THE timetable for generating electricity from a new nuclear power station at Sellafield has slipped by a year, NuGen says.

The company, which wants to build three reactors at Moorside, now expects the first to come on stream in 2025, a year after its target date.

The new timescale is included in the latest consultation documents and follows a “reassessment" of the schedule. NuGen is a partnership between Toshiba of Japan and the French company ENGIE.

It is due to make a final decision on whether to proceed with the Moorisde project in 2018 and had hoped to start construction two years later.

It emerged in March that the reactor design were taking longer than expected to get regulatory approval.

And earlier this month NuGen confirmed that it is hoping to attract external investment to help raise the £10bn needed to fund Moorside. The Korea Electric Power Corporation has been linked to the project.

A spokesman for NuGen told in-Cumbria: “Our shareholders, Toshiba and ENGIE, remain committed to funding the development phase of NuGen’s Moorside project until a financial investment decision is reached [in 2018].

“It has always been part of our plans to include investors, debt and equity into the project.

"A universe of potential investment options is open to us and we have the flexibility to be able to talk with a wide range of potential investors.”

Moorside is seen as crucial to west Cumbria's prosperity.

The three reactors would have a combined output of 3.6GW – enough to power 6m homes and supply 7.5 per cent of the UK's electricity needs.

Up to 6,000 people will be working on the site, immediately north and west of Sellafield, at any one time.