The Hinkley Point C nuclear plant in Somerset could end up costing £33 billion due to inflation, its developer EDF has revealed.

The new estimate, disclosed in The Times, highlights the scale of funding that the French energy group will need to find to complete the project.

It will heighten fears over the costs of a proposed sister station at Sizewell C in Suffolk.

On Friday, Punchline reported that EDF's core profits in its UK business grew as it charged more for the energy it produced.

The state-backed utilities giant, which has a major base at Gloucester Business Park, said profits before tax, interest and one-off items lifted to £1.12billion for 2022 in the UK, following a loss of £21 million in the previous year.

However, the wider company reported an annual lossof €5billion.

Setbacks and delays at Hinkley Point C have already pushed its estimated cost to between £25 billion and £26 billion, up from £18 billion when the project was given the go-ahead in 2016.

Those figures, however, excluded the impact of inflation which has pushed up the price of everything from labour to raw materials.

The Times yesterday reported EDF as saying that, based on inflation indexes as of June 30, 2022, the estimated nominal cost at completion could reach £32.7 billion, adding that in 2015 prices, the cost estimate was unchanged.

Hinkley Point C could generate enough energy to power six million homes, helping to replace EDF's existing fleet of ageing UK nuclear plants.

Hinkley Point is expected to start up by 2027 or 2028.