Nuclear power has an essential role to play in achieving a 'carbon free' future, Rosatom deputy director-general Kirill Komarov said yesterday during the Expo-2017 conference in Astana, Kazakhstan.

The UK needs to build 14.5 GWe of new nuclear capacity by 2035 or it will fail to meet the Two Degrees scenario, National Grid says in the annual update of its Future Energy Scenarios it published yesterday. The report also suggests that national electricity demand could peak at 85 GWe by 2050, compared with around 60 GWe today. National Grid is the private company which runs Britain's high-voltage electricity network.

The UK government's Department for Exiting the European Union has today published a position paper on nuclear materials and safeguards issues, which the head of the country's Nuclear Industry Association says "demonstrates the complexity" of replicating arrangements with the European Atomic Energy Community.

The British government and media are discussing with renewed concern the prospect of the UK's departure from the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom). Current plans would see the UK leave both the European Union and Euratom by April 2019.

Energoatom has received regulatory approval to start construction of a central used fuel storage facility at the site of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine. The State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate of Ukraine issued a licence on 6 June.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in has been urged to consider the climate and environmental impacts of phasing out the use of nuclear energy in the country. Moon used the permanent shutdown of Kori unit 1 last month to outline his intended nuclear energy phase-out policy.

The French nuclear regulator has provisionally ruled that EDF's Flamanville 3 can start up safely, but that the head of its reactor pressure vessel will need to be replaced by the end of 2024. The Autorité de Sûreté Nucléaire said yesterday the unit, which is under construction in northwest France, is fit for operation despite issues with its steel.

Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority has approved a plan to decommission unit 1 of Shikoku Electric Power Company's Ikata nuclear power plant in Ehime prefecture. The reactor was due to end its 40-year operating period in September this year and could have applied to the NRA to extend its licence for a further 20 years if it invested in upgrade work.

The two companies responsible for the clean-up of the UK's nuclear legacy are willing to share lessons learned with the global decommissioning industry, Martyn Jenkins, managing director of Enkom Consulting, told a recent conference. Both Sellafield Ltd and Magnox Ltd have "moved from operational to project delivery" and have identified five main challenges, Jenkins said.

More cooperation agreements and contracts have been signed by Russian state nuclear corporation Rosatom and its subsidiaries during the IX AtomExpo International Forum it is hosting this week in Moscow. The latest agreements, with Asian and European companies, cover collaboration in a wide range of nuclear-related areas and beyond.

The Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant in Lithuania has taken another step forward in the decommissioning process with the start today of hot trials, using radioactive materials, of the new Solid Radioactive Waste Management and Storage Facility. The milestone was announced by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

JSC Dalur has received a permit to develop the Dobrovolnoye uranium deposit in the Kurgan region of Russia. JSC Dalur is a subsidiary of ARMZ, the uranium mining division of state nuclear corporation Rosatom. The permit was issued according to government decree dated 3 June, ARMZ said on 5 June.