JD Vance - his eye on Building UK Nukes

JD Vance is teeing up a nuclear building blitz in Britain ahead of Donald Trump’s upcoming state visit, the Telegraph can reveal. During his holiday in Scotland last month, the US vice-president held private talks with a string of major US nuclear companies about projects they are pursuing in the UK. Executives from Westinghouse, GE Hitachi, X-energy, Holtec International and TerraPower, the nuclear developer co-founded by Bill Gates, are understood to have attended the meeting. It was scheduled to last just 20 minutes but ultimately went on for double that amount of time, multiple sources confirmed. Now with less than a fortnight before the president touches down for his state visit in London, the White House is understood to be lobbying in support of plans for American companies to build nuclear power plants and data centres that could power artificial intelligence (AI) software in the UK. These include a major nuclear plant proposed by Westinghouse on the island of Anglesey, North Wales, as well as a string of miniature plants that X-energy, the start-up backed by Amazon, wants to build in industrial areas across the country. X-energy is seeking to build an advanced modular reactor (AMR) in Hartlepool, reactor (AMR) in Hartlepool, County Durham, with a view to building up to 10 in the UK if it proves successful. The company is understood to be regarded as highly credible within Whitehall and is in talks about receiving potential debt and equity financing from the National Wealth Fund. In June, The Telegraph also revealed that Westinghouse was in talks with the Government about a proposed large nuclear power station at Wylfa, A. However, the proposal has created a potential dilemma for Ed Miliband, the Energy Secretary, as Wylfa is also being eyed as a potential testbed for the first mini nuclear reactors plants designed by Rolls-Royce, which are due to be built by the mid-2030s. Its London base is now costing the watchdog more than £10,000 per day, yet bosses have told staff they only need to come in one day a week.