LONDON, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Britain on Thursday promised

to free more sites for nuclear energy developments across

England and Wales, seeking to attract private investment into

Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) as part of its push to decarbonise

the power network.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer's office announced plans to

expand the list of possible sites for nuclear development and

set out other reforms to streamline the planning process.

"This country hasn't built a nuclear power station in

decades. We've been let down, and left behind," he said in a

statement.

Successive British governments have championed the benefits

of SMRs - effectively small-scale nuclear plants - in search of

a way to avoid the high upfront costs, planning delays and

difficulty of securing investors associated with larger plants.

But to date, no SMR projects have been built.

Attracting private capital is central to Starmer's overall

plan for government following his election win in July, after he

inherited a sluggish economy and then imposed rules on spending

and borrowing to promote economic stability.

His bid to generate growth has already seen the announcement

of planning broader reforms, particularly for large

infrastructure projects.

There are currently eight sites approved for nuclear

development. The new plan would encourage developers to put

forward other possible sites and promises flexibility that could

see SMRs located alongside power-hungry Artificial Intelligence

data centres.

The new nuclear policy document builds on a consultation

undertaken by the previous, Conservative government last year

and will be subject to further consultation and parliamentary

scrutiny before it is adopted.

A government competition to develop SMRs has been running

since 2023, with four bidders still in the race for what could

be multi-billion-pound technology development contracts. They

are Rolls-Royce, Westinghouse, Holtec Britain and

GE-Hitachi Nuclear Energy - an alliance between General Electric

Co ( GE ) and Japan's Hitachi Ltd. ( HTHIF )

A previous SMR competition was launched in 2016 but did not

proceed beyond the information-gathering stage and closed in

2017.