Photo: CPS Fellows inside the visitor center at Sizewell B power station.

Sizewell B Power Station (Leiston, Suffolk)

This year’s annual visit (also known as the CPS Summer Visit) was to Sizewell B Power Station at Leiston in Suffolk, operated by EDF energy. CPS Fellows were given a guided tour of the site, which included the turbine hall.

Sizewell B was built between 1987 and 1995 and started supplying power to the grid on Valentine’s Day 1995. It is the country’s only operating civil Pressurised Water Reactor (PWR) and to date has produced 271 terrawatt hours of electricity. Each year it provides around 3% of the UK’s electricity needs. The station is the single most productive nuclear reactor the UK has ever operated. Since 1995 the site has generated so much power it could meet the needs of every home in East Anglia for more than 83 years and, according to recent calculations by an independent economic consultancy, has already saved more than 123m tonnes of CO2 emissions going into the atmosphere.

In 2012 the site opened itself to the public with the creation of a visitor centre which co-ordinated public tours demystifying nuclear operations. Since then 120,000 visitors, from school children to pensioner groups, have passed through the gates and seen for themselves the enormous contribution Sizewell B is making to East Anglia and the nation.

For more information, please visit www.edfenergy.com/energy/power-stations/sizewell-b.

As a benefit of membership of the CPS, members take part in free visits throughout the year to various science related locations across the UK. To join the Cambridge Philosophical Society visit our membership page here