Government funds nuclear firm01: 05 16/03/2010, Tim Webb, business, carbon emissions, energy, energy industry, guardian.co.uk, manufacturing, news, nu

Government funds nuclear firm01: 05 16/03/2010, Tim Webb, business, carbon emissions, energy, energy industry, guardian.co.uk, manufacturing, news, nuclear power, Peter Mandelson, politics, unions, University of Sheffield, Guardian Unlimited

Mandelson to announce the funding of EUR 170 million nuclear manufacturer that could lead industrial low-carbon strategy


Both touted government "strategy of low carbon-industrial" is set to receive a boost on Wednesday with the expected announcement of a financing package of EUR 170 million for the British nuclear manufacturer, Sheffield Forgemasters.

The company, which has been in negotiations for the financing of more than six months, has secured the last remaining £ 20m of bank loans, the Guardian has learned.

This means Sheffield Forgemasters will be able to build a 15,000-ton press to make large forgings used in modern reactors are built in the UK and abroad.

The business secretary, Lord Mandelson and Energy Secretary Ed Miliband will travel to Sheffield, with the business minister Pat McFadden, to make the announcement on Wednesday.

Boost for high-tech industrial economy in the UK will become a key political battleground in the run up to general elections after the credit crisis exposed the dangers of being too dependent on financial services. Official figures recently showed that in its first decade in power Labor has allowed the manufacturing sector to reduce more rapidly than Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s.

In response, Mandelson, who has actively participated in complex negotiations, has been defending a new policy of "industry". Ministers say that without more government support for industry tens of billions of pounds of new reactors and wind turbines are planned to reduce carbon emissions would have to be imported. British manufacturers and workers lose.

To secure funding, the government has pledged EUR 65 million in soft loans, with £ 35m from the European Investment Bank. The signing of a nuclear reactor from Westinghouse is paying 50 million pounds of their initial orders.

The agreement also provides much-needed impetus to the north-east, where the traditional makers such as Corus has been hit by the recession, which has one of the highest unemployment rates in the UK. Mandelson wants to create a center of low carbon producers in the region with ties to the University of Sheffield. He recently opened a center of 25 million pounds of research in Rotherham for the UK civil nuclear industry in Sheffield Forgemasters can work with other UK companies in the supply chain.

Dougie Rooney, Unite union, said: "The only hope for the nation in terms of paying their debts is for the engineering industry in the UK to become a player in global supply chain supply of components and equipment for new energy projects. "

The Sheffield company is one of the few worldwide that can do special forging reactors. There is growing political pressure on nuclear operators to source as many components as possible from the UK. The agreement will create 150 jobs directly, but thousands more could be created in the nuclear supply chain wider as a result, according to join.

Sheffield Forgemasters, which dates back to the 1750s, became famous in the 1990s after being involved in the subject line "supergun" arms sales to Iraq.

Manufacturing
Energy Industry
Nuclear power
Energy
Energy
Carbon emissions
University of Sheffield
Peter Mandelson
Unions
Tim Webb


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