The Nuclear Industry Association (NIA) applied in July 2024 to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) for a justification decision for the Rolls-Royce SMR, marking the first ever application for justification of a UK reactor design.
DEFRA has now opened a public consultation on the NIA's application, which will close on 1 December.
It said it is seeking views on: whether the proposed practice belongs to a new, or to an existing class or type of practice; whether the proposed practice is a suitably defined class or type of practice for a justification decision; and whether the information in the application and supplementary information is suitable for DEFRA to make an appropriate assessment of the balance of benefits and detriments of the proposed practice.
"The Justifying Authority (DEFRA's Secretary of State) will consider all responses to the consultation questions before producing a draft decision document for further public consultation," DEFRA said. "The draft decision document will give the Justifying Authority's view on whether or not the Rolls-Royce SMR reactor should be justified in the UK and, if it should be justified, propose the most suitable definition of the class or type of practice."
The NIA welcomed the launch of a public consultation, noting: "The NIA's application makes the case that the benefits of clean, firm, flexible power from the reactor would far outweigh any potential risks, which are in any event rigorously controlled by robust safety features, including passive safety systems, built into the design, in line with the UK's regulatory requirements."
The Rolls-Royce SMR is a 470 MWe design based on a small pressurised water reactor. It will provide consistent baseload generation for at least 60 years. 90% of the SMR - measuring about 16 metres by 4 metres - will be built in factory conditions, limiting on-site activity primarily to assembly of pre-fabricated, pre-tested, modules which significantly reduces project risk and has the potential to drastically shorten build schedules.
In June this year Rolls-Royce SMR was selected as the UK government's preferred technology for the country's first SMR project with the goal of signing contracts later this year and forming a development company. Great British Energy - Nuclear, which ran the selection, will also aim to allocate a site later this year and connect projects to the grid in the mid-2030s. A final investment decision is expected to be taken in 2029.
The NIA, as the representative body of the UK civil nuclear industry, often makes justification applications, because justification is a generic decision that can be relied upon by anyone and are not personal to individual reactor vendors or project developers. The NIA has previously applied for justifications for HiRolls-Royce SMR named as UK's selected technologytachi's Advanced Boiling Water Reactor, Westinghouse's AP1000 and Framatome's EPR.
