Hacker News Reader

Hacker News

Comment by rcpt | Hacker News Reader

Full thread

rcpt

These press releases aren't great sources of news. Anyone got a different link?

View on HN

"US firms pledge £150bn investment in UK as tech deal signed" https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx2nllgl3q7o

Had posted this a few days ago https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45285763

It's all related afaict

It's not stated in the article but what US gets in return? I guess some promises of political/tax policy stability. I am curious if there is anything official though.

I think the idea is that we(the UK) will buy small nuclear reactors from the US, and we'll develop ceramic uranium fuel system.

This is wild if so. They’re basically saying the UK gets what it needs (investment) in return for something the Labour Right has always wanted (Nuclear). This is an insanely good deal from Starmer’s perspective.

Well then Trump will unilaterally abandon it the second he figures that out. Clearly the UK's unfair trade practices have disadvantaged American workers for decades.

> Labour Right has always wanted

I think its more complex than that. The nimbys don't want it, along with significant parts of the eco lobby. (they scuppered the nuclear plan from EDF that would have locked in prices from 2000....)

There’s plenty of groupings that oppose nuclear power, for a variety of reasons. I’m merely arguing that this grouping has been consistent in its enthusiasm for nuclear for decades.

This isnt a left vs right issue. Lots of people on both sides support nuclear. Stop seeing everything through this silly binary lens.

Yes, but specifically the Labour Right are the grouping that are in power right now so their opinion matters. No-one thinks Corbyn is pro-nuclear but the stance of the Blair->Brown->Starmer axis has been extremely consistent. Without the qualification one could argue that the support was inconsistent, but nothing is further from the case. They’ve wanted this for a very long time.

Isn’t there a British company, Rolls Royce SNR, that is building small nuclear reactors?

They haven't actually built one yet. They have been selected as the preferred bidder here in the UK, but that's as far as it has got so far.

https://www.rolls-royce-smr.com/press/rolls-royce-smr-will-b...

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/rolls-royce-smr-selected-...

Don't know that this is any better, but here's the gov.uk version:

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/us-uk-pact-will-boost-adv...

and the follow up press release from Thursday:

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/record-breaking-150bn-inv...

I'm not sure about this one. However, what I'm almost sure of is that neither the US-Japan Trade Deal nor the US-EU Trade Deal that Trump and WH announced loudly a few months ago were actual deals – they were essentially handshakes and non-binding declarations of intent by both parties, which also happened to have prerequisites that were (and still are) physically not possible.

So, my guess is that this is essentially, once again, a camera-focused announcement.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com