Nuclear Power Plant In N.Z. Possible In 1970’s

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30274, 29 October 1963, Page 14

Nuclear Power Plant In N.Z. Possible In 1970’s

By the 1970's a nuclear plant might be available capable of nroducing electricity at a rote and price suitable for New Zealand, said Sir Harold Mullens, a British industrialist and managing director of the Nuclear Power Plant Company, Ltd., in Christchurch yesterday By that time, he said. New Zealand might be looking for a complementary method of producing electricity His company, working with others in Britain to form the Nuclear Power Group has two stations now running a' Bradwell and Berkeley The consortium is building another station at Dunderness and another at Oldbury At Latina, Italy, a fifth nuclear power plant built by the group has just started to produce electricity. Sir Harold Mullens said that the design at nuclear power stations was improving all the time. He thought the next “round" of stations would be of a different type —advanced gas-cooled reactors using slightly enriched uranium as a fuel and running at higher steam pressures and temperatures. The present type was a large power stattoe by any comparienn. The latest British one was of 1000 megawatts The economy of the stations improved with size so it was necessary to have a large power system to absorb the output On the other hand, the kind of nuclear reeetor was chang ing and the advanced gascooled reactors whteh would pmbably be used m the next round a! stations would be more economic in a Station of the present size Sir Romld Mullens is visiting New Zealand for the fi*st tune although one of his

companies has been selling switchgear in New Zealand since 1919. He said that heavy-duty switchgear was something New Zeeland could not very well make for itself because it required a market of a certain size. “You could not afford to make it in small quantities," he said.