The contract for a French-Chinese consortium to build Britain’s first nuclear plant in a generation was signed on Thursday at a low-key ceremony. The British government had delayed agreement over concerns about China’s involvement, while there were also questions about how the French state-owned power giant EDF would fund the construction of Hinkley Point, according to the South China Morning Post. Britain finally gave the go-ahead earlier this month for the £18 billion (HK$ 180 billion) complex, which is expected to provide 7% of the country’s power needs, but it set conditions for the deal. China has a one-third stake in the project and analysts had warned that Britain could have jeopardized relations with the world’s second-largest economy if it scrapped the deal.

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