It is a small invention at the heart of a big idea, a miniature nuclear plant no bigger than a windmill, which designers believe could help to solve the world’s clean energy puzzle.
For now, it is only a mocked-up prototype on display at a British workshop, but when The National toured the assembly plant its developers made no secret of their plans to reinvent atomic energy.
“We keep challenging the engineers … not to bolt on stuff to the nuclear reactor that it really doesn’t need,” said Steve Threlfall, the head of a British start-up building the uranium-fired contraption it calls a U-Battery.
The pitch goes like this. The reactor is small enough that a factory or remote community could have its own power source on site, escaping the fickle prices of the electricity grid. It could take less than two years to build, compared with a decade or more for a full-size nuclear power station.
Power companies would step in to deal with maintenance, designers think, meaning energy users would only have to pay the bill. And the reactor’s carbon emissions are basically zero – an alluring prospect for hard-to-decarbonise industries such as glass, paper and chemicals manufacturing, which rely on extreme heat typically generated by fossil fuels.
It is an attractive enough market for the U-Battery to have several competitors. But making reactors smaller does not eliminate what critics see as the fatal flaws of nuclear energy, namely that they still produce radioactive waste and conjure fears of a catastrophe.
“People have heard of Chernobyl. People have heard of Fukushima,” said Lee Whitworth, one of the engineers behind the U-Battery, at the workshop in Whetstone, Leicestershire.
Designers believe their product is virtually immune to accidents, but when a sceptical public asks questions, “we can’t just say that’s not going to happen here and walk away”, Mr Whitworth said.
Nuclear debate
The debate over nuclear power is playing out across Europe as the race to replace fossil fuels with zero-carbon energy gathers pace.
France is planning up to 14 new reactors. Germany will switch off its last three this year. The EU recently made the contentious decision to classify atomic energy as green.
French President Emmanuel Macron, who has at least nine pro-nuclear allies in the EU including Finland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, recently called for the "renaissance of the French nuclear industry" and promised a €1 billion ($1.14bn) in funding for small reactors.
The country already gets the majority of its electricity from nuclear power and last year became Europe's top power exporter, according to data analysts, supplying the UK and Italy among others.
On Germany's side of the debate, Austria and Luxembourg are planning a lawsuit against the EU's green plans, with Portugal and Denmark also among five countries who took an anti-nuclear stand at last year's Cop26 summit.
Britain sits somewhere in the middle of this spectrum, with a slice of nuclear in its power grid but offshore wind expected to do the heavier lifting in the push for net zero.
But industry insiders say ministers are on the same page on the future of nuclear energy, including on technical issues such as land zoning and insurance.
During Cop26, the UK government announced a £210 million ($284m) grant to Rolls-Royce, the luxury car maker, to build small reactors capable of powering a million homes each.
Rolls-Royce has previously built engines for the UK’s nuclear submarine fleet and, unlike the U-Battery developers, intends to supply the electricity grid with its small reactors.
It says its reactors would be bigger than the U-Battery, which is 15 metres tall but would be partially sunk underground, but last longer, with a 60-year lifespan instead of 25 to 30.
Mr Threlfall and his team have also received public funding for the U-Battery, and are hoping for more to make their £50m reactors viable on the market.
“We can’t be shutting down industry by forcing it off its current fossil fuel use into something that’s much, much more expensive,” Mr Threlfall said. “The world will never work like that.”
Britain is still building heavy-duty nuclear power stations too, including a project called Hinkley Point C, described as Europe’s largest construction site. But these are to supply the electricity grid, while small reactor makers believe there is a gap in the market for factories, mines and off-grid communities.
The U-Battery’s designers hope to supply remote communities in Canada, and would happily sell reactors to remote Scottish islands if the devolved government in Edinburgh took a more favourable view of nuclear power.
There are other players in the small reactor market abroad. In Russia, two small reactors entered operation on the world’s first floating nuclear plant, a converted barge in the country’s Arctic north.
The project was labelled an “enormous monstrosity” by environmental campaigners, who feared a lack of transparency similar to that which surrounded Chernobyl.
One American company, Ultra Safe Nuclear, has a product called a micro-modular reactor that is a direct rival to the U-Battery in aiming to supply mines, factories and remote communities.
Another US business, the Westinghouse Electric Company, hopes to have a small reactor in operation by 2025.
All these companies tout a variety of safety features which they say makes an accident implausible and giant cartoon cooling towers unnecessary.
Safety checks
At the U-Battery plant, lead engineer John Eldridge says the reactor would be so closely monitored for safety that “if a fly landed on it, you’d know”.
Nuggets of uranium fuel in the reactor would be protected by three layers of coating, he said, intended to withstand extreme conditions such as temperatures of 1,600°C.
This means the reactor would not be wrapped in “layers of safety systems”, Mr Eldridge said, although it would be encased in steel 65 millimetres thick and sealed by a 1.5-metre concrete plug, lifted once every five years for refuelling.
There is a store for spent fuel to be kept and eventually driven away, and putting the reactor partly underground is meant to reduce the risk of a plane hitting it.
But insiders admit that explaining all this to regulators is different from convincing the public that a nuclear reactor at their front door is nothing to worry about.
The company hopes to sell its first U-Battery by 2028, although the first one may look something like a porcupine with sensors attached to it to monitor its performance, Mr Eldridge said.
Designers have identified about 200 potential sites for the reactors, which could include greenhouses, mines and paper, glass, cement or ceramics factories.
They could also be used in the production of hydrogen – another opinion-splitting fuel that Europe is eyeing up as a source of jet power.
The aim is to “address a market that nuclear is not used to addressing”, Mr Threlfall said. “The world needs nuclear – big, middle and small.”
'The Sky is Everywhere'
Director:Josephine Decker
Stars:Grace Kaufman, Pico Alexander, Jacques Colimon
Rating:2/5
Favourite things
Luxury: Enjoys window shopping for high-end bags and jewellery
Discount: She works in luxury retail, but is careful about spending, waits for sales, festivals and only buys on discount
University: The only person in her family to go to college, Jiang secured a bachelor’s degree in business management in China
Masters: Studying part-time for a master’s degree in international business marketing in Dubai
Vacation: Heads back home to see family in China
Community work: Member of the Chinese Business Women’s Association of the UAE to encourage other women entrepreneurs
Timeline
2012-2015
The company offers payments/bribes to win key contracts in the Middle East
May 2017
The UK SFO officially opens investigation into Petrofac’s use of agents, corruption, and potential bribery to secure contracts
September 2021
Petrofac pleads guilty to seven counts of failing to prevent bribery under the UK Bribery Act
October 2021
Court fines Petrofac £77 million for bribery. Former executive receives a two-year suspended sentence
December 2024
Petrofac enters into comprehensive restructuring to strengthen the financial position of the group
May 2025
The High Court of England and Wales approves the company’s restructuring plan
July 2025
The Court of Appeal issues a judgment challenging parts of the restructuring plan
August 2025
Petrofac issues a business update to execute the restructuring and confirms it will appeal the Court of Appeal decision
October 2025
Petrofac loses a major TenneT offshore wind contract worth €13 billion. Holding company files for administration in the UK. Petrofac delisted from the London Stock Exchange
November 2025
180 Petrofac employees laid off in the UAE
JAPAN SQUAD
Goalkeepers: Masaaki Higashiguchi, Shuichi Gonda, Daniel Schmidt
Defenders: Yuto Nagatomo, Tomoaki Makino, Maya Yoshida, Sho Sasaki, Hiroki Sakai, Sei Muroya, Genta Miura, Takehiro Tomiyasu
Midfielders: Toshihiro Aoyama, Genki Haraguchi, Gaku Shibasaki, Wataru Endo, Junya Ito, Shoya Nakajima, Takumi Minamino, Hidemasa Morita, Ritsu Doan
Forwards: Yuya Osako, Takuma Asano, Koya Kitagawa
Dr Amal Khalid Alias revealed a recent case of a woman with daughters, who specifically wanted a boy.
A semen analysis of the father showed abnormal sperm so the couple required IVF.
Out of 21 eggs collected, six were unused leaving 15 suitable for IVF.
A specific procedure was used, called intracytoplasmic sperm injection where a single sperm cell is inserted into the egg.
On day three of the process, 14 embryos were biopsied for gender selection.
The next day, a pre-implantation genetic report revealed four normal male embryos, three female and seven abnormal samples.
Day five of the treatment saw two male embryos transferred to the patient.
The woman recorded a positive pregnancy test two weeks later.
PREMIER LEAGUE FIXTURES
All times UAE ( 4 GMT)
Saturday
West Ham United v Tottenham Hotspur (3.30pm)
Burnley v Huddersfield Town (7pm)
Everton v Bournemouth (7pm)
Manchester City v Crystal Palace (7pm)
Southampton v Manchester United (7pm)
Stoke City v Chelsea (7pm)
Swansea City v Watford (7pm)
Leicester City v Liverpool (8.30pm)
Sunday
Brighton and Hove Albion v Newcastle United (7pm)
Monday
Arsenal v West Bromwich Albion (11pm)
Desert Warrior
Starring: Anthony Mackie, Aiysha Hart, Ben Kingsley
Director: Rupert Wyatt
Rating: 3/5
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
Gulf Under 19s final
Dubai College A 50-12 Dubai College B
The specs: Lamborghini Aventador SVJ
Price, base: Dh1,731,672
Engine: 6.5-litre V12
Gearbox: Seven-speed automatic
Power: 770hp @ 8,500rpm
Torque: 720Nm @ 6,750rpm
Fuel economy: 19.6L / 100km
Match info
Australia 580
Pakistan 240 and 335
Result: Australia win by an innings and five runs
hall of shame
SUNDERLAND 2002-03
No one has ended a Premier League season quite like Sunderland. They lost each of their final 15 games, taking no points after January. They ended up with 19 in total, sacking managers Peter Reid and Howard Wilkinson and losing 3-1 to Charlton when they scored three own goals in eight minutes.
SUNDERLAND 2005-06
Until Derby came along, Sunderland’s total of 15 points was the Premier League’s record low. They made it until May and their final home game before winning at the Stadium of Light while they lost a joint record 29 of their 38 league games.
HUDDERSFIELD 2018-19
Joined Derby as the only team to be relegated in March. No striker scored until January, while only two players got more assists than goalkeeper Jonas Lossl. The mid-season appointment Jan Siewert was to end his time as Huddersfield manager with a 5.3 per cent win rate.
ASTON VILLA 2015-16
Perhaps the most inexplicably bad season, considering they signed Idrissa Gueye and Adama Traore and still only got 17 points. Villa won their first league game, but none of the next 19. They ended an abominable campaign by taking one point from the last 39 available.
FULHAM 2018-19
Terrible in different ways. Fulham’s total of 26 points is not among the lowest ever but they contrived to get relegated after spending over £100 million (Dh457m) in the transfer market. Much of it went on defenders but they only kept two clean sheets in their first 33 games.
LA LIGA: Sporting Gijon, 13 points in 1997-98.
BUNDESLIGA: Tasmania Berlin, 10 points in 1965-66
Other acts on the Jazz Garden bill
Sharrie Williams
The American singer is hugely respected in blues circles due to her passionate vocals and songwriting. Born and raised in Michigan, Williams began recording and touring as a teenage gospel singer. Her career took off with the blues band The Wiseguys. Such was the acclaim of their live shows that they toured throughout Europe and in Africa. As a solo artist, Williams has also collaborated with the likes of the late Dizzy Gillespie, Van Morrison and Mavis Staples.
Lin Rountree
An accomplished smooth jazz artist who blends his chilled approach with R‘n’B. Trained at the Duke Ellington School of the Arts in Washington, DC, Rountree formed his own band in 2004. He has also recorded with the likes of Kem, Dwele and Conya Doss. He comes to Dubai on the back of his new single Pass The Groove, from his forthcoming 2018 album Stronger Still, which may follow his five previous solo albums in cracking the top 10 of the US jazz charts.
Anita Williams
Dubai-based singer Anita Williams will open the night with a set of covers and swing, jazz and blues standards that made her an in-demand singer across the emirate. The Irish singer has been performing in Dubai since 2008 at venues such as MusicHall and Voda Bar. Her Jazz Garden appearance is career highlight as she will use the event to perform the original song Big Blue Eyes, the single from her debut solo album, due for release soon.
START-UPS%20IN%20BATCH%204%20OF%20SANABIL%20500'S%20ACCELERATOR%20PROGRAMME
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WHAT%20MACRO%20FACTORS%20ARE%20IMPACTING%20META%20TECH%20MARKETS%3F
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