EDF has again pushed back the start of the UK’s Hinkley Point C NPP in Somerset. EDF said the first of the two reactors at the plant would now begin operating in 2030, blaming delays in “electromechanical work” and saying the new forecasts were “more realistic”. The previous “best case” target was 2029, although EDF CEO Bernard Fontana, said the 2030 startup was “within a range that has not changed” since 2024, when it said operations would start between 2029 and 2031. When the project was approved in 2016, it was due to come online in 2025.
Construction of the first of two 1630 MWe EPR reactors at Hinkley Point C began in December 2018, with construction of the second beginning a year later. In 2024, EDF revised the cost from £26bn ($32.8bn) to between £31-34bn in 2015 prices. The two EPR reactors are expected to operate for up to 80 years. EDF now expects the cost to be £35bn in 2015 prices. The project was costed in 2016 at £18bn in then-current prices. EDF warned that a further delay to 2031 would add another £1bn.
EDF is under pressure to show it can improve on its record of reactor construction as it prepares to start construction on six new reactors in France, and complete the Sizewell C project – where it holds a 12.5% stake. Recent projects at Olkiluoto unit 3 in Finland and Flamanville unit 3 in France have been delayed and over budget, taking more than 10 years to complete.
The company reported 2025 full-year earnings of just over €29bn ($34bn), down from €36bn in 2024. Net profit fell 26% to €8.4bn in 2025. EDF’s full-year earnings from generating electricity in the UK fell by a third to €2.3bn after longer unplanned outages, particularly at its Hartlepool nuclear plant, and a busier maintenance programme combined with lower market prices.
Meanwhile, EDF Energy has scrapped plans to build a campus to house 1,000 Hinkley Point C workers next to the M5 near Huntworth in Somerset are not going ahead because there are fewer workers than anticipated. A spokesperson for Hinkley Point C said the supply of housing would be boosted with extra support to an existing accommodation fund. Plans for the campus had been developed to ease pressure on the local housing market. According to EDF, the peak number of workers at the site will be 14,000 – lower than earlier projections of 15,000. EDF Energy currently has two bespoke campuses for Hinkley Point C – the Sedgemoor Campus on the A39 Bath Road, and the Hinkley Campus adjacent to the power station.
