To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change what recent assessment he has made of the merits of pebble-bed technology in the design of new nuclear reactors. (318260)

In line with the reactor designs currently being assessed by the regulators through the generic design assessment (GDA) process, any new nuclear reactors built over the next 10-15 years will be generation III designs. These designs are already available commercially. The pebble-bed reactor is a generation IV-plus design that is not yet available commercially and has not been considered as part of the GDA process.