldn't get a job in construction or pharmaceuticals or whatever they might want to do with what the nuclear industry is recruiting people still, there were quite a lot of people who had joined and then sort of progressed through the ranks. So there were there were a number of eight cuddler vacancies around in the nuclear sector at the time it was growing, and certainly in the UK. They were looking to recruit people. But I think I almost made a, you know, I entered a sector that 10 years or 20 years later, and I've had to find quite hard to get into, and I entered it almost by stealth, because they had a family connection that led me to connect with it prior to university. But I think it's fair to say that early 10 years or so with, first of all Three Mile Island, and then turn a bill happening. Three, four years after I joined because I signed up to him, I started my employment in 83. You know, it was it was some fairly dark days at that time. And the there was a still a stable UK sector in the UK, sizewell B was was being built and the ADRs had been advanced gas cooled reactors had been built. So nuclear was providing quite a slug of UK electricity. But a lot of the hopes for a sector that was going to continue to grow and expand globally, soon got turned on their head soon after I soon after I joined.

Michael LaBelle  11:23  
And please correct me if I'm wrong on this. But also that was the time of coal and the coal miners strike as well. And so nuclear still wasn't perceived as this is what we need to go forward or what was that balance there?

Adrian Bull  11:39  
I think that's an interesting question. Because in the UK, you're right there were there was a minor strike that had happened in the 70s. And there was another one that took place in the in the 80s, that had less of an impact on the public. Because it didn't have the it didn't lead to the power cuts and kind of rolling brownouts that the 70s miners strike had done. And part of the reason for that was the UK had a much stronger, much greater share of electricity coming from nuclear. So it wasn't necessarily publicized. So well. But I think government and policy makers recognize that it was a nuclear industry, operating quietly and, and steadily in the background that helped to keep the lights on during the early 1980s, when the miners had been causing a lot of challenges for the coal sector. This was before we had a big dash to gas and coal, a lot of coal plants were sort of shut down and replaced by gas plants through the 90s. So at the time there was there was very little renewable. So essentially, coal and nuclear, were providing the bulk of electricity and nuclear was playing a big part to help keep the keep the nation's lights on. So it's important to remember, of course, this is a time when we only got relatively limited information through our newspapers, and through a couple of news broadcasts on TV a day. We didn't have that wealth of access to everybody's views on everything that we do now. But the the kind of quiet, I feel like quiet recognition by government was nuclear had helped to, you know, save the country's economy to a large extent through those those early years. And I think that's still in good in good position for the future. Is it

Michael LaBelle  13:16  
is that kind of described, even to today, the role of nuclear power in in the UK is this quiet industry that's been producing sufficiently over time and quietly over time without and things come up right accidents that have happened. But but it has been quietly happening in the background while gases entered the market and renewables have entered the market. Yeah, so Mike, my question would be, overall, would you you you characterize it as a this quiet, the energy sector that's continued to produce energy?

Adrian Bull  13:53  
Yeah, you could almost say the unsung hero in some ways that people have been perhaps wary about shining the spotlight on it too much and perhaps reflecting their own active support for nuclear but you know, we saw it again after Fukushima in the UK when there were a lot of plans for nuclear new bill progressing at that time, Coleman was still remained very supportive of nuclear, whereas Fukushima could have given them an opportunity to have a rethink and change their policy. And the UK his position on it was they recognize there was no way they were going to progress and hit their their low carbon targets and continue to make progress in that direction without a replacement nuclear program. For those certainly UK reactors that we're getting towards the end of their their lifetime. And, in fact, it already started to close some of them by the time Fukushima happened 1011 years ago.

Michael LaBelle  14:49  
And back in the 1980s. I'm just reflecting on your role as a member of the British industry CBI. And because I'm really interested in this industrial perspective And while you are in the nuclear sector, and that's, I would say your employment, you, you're on this board that has this interaction with British industry. And overall, what is your feedback or your impression of British Industry of supporting nuclear power or not supporting it?

Adrian Bull  15:17  
I think there's a lot of recognition both from other industrial sectors who are particularly energy intensive users that big factories in the steelworks, cement works, chemical plants, etc, who I've seen, and we're seeing it now we're seeing it every weekend in our energy prices, and people worried about where their electricity bills are heading domestically, the same is happening industrially. And perhaps to an even larger scale, it doesn't perhaps just mean a few more pounds or dollars or euros on a monthly energy bill as it does for consumers. But if an if a big energy intensive industry is finding itself uncompetitive, because its energy costs that are outside its control, are going up so high, and somewhere, someone else in the world can can do the same thing for, again, that get access to that energy at a lower rate, they go out of business. So it isn't just a question of, it's a shame, we have to pay a little bit more it can for businesses that are dependent on their energy, either for reliability in factories, where quality assurance is critical, or cost wise, that that can be a deal breaker for them. And it can be the difference between there being a viable business or not. So I think there is a lot of recognition from that perspective of the role of nuclear within the market. But there's also a recognition of the other benefits that certainly in the UK, the nuclear sector brings, those are very strong and vibrant supply chain, which isn't just a nuclear specific supply chain. So a lot of that engineering and technical supply chain supports other businesses as well. And the way that the industry tends to be located, quite a lot of it does very little of it in London and the Southeast, where a lot of our other economic activity is centered. The nuclear industry tends to be based around the coast and around in particular in the northwest of England, quad in north Wales, and Somerset and East Anglia, which are parts of the country that don't really have a huge, a lot of other industrial activity in some cases. So you can look at places like North Wales and Cumbria, which are very, very dependent on the nuclear industry and its supply chain, for their their overall economic viability. And so we have something that is kind of called the leveling up agenda from our government, which is particularly around the geographical rebalancing of the economy to make sure it isn't all centered around the Capitol, and that more and more investment doesn't continue to go into, you know, where there is already a lot of economic activity and growth. And that leveling up agenda. I think the nuclear industry plays very strongly to that, because it's good in some of those more remote regions of the country. And it's, it's very, it's very active there. And it's got long term, you have a, you know, the one thing you do know about nuclear, whether it's reactors or other fuel cycle sites is they're not going away overnight. So, you know, there's a long term economic presence there, that the community in the region can build on to support other activities. So you'll, you'll get companies locating there, because they know, they will be able to support an industrial sector there for a long period of time.

Michael LaBelle  18:32  
And so how have you seen this? I would say change over the years. And this community support is where I'm going with this question. And, I mean, since you started off as an engineer, and then you've progressed through through the sector and in different roles. And you've so you've lived in these communities, I would imagine, and how have you seen the reception in the communities to nuclear power and from the past? And how is it today, just from your your perception of this?

Adrian Bull  19:04  
That's a really good question. To be fair, I haven't lived specifically anywhere other than around to the Manchester Preston area. But But both of those who are close to nuclear sectors as well. But I spent a lot of time traveling and doing business and working with many of the people in in places like Cumbria, north Wales in my career. And I think there's almost like a ripple effect there is within the community and what you might call the travel to work area around the nuclear facilities. There is a lot of recognition of the role that it plays and a lot of support. Or at least, you might say, a strong level of acceptance of nuclear and people recognizing how important it is to their society. Then as you start to get a little further away, there are areas and regions that are perhaps feeling that what they do might be threatened or negatively impacted by Nuclear. So particularly if you're interested in areas like tourism, some of the tourist sector fears that people will be less keen to come on, on vacations and to visit parts of the country, if there is a big high profile nuclear facility nearby, so even though it's been there, and even though there is an existing tourist sector, or agricultural sector there, there's a feeling that bringing more of it might deter people from wanting to come in and spend time in that part of the world. I think when you when people are doing, you think about engagement and how to to, you know, work with communities and regions, you know, even within the same sort of county area, you can find very different views from, you know, five miles from the site to 15 to 25 to 35 miles from from a site, you can get very different opinions and very different attitudes towards new care.

Michael LaBelle  21:00  
And this goes to this article you wrote, which I'll put up a link to the document about engagement and community engagement. And how do you? And I'm really interested in this. So how do you engage in the community? Where you, yes, you have the people that recognize the employment or the the positive business, impact in the community, whether that's attracting other businesses, or just supplying jobs, which is very important. But then of course, we and then, of course, we have to get to the anti nuclear perspective as well. But how do you how do you engage in the people that are really concerned, for example, tourism, or just nuclear waste? And all these these big issues that are put up? And from from that perspective, how do you engage with with those people?

Adrian Bull  21:52  
That's a great question. And I think the first thing is, well, the first two things for me, I won't bring them into the conversation, don't don't try and have a conversation that they are not part of about them, but bring them into the conversation from the very beginning. It's never too early to engage with them. And I've seen this a lot where people will say, Oh, we want to bring them in. But we want to make sure we get our messaging and our picture and everything. So you know, just bring them in from the start. Because if they know you're talking and they're not in the room, immediately, that creates a negativity and hostility that there's conversation going on that we're not allowed to have a party in yet. So bringing them in from the very start. And then it sounds really stupid and really basic, but just listening to them. Before we tell them anything. Listen to what their concerns are and what their views are and what they do they recognize some of the things that we wanted to talk to them about, or is it? Are they? Are they disbelieving? Do they just not know stuff? Do they have a different view? Are there some common things that we can agree on before we start to move forward and identify where we might disagree? So listening and respecting people's views is just absolutely critical. And so often, I think, as a as an industry, we've tried to talk to people about what we think they are concerned about or misinformed about. And actually, it's totally different. And if nothing else, you know, you gain respect by letting people have their say, and having an open two way dialogue that is respectful to one another. I remember doing a talk once. And it was an evening talk. And it was in a similar political group up in Scotland. And it was a Labour Party group probably 15 years ago, at the time, the Labour Party was not particularly maybe longer than that. But they were they were quite skeptical towards the nuclear industry. And a lady came up to me at the end, and we'd had a quite a lively conversation that they'd ask some challenging questions. And we'd had a good sort of lively debate where we didn't always agree with each other. And a lady came up to me at the end, and I'll never forget what she said to me. She said, I don't agree with you. And I'll never agree with you. But I've had a really good evening talking about it. And I thought, What a great bit of feedback, you know, she's not, she's quite wedded to her views. But at least she's taken part in a discussion where we've had, you know, the positives rather than negatives. And she may not, she may not change the view, she may never change the view. But at least if politicians decide to do something else, and to go forward with nuclear, she may at least be less likely to actively oppose what they've done, because she's been part of a conversation in the round, where we've talked about the pros and cons of not just nuclear, but other options as well. And I thought, what a really nice bit of feedback to come and tell me I still don't agree with you, but I've really enjoyed talking about it. Yeah, that's great. I think that opens up at least a level of respect, that, you know, that lady would be open to listening to something the nuclear industry might say to her in the future, whereas maybe prior to that she would have been less

Michael LaBelle  24:57  
so, but it's also a good lesson a good experience. To relate. For other, I'm just thinking of energy technologies as a whole, whether that would be installing more solar or installing a wind farm, you would have these conversations as well, regardless of the industry that you're representing. And maybe my next question would be that would be, what are your takeaways from, from these public engagements? Talking about it, because it's really high technology, high science, very complex things that that produce waste. But also the landscape has all these factors that people are concerned about, but it also applies to other energy, we say generation units, what are some key takeaways, or advice you would give to others?

Adrian Bull  25:43  
We I think you almost answered answered your own question there. I think, for me that one of the biggest lessons is, if you have a conversation just about nuclear, then it becomes very polarized into the advantages and the disadvantages of nuclear. And if you're having that framed around, should we have nuclear or not question it's very easy for people to say no, because they hear about the challenges that we have, and that they're all legitimate challenges around nuclear that people are concerned about the fact they can't see radiation, the fact that it is very big infrastructure, it's technically complex, you know, when things go wrong, they go very badly wrong, potentially, there's a legacy for future generations that concerns people, there are historic links to the military. So there are a lot of legitimate stuff that is in people's minds. And if we have conversations that are just about that, it's quite easy to say on balance, I hear the good stuff, I also have the stuff I'm not comfortable with. I'm going to say I'd rather not have it far better, I think to have a conversation about energy or electricity in the broadest sense. And say to people, you know, we have some challenges to meet the trilemma is often called in the UK or, you know, environmentally sustainable, reliable and affordable electricity. Okay, folks, how should we do that? What would you know that you be the energy minister or the prime minister or whatever for a day? And think about given the pros and cons of different technologies that we can perhaps agree on? How would you like an electricity mix to look, and people will come to, you know, they have to then think about the the challenges and the difficult decisions that governments have to make around, you know, the role of renewables, the role of gas, you know, maybe maybe even coal, with, hopefully with carbon capture and maybe a role for for nuclear?

Michael LaBelle  27:41  
Yeah, that's exactly what I give my students the assignment to do.

Adrian Bull  27:48  
And you can make it very complex. So you can make it quite simple. And there's, you know, I mean, I've seen card games where people do it, I've seen, you know, there's a wonderful online tool that a previous government cheeps, scientists in the Energy Department helped to create a guy called Dave Mackay, who sadly is no longer with us, his sort of energy calculator around how do you get to zero carbon by either either carbon reduction by 2020 2030, or looking at zero carbon, potentially by 2050. And it's almost literally sliders for moving things up and down around behaviors around, you know, storage around imports around generating from renewables, etc, etc. And it's quite hard to do that we now have to hit the targets without some elements of nuclear in there.

Michael LaBelle  28:39  
Yeah, yeah. Excellent. Excellent. I think I actually use that in my class, too, that that tool. It was very good, because it's powerful. And what are the challenges because we have the technical challenges of previous designs, and maybe we don't have to get too technical. And, and, but but we can, but But understand that the technology around nuclear power has advanced a lot, and that there's new models, new generations, but also there's this and I'm really interested in your career in what you're doing. Now. It's the social side, the social engagement. And how would you how would you frame the nuclear industry as a whole with the tech? You know, is it 50% technical challenges and 50% societal acceptance? Or what are the challenges for the nuclear industry going forward?

Adrian Bull  29:31  
I guess you can approach that question in a number of ways. I mean, that there's a whole there's a limitless amount of technical work that we can do to go and explore new technologies bring in new innovation, it doesn't have to be created from from the ground up in nuclear it can be bringing in technology from from lots of other sectors and thinking how that can benefit you clear? That in my mind, when you look at the history of nuclear, not just in my country in the UK, but but elsewhere in the world. It's very rarely the technology that gets in the way of plants being built. It's almost always something to do with either finance or communication. And the finance piece is sometimes linked to both technology and communication, because it's where does the industry get its funding from does that come from government and how much risk do they attach to investment in nuclear, either direct government or other sources of funding. And far more often than not, in my opinion, or in my experience, it's, it's kind of either directly public opinion, or its policymakers perception of public opinion, which can cause them to make decisions to either you know, withhold state funding, or to attach a very high interest rate to state funding or to change policies so that nuclear is harder, more expensive to deliver in one way or another. Because it is so big, and it is so complex, that it's virtually impossible to bring nuclear plants into operation without some form of government involvement. One way or another. We've seen it in the UK recently, with with Hinkley Point C being a new project funded by by EDF who obviously are backed by the French government. But even they needed financial support and involvement from the Chinese to come in as their partners to bring that project into operation and hopefully bring it into operation. It's currently in construction. So if you've got state owned utilities of the size of EDF, that bring in, you know, financial partners to spread the burden, you know, there aren't going to be many organizations that are even at state level that have got deep enough pockets to do this themselves. And then certainly, if you're looking for funding elsewhere, so I think quite often, governments and policymakers believe the public are much more anti nuclear than they actually are. And so a good sometimes connecting those two pieces together and getting policymakers and government officials to realize UK probably isn't the big, sort of the big red button for your voters that you might fear that it might be maybe it was 20 years ago, but the awareness of climate change has has developed so much. We've seen in the UK over the last 10 years, much more hostility towards sort of fracking for shale gas in your underground. And a lot of protests around that far more than we've seen around nuclear. And I was at a couple of energy policy debates, some years ago, where it almost felt weird to be, you know, the word nuclear would get mentioned, and people wouldn't react and to suck through their teeth. It was when people mentioned fracking that that happened is oh, well, we we suddenly the good guys are amongst the good guys. You know, we're certainly not the bad guy in the room.

Michael LaBelle  32:52  
In comparison. Yeah, yeah,

Adrian Bull  32:54  
I think there is a lot of a lot of recognition that nuclear plays a positive role and can continue to do that, there is probably less recognition that we're going to be scaling it down before we can scale it back up again, certainly in the UK, and that our plans are going to be closing over the next 10 years or so. So even our new build plans that are currently on either under construction or in different stages of planning are going to do very little more than replace the reactors that have closed and a good close over the next decade or so. And, you know, we need to think then do we want to just get back to where we were? Or do we perhaps want to go a little further and you know, bring in some of the advanced technologies, smaller reactors and so but I think when you talk to the public about that, talking about new technology and advanced technology, smaller designs and more innovative these objects to me, it's like well, Are these not work then you know, what's wrong with the ones that we've got you? You know, if you get on an aeroplane, do you want the pilot to tell you it's a it's a new plane? That's new technology that's not been tried much not been used much before I can I'd rather go on the one that I've been going on for the last 20 years Thank you might be might take me 10 minutes longer to get there. And it might not be so. So comfortable. But I don't necessarily want to be trying out the prototype at 30,000. Not a prototype but the earning 30,000 feet.

Michael LaBelle  34:19  
Yeah, I actually watched these air disaster movies with my son. They talk about Yeah, the latest planes, there was new technology. And here's what went wrong that caused the plane to crash. So So yeah, proven proven technology.

Adrian Bull  34:33  
We actually we my partner and I had that a couple of years ago, we went on a flight. And the pilot came on as we were, I can't remember if we taken off or not, but he proudly told us it was something like the only the third flight of this aircraft, brand new aircraft and he was obviously very proud of his new piece of care. And you heard a few people go and I said to my partner it rather it was the 303rd actually was just nice to be on. A new plane in a lockbox.

Michael LaBelle  35:01  
Yeah, exactly something that has some miles behind it at least. My next question actually brought it up with the finance and the risk. And this is really what has Doom some plans. For example, in America, this Toshiba plant that they finally decided not to go ahead with an overall, the financing of new nuclear powers seems to be the biggest stumbling block. And you mentioned, for example, ADF, with government backing and the Chinese as well, is it? How can this I don't know where my questions are with this, but But how can this maybe you don't know the answer? So I'm not expecting a clear answer. But how can this be solved? Because this seems to be really one of the key issues moving forward.

Adrian Bull  35:47  
Yeah, I, if I had a magic bullet to that, I probably wouldn't be sitting here today. My perception, and I'm not an economist, I'm not an economist or a finance expert. But based on what I see is that one way or another government will always be involved. So the UK we've tried to open up the electricity market to private investment to get the utilities to fund whatever it is that they want to own and operate out into the future. But equally, government kind of has to own the targets that the energy market impacts, such as climate change, and it has to own the security of supply for the nation, particularly where you have, you know, a number of different energy providers. So if the lights go out in a residential block, you know, it's not one provider, because we all get it's the state's fault. It's the government's fault at one level or another. So government can't really privatize that potential for failure. And my colleague from the nuclear industry association, Tim stone is often says that governments can privatize almost anything, but they can never privatize failure. So when things go wrong, and people are suffering, it is the government's fault. And, you know, our energy supply is so critical to whether it's from an economic point of view, whether it's keeping, you know, warm and safe in the winter, whether it's continuing to be able to communicate like this, like we can now through, you know, equipment that is plugged into the wall, if the electricity isn't there, then things don't work as we want them to. And that is ultimately government's responsibility to make sure that, you know, things stay as they should. So, I really think, for farsighted governments have to recognize they have to grab the controls and do stuff. And, you know, either mandate investment or make that investment themselves into into nuclear plants, if that is what they want to see come forward as part of the mix. So it's all very well saying we want the market to deliver but the market doesn't always move in a direction of low carbon or a direction of affordable electricity or a direction of reliable electricity. And, you know, sometimes it's really simple stuff. And for me, one of the things I find the most strange from again, sitting here in the UK, and it's a message that when I share it with people, everybody kind of nods and goes, Yeah, that's obvious. But it hasn't occurred to folks is our peak electricity demand is around 10 days, either side of Christmas. So it's either mid ish, December or early January, when schools and factories and offices are operating. Kids are in school, and it's about five or 6pm in the evening. So you know, officers in schools are probably still got the lights on people are home, they've got lights on they're cooking dinners, everybody's keeping those those premises warm. And we know in the UK to Darkman. So our time of maximum electricity demand our solar panels, however many of them we have around the UK are giving us nothing. So by all means encourage investment into renewables. But why are we giving subsidies to homeowners to put solar panels on their roof that will help them in the summer when we really don't need the electricity and other time of the year that we know we are going to need it the absolute most we know they will be giving you nothing. I just seems perverse to me. And that's that's based on UK weather and and demographics, etc. Just this country? You know, the the answer might be different in elsewhere. But you know, we've got state subsidies going into funding a solution that is not going to help us when we need it the most. So why not direct things towards where they can help to keep people's electricity supply? I know you can have storage, but you know, daytime in December or January ain't gonna get you enough to get you through the night time. And seasonal storage is vastly more expensive and inefficient. So even though simple messages I think just getting them out there and getting people thinking and talking about them, because I have friends who've invested in in solar panel wasn't at a micro level for them, it works well because they get money off their bills, and they get government support to put them on their roof. But it's not helping us collectively at the time we needed

Michael LaBelle  40:10  
an engine or we, I feel like we're at a turning point the past few months maybe. And maybe I'm Miss characterizing things. But once you point out people, I think are becoming much more aware of peak periods and the limits of solar, the limits of storage and the storage technology is not there yet. Along with, for example, the European Commission now proposing that nuclear power is considered green power. And we have high gas prices. So and it's always these events, but also, what you mentioned about the role of government deciding on the energy mix. I think in the past, it was always this, particularly in the UK, which was, I would say in still is a forerunner in energy policy, and the involvement of the private sector and government sector. And we had this neoliberal mix in the past where yes, it was private industry, the private sector that would decide things, but but not really. And now, there seems to be a much bigger, I would say, push that governments are involved in this energy transition, helping to decide much more actively, you know, even if they did in the past, what the energy mix is, do these trends, particularly the instability in the electricity markets, around the price, European Commission, and the closing down? I would say, even the decommissioning of these solid plants that have been operating, is there a new era or the lights now for the nuclear industry? Or it's just

Adrian Bull  41:37  
I would love to say yes. And my glass half full says yes, certainly, I think there's there's a challenge, which is the lead time from decision making to actually having a plant operational is so long, that you really need to almost ignore the day to day noise around energy prices, or whatever might be happening in today's market for this year's market. And think, where do we want to be in 1520 years time? And how are we going to get there are several general elections in the UK, on a five year drumbeat between somebody making a decision to invest and something actually starting to produce electricity from from nuclear, whichever technology might go for. So governments need to know they need to be bold enough to be to make those decisions and to defend them to the electorate, and the time comes with a view that it's strategic national infrastructure that that we will be grateful to have when when we have it not being distracted by a question of well, you know, will it be along in six years time because this plan is going to come off and this is going to happen in the market? And etc, etc? Yes, if we should have been doing this 10 years ago, I would just past New Year. And as we're talking, and one of my social media posts from 1112 or 12 years ago, cropped up on my, on my memories just the other day, saying, you know, we're entering the 2010s. And this is the decade with when we're going to see a transformation in new nuclear coming forward in the UK. 12 years old. Not an awful lot has happened apart from Hinkley Point C being, you know, well on the way to being built. And it's the time is, you know, it's almost always a good time at that moment. But I think politicians and investors are always thinking of the next. Well, certainly in the tough, challenging times, we're in at the moment, next 12 months, the next three years, the next five years, maybe if they are, you know, particularly strategically minded the next 10 or 15 years. And that just about gets you to the point where they might start to think about what would it be nice to have nuclear as part of new nuclear coming on the bars, you know, in on that timeframe. But even governments it's challenging for governments to get get people to think on that on those timescales, on act and invest on those timescales, when there's a lot more pressing social and economic concerns around at the moment, and whether it was Brexit or whether it's COVID, or whatever, there will always be short term stuff, maybe not on that magnitude. But but which governments are being pressured to invest in. When it takes bravery to put stuff aside for the longer term that you know, the phrase fix the roof when the sun is shining?

Michael LaBelle  44:21  
Yeah, no, I think it definitely plays a

Adrian Bull  44:23  
very important one that gets gets rolled out quite a lot. But it's very, it's very relevant. You have to start making those investments way before the time you need

Michael LaBelle  44:31  
them. And one of those investments, of course, is in people. And I see a lot of the information on the on the nuclear website. Nuclear authority website is about educating and careers. And my question almost goes back to the start of your career too, is how appealing or and even with a new nuclear power plant potentially coming online. How is it to attract younger people into the area of nuclear power?

Adrian Bull  45:01  
I find it is completely different picture now from the early part of my career, we have many, many applicants or for every position that we have, whether it's apprenticeships, graduate schemes, even mid career positions, people see the nuclear sector as being part of that clean energy space, that they want to be part of that you feel comfortable telling your friends and your neighbors you're working in clean, sustainable energy to help deliver net zero. You know, whether that's a conscious thing, would it be nice to say that or even if it's just a feelgood factor, I find the nuclear industry is now almost close to the top of people's Wish List of sectors they would like to work in. Whereas, as I said, when I started, for many people, it was more towards the, you know, what if I can't get a job in A, B, or C, maybe I'll go work in nuclear, you know, we, we see a lot of people, young people saying that they're excited by the technology, but also some of them just saying they're excited by the the environmental movement, and they want to be a part of it in a, in a sector that employs a lot of scientists and technical people to help bring innovation and as well as cleaning up the legacy, which is really important. And these links very much to the societal acceptance around, bringing forward new build as well.

Michael LaBelle  46:18  
I wanted to ask you about science and media. But before I do that, I'll ask you about the waste issue. And you mentioned the cleaning up of the waste in the past? And how how do you a how is that done? Because that is the legacy for generations is is the waste from nuclear power. But also the more immediate, we can say what the short term disposal on the sides and the cleanup that's necessary at some of these locations. How is that being done? And how is that being communicated?

Adrian Bull  46:50  
I think there is a lot of good progress being made on the decommissioning of closed reactor sites, and also the work that's being done to handle and manage and store waste, particularly in going back and re repackaging some of the higher hazard waste from the very early years of the industry. I think when it comes to that level of community involvement, particularly around things like a, an ultimate geological disposal facility for for higher level wastes, where UK Government policy is that the host community will volunteer, so they will, there will be some kind of test of public support, whether that's a local vote or some other test down the line that says the community will decide themselves to host that repository. And that, you know, that almost comes back to the question we asked before about how you frame that conversation? Is it is it do you want it or not? Or? Because it's very easy to say no. When you give them that binary choice, but starting to have a conversation around, you know, what do people feel about nuclear waste? What do people know about it? What do we do with it at the moment? Is that is that a long term sustainable solution? Or does society have to move on in a way that involves a community, you know, hosting that material, deep underground in a safe, secure environment. And then looking at what the economic sort of implications are of a community taking that step and hosting it and thinking of the financial support that they would get and what they could do with that. And it's, you know, that there's a parallel in, you know, in the waste management and the cleanup and decommissioning of sites all around the world with, you know, the industry has a slightly slightly paranoid obsession almost, with cleaning away everything that that he'd ever created, you know, every last atom of the nuclear industries, Legacy has to be identified and removed. So we leave the world, you know, as a Greenfield, almost. But when you go to those communities, who host nuclear facilities now, certainly in the UK, and in many other parts of the world, there is nobody there living there that remembers a time when it wasn't Greenfield. You know, it meant it was certainly for UK sites. Most of these were industrial facilities before they were nuclear facilities. But there's always been some kind of industry there. So even the older people living there don't remember a time when it was it was a green sort of field with with cows and sheep grazing on it. So it's not a it's not a restoration of something that people knew before and want to return to. But for anyone alive today, and certainly for future generations. It's a change. It's removing the industrial activity that is there and bringing something that they have never seen before. And I don't think the industry perhaps has the conversation in those ways. It doesn't say, how do you how do you as a community want to reflect the industrial legacy that He's here now for future generations. And you can take examples from outside of nuclear and, you know, the two cities that come to mind, the City of Sheffield in the UK and the city of Pittsburgh in the US. And I know Pittsburgh quite well from from having spent time there, both of them established through the steel industry. But both of them have relatively little steel industry still operating there. But they don't hide away from the fact that those economies were built on that, you know, on that industrial activity from steelmaking. You know, to take a very simplistic example, you know, Pittsburgh's football team is the Pittsburgh Steelers, Sheffield, Sheffield have a football team that is known as the blades, you know, that the history of steelmaking is woven through all of the societal infrastructure that is there and former steelworks and are converted into, you know, whether it's shopping malls or, you know, apartment blocks, or whatever it might be. Now, I'm not suggesting that we turn reactors in. But I do think there is a space at somewhere where we say to communities, how do we leave a legacy that acknowledges the economic impact, and that the industry that, you know, this generation, previous generation, their fathers, and grandfathers or mothers and grandmothers worked in, and provided the food on the table for many of those people? Let's not just erase it and pretend it never happened. But let's listen to the community about how do we balance leaving some kind of a legacy with making sure that the site is clean and safe and secure? Yes, or even you know, extends to things like the supply chain, as well as the actual nuclear infrastructure as well,

Michael LaBelle  51:47  
or preserving the nuclear power plant in the starkness. Lithuania, they have, they've closed down that nuclear power plant there, which was the same type as the Chernobyl reactor there. But there's some really interesting urban research going on about the role of nuclear power plant and the town because the town was created only for the nuclear power plant. And so there's this very interesting dynamic of how do you how does the town continue economically without this nuclear power plant, but also preserving the legacy just like there's a legacy in the coal sector of the steel sector, and having a nuclear power plant that is part of the history, the energy history of the region? So how do you respect that if something's decommissioned, because so many people work there. So

Adrian Bull  52:32  
or you hit on a really important point there, because there is a there is a sense of identity of community identity and individual identity that we run the risk of, you know, causing damage there by removing that completely, if that is not what people want?

Michael LaBelle  52:46  
Yeah, and what do they do afterwards? And I'm sure that's gonna be much more prevalent in the UK with more decommissioning happening. My last question to you, though, is about the media and science. And maybe it's just the past few years. And this could even you know, we can look at COVID, we can look at climate change. But But I think this this topic is really relevant for the nuclear sector as well, in how is media and you mentioned at the very beginning, that was a different time, when you started of, you know, just a few media outlets, able to communicate about about issues, basically. And now we have this plethora, including this little podcast, of communicating what science is, and understanding science, and it's part of this media landscape that people consume. And maybe from your understanding, and I really liked this quote from the science media center is the media will do science better than scientists do the media better. Maybe I double did that. Okay. Anyway, so So but

Adrian Bull  53:51  
the media will do science when science learned to do media, I think is the gist of what that that quote,

Michael LaBelle  53:56  
yes, yes. And so my question is, what does that mean to you? And what is a, you know, part of an answer there?

Adrian Bull  54:07  
I think it's about science and science based industry, moving away from let us show you how clever we are, because that will reassure you that we are experts in our field. And and it comes back to almost moving around to the question we raised before of you know, you mentioned the kind of message voice channel audience outcome, it's thinking about the outcome. What's it mean for me? Why does this matter to me? And I'm getting trusted voices to deliver or to talk about that, that message. So you know, there's a huge parallel here, you mentioned it just there, which I think is really insightful and all industries, certainly science based industries, like nuclear need to learn from of the way that COVID has been communicated over the last two years that we've seen, messages come from government officials, we've seen messages from scientists, we've seen messages from health care workers, as in these other people who we see on our TV screens, and we listened to. And we have different levels of trust, perhaps between a doctor or a nurse in a hospital and the scientist and a government minister. So there's who do we get to deliver those messages in to talk about these issues that we think people will trust? And also, what does it mean for the audience. So it isn't just, we are very clever. Let it let me know, I don't want to have to become an amateur or a semi professional virologist, or immunologist. To understand the risks of a vaccine versus the benefits of a vaccine. I want somebody I trust to tell me what I should be doing. But if I don't trust them, doesn't matter what they say. So they can have as many letters after their name, or qualifications are the job title if I don't trust the person. So you know, we've seen a lot in the, in the media about getting the healthcare workers and the people at the sharp end, we're dealing with, with, you know, patients to talk to talk about what they see and why that's important. In nuclear, it's good to get people who work in the industry, but who are not the executives and communications professionals, but who are doing a day job on a reactor or on a decommissioning site, or in a research lab or whatever, to talk about the work that they do, why that's important to them, what that means to them, how their work in their day to day activity, links to a wider benefit to society. And, you know, take the passion and the understanding from those trustworthy sources in general, because we recognize that they are more likely, rather than listen to, to a whole lot of scientists speak. And if I may, I've had a couple of things lined up that I make sure that there's one that really sort of speaks volumes on this. So I did some work with the Sri Lankan authorities a couple of years ago as part of a an IAEA mission to Sri Lanka. And they we talked to them about the work they were doing in the stakeholder engagement they were doing. And they showed us very proudly a brochure they produced for their audiences. And it was one brochure for all of their audiences, and it was in their native language. So they were really proud of that, that was a good thing. But hopefully, you can see it, this is the front cover of the brochure. The cover has a cutaway of a reactor design on it. When you look inside, there are, you know, lots of technical pictures of what fuel rather than look like or decay charts of the atomic nuclei.

There's lots of graphs, there's lots of text, there are I think, 48 pages, or 30, something pages in here, there isn't a single human face in there. That's great. That's really nice for maybe people in in school or university who are thinking about technical careers in nuclear that will tell them about what but is that going to land well with a community leader, or a school teacher, or somebody who has to talk about this to to other people, because there's no people in there. And it's all about people at the end of the day, if you if you have people to talk about what it means to that doesn't always have to mean splitting of the atom, it might mean food on the table. Because somebody works there, it might mean recognition that it's delivering clean electricity, it might mean that it's supporting other jobs in the economy, whatever it means talk about what it means to them, and why that's important. So there's a place for the thing that they produce, but we did say to them, you know, you might want to think about getting some personal stories from people who either could work in the industry or already work in the industry and in other countries, and what that means to that we see a lot, you know, in the UK, we have site community stakeholder groups around the nuclear facilities where anyone you know, the authorities are represented the local community groups, the emergency services, regulators, the environmental authorities all come together and share their information and activity that's going on in relation to the facility but the public can come to, and they can all come and they can all ask questions, and they get those questions answered. So it's a way of hearing from and building trust. You know, the benefit isn't just the question and the answer. The benefit is sometimes I know the person now who works there. I know the regulator and I've had a cup of tea with them afterwards. And, you know, I know where their family go to school, and we talked about our holidays, and we build a trusted relationship. So that heaven forbid, but whenever there is an accident or an incident, I will now believe what they are telling me rather than it being a stranger that I've never met before. And then those community leaders who go to those meetings can pass that message. John that they that they believe in, because they've heard it from a trusted source and can share it. And it doesn't just have to be about accidents, it can be about plans for new new investment or the future of the site or whatever. But all of those conversations take place through trusted networks, rather than suddenly, somebody appears that you've never met before, who wants to tell you something that is important to them, but you don't feel is important to you.

Michael LaBelle  1:00:22  
So it comes down to this local level, this relations between people in one sense, regardless of the technology,

Adrian Bull  1:00:30  
and you know, the parallel with COVID is great. And we're looking at doing some research on printer this in the university at the moment, that we've all kind of become amateur scientists, amateur statisticians. Over the last two years, we're looking at data that comes out and thinking about how is that data different from what I was seeing last week, or last month, we've all got friends and family members. You know, I've had multiple conversations with people I've been with over the Christmas New Year period. Not conversations I've started. But the number of times people are talking about, you know, vaccinations and somebody that they know, somebody has had it, they were boosted, and they weren't this and that. And so we're all gathering this anecdotal data. If somebody told me this about their friends, next door neighbor, as well as all the scientific data we're getting through our media, as well as the fact that there's an explosion of views on social media now that you wouldn't have had 20 years ago either. So it's a very different world for engaging, and the importance of trust in those communications is never more vital than we've seen recently. And there's a lot of lessons that the nuclear sector can learn from that.

Michael LaBelle  1:01:40  
Excellent. Adrian, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for joining us. For this episode, we produce the high energy 2050 podcast to learn about cutting edge research, and the people building our clean energy system. If you enjoyed this episode, or any episode, please share it. The more we spread our message of the ease of an energy transition, the faster we can make it. You can follow us on LinkedIn where we are the most active on the My energy 2050 web page. We're on Twitter and Facebook. I'm your host, Michael LaBelle. Thank you for listening to this week's episode.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai