The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy announced last week the results of its latest auction in which more than three gigawatts electricity generation was awarded.

The big news was the impressive strike prices for two offshore wind farms to be delivered in 2022-23 - £57.50 MW/h.

This falls well below the price guaranteed for the planned Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant of £92.50 MW/h, guaranteed and inflation uplifted for the next 35 years!

The wind farm strike prices represent an average drop of 47 per cent from those in the first competitive auction held in February 2015 - testament to the growing importance and value attributed to offshore wind in Europe, proving the technology now demonstrably cheaper than other mainstream technologies - specifically, nuclear and gas - and reversing a forecast decline in offshore wind.

Coupled with the expansion in solar panel generation, and despite Tory government restraint, future energy is bound to see renewables and battery storage dominate, with offshore wind central to this cheap clean energy revolution.

Most of the talk now focuses on the £35 billion nuclear new-build at Hinkley Point - controversial both in exorbitant joint French-Chinese financing and radioactive dangers in operational and on-site waste disposal, plus big potential public subsidies to maintain the overblown £92.50 strike price for 35 years and possibly the loss of the government’s £10 billion loan guarantees against likely project failure.

The government putting all its eggs into the multi-billion pound new nuclear basket and then finding that nobody wants to buy its hopelessly overpriced electricity is a misjudgement disaster on a par with being forced into Brexit after failing to dispose of UKIP and Tory rebels in the EU referendum.

Put simply, this latest news should be the death knell for Hinkley C and the whole Tory resurrected nuclear new-build programme - very sad for the millions put into all the widespread preparatory works for this white elephant doomed at birth.

Alan Debenham, Clifford Avenue, Taunton.