CUMBRIAN businesses stand to benefit if, as expected, EDF announces today that it is pushing ahead with a new nuclear power station in Somerset.

The eagerly-anticipated 'final investment decision' for Hinkley Point C would also be a boost for NuGen's proposal for a nuclear power plant at Moorside, Sellafield.

James Fisher Nuclear, in Egremont, is among the Cumbrian firms hoping to win work at Hinkley Point.

The company said in March that it hopes “to provide services to the UK's nuclear new-build sector once this moves forward.”

And Bendalls Engineering in Carlisle signed a ‘memorandum of understanding’ as long ago as 2012 with a view to it supplying pressure vessels to Hinkley Point.

The two reactors are scheduled to begin operating in 2025, generating around seven per cent of the UK's electricity needs. China General Nuclear will take a one-third stake in the £18bn project.