Nuclear Energy in the UK, Finland and Germany: Three Paths, One Direction

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“Defoes joins the dots between the UK’s delivery push, Finland’s quiet pro‑nuclear consensus and Germany’s reopened phase‑out argument — showing how three very different debates all point in the same direction: nuclear returning as a serious, long‑duration pillar of Europe’s energy‑security and net‑zero plans.”

Nuclear policy in Europe is no longer moving in one direction, but the underlying trend is clear: more governments see nuclear as part of their long‑term energy‑security and decarbonisation toolkit, even if they are travelling at different speeds. The UK is pressing ahead with large reactors and small modular reactors (SMRs), Finland is consolidating a pro‑nuclear consensus around energy security and climate goals, and Germany is reopening a debate it officially closed with its phase‑out. Together, these three cases show that nuclear is shifting from the political periphery back toward the centre of Europe’s power‑system planning.

UK: From rhetoric to delivery

In the UK, nuclear policy has moved from aspiration to a concrete build‑out plan. The World Nuclear Outlook notes that the country aims to reach around 24 gigawatts of nuclear capacity by 2050, up from about 5.9 gigawatts today, with new European Pressurised Reactors (EPRs) under construction at Hinkley Point C and a further pair planned at Sizewell C. The Labour government that took office in 2024 has maintained this 24‑gigawatt target, backing it with a new nuclear delivery body and a funding model designed to bring in institutional capital. In 2025, the government also concluded a competitive process to select Rolls‑Royce as preferred SMR vendor, with site allocation due later in 2025 and a first grid connection targeted for the mid‑2030s. Subsequent announcements confirmed that Wylfa in North Wales will host the UK’s first SMR units, framed explicitly as a jobs and regional‑development anchor as well as an energy‑security asset.

The policy stance is straightforwardly supportive. In a 2025 Nuclear Industry Association keynote, the Energy Secretary described nuclear as “indispensable” to reaching UK climate goals and stabilising an increasingly renewables‑heavy grid, while outlining an “advanced nuclear framework” that brings large reactors, SMRs and potentially advanced modular designs under a single strategic umbrella. For investors, that translates into a visible pipeline, growing policy sophistication and a deliberate effort to de‑risk early SMR deployments through state participation and long‑term offtake structures. The bull case is not that UK nuclear projects are low‑risk — history argues otherwise — but that the direction of travel is locked in by cross‑party energy‑security and net‑zero imperatives.

Finland: Quiet, pragmatic nuclear expansion

Finland’s debate is less noisy than the UK’s but more settled. With Olkiluoto 3 connected to the grid and now ramped up, World Nuclear Association statements frame the unit as a material boost to Finland’s clean‑energy supply and energy security, coming just as the country moved rapidly away from Russian fossil‑fuel imports. A 2025 DW analysis notes that Russia’s share of Finland’s energy imports has fallen to nearly zero and that nuclear, alongside a fast‑growing onshore wind sector, is central to the new mix. Finland’s Climate and Environment Minister has said the government is “laying the groundwork for increased nuclear power”, including reviewing nuclear‑energy legislation to speed permitting and exploring risk‑sharing mechanisms for future projects. A separate column from the Finnish government highlights broad political recognition of nuclear’s future role, even as profitability has weakened, and calls for new tools to support investment.

Finland’s model is technocratic rather than ideological. The political class frames nuclear as a workhorse of energy security and climate strategy, and policy is now focused on improving project economics, updating regulation and addressing waste and public‑acceptance issues through long‑term solutions like the deep‑geological repository at Onkalo. For capital, that combination — broad consensus, clear climate role, and a government actively looking for “paths to promote nuclear energy investments” — is a quietly bullish signal, even if the pipeline is smaller than in the UK.

Germany: Official phase‑out, unofficial rethink

Germany remains the outlier — officially out of nuclear, but politically unable to stop talking about it. Chancellor Friedrich Merz has described the country’s nuclear phase‑out as “irreversible”, stressing that he personally regrets the decision but will not reopen it as government policy. Yet party colleagues and other actors are pushing in the opposite direction. Coverage from German and international outlets reports that Jens Spahn, leader of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, has called for a “renewed political reassessment” of nuclear, citing studies suggesting that restarting recently shut reactors could cost 9 to 10 billion euros, which he argues is manageable relative to building new plants. Markus Söder, Bavaria’s state premier, has said his region is ready to pilot SMRs, and the far‑right AfD has repeatedly tabled motions in the Bundestag to restart nuclear plants.

Public opinion is not aligned with the formal phase‑out either. Polling cited by German media indicates that about 59% of respondents agreed with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s comment that abandoning nuclear was a “strategic mistake”, and around 60% support introducing new nuclear technologies such as SMRs. For now, the bear case dominates: federal policy is firmly anti‑nuclear, and coalition dynamics make a near‑term reversal unlikely. But from an investor’s perspective, the emerging German debate matters because it sets the stage for future policy optionality, especially if power‑price volatility, industrial competitiveness and security‑of‑supply concerns intensify.

One technology, three investment signals

Viewed together, the UK, Finland and Germany offer a snapshot of nuclear’s evolving place in European energy policy. The UK is in execution mode, building a mixed fleet of large and modular reactors under an increasingly sophisticated policy and financing framework. Finland is consolidating a pragmatic, pro‑nuclear consensus and actively seeking tools to make new projects investable in a small, open economy. Germany remains officially out, but opinion polling and elite debate are already reopening questions that Berlin tried to close. From a Defoes standpoint, the bullish stance is that, despite divergent national narratives, nuclear is regaining strategic importance across Europe’s policy landscape — and that, over time, financing frameworks in supportive jurisdictions are likely to become more rather than less accommodating to long‑duration, low‑carbon nuclear assets.