Last week one of Britain’s oldest companies sowed the seeds of a mammoth transformation in its operations. Having built an empire through petrol cars and gas turbines, Rolls Royce now faces the same bleak reality as many of its legacy counterparts – change or die. For the engineering icon, a lifeline has been extended by the UK government and its obsession with nuclear power. The plan at hand, which Boris Johnson is poised to back with £200 million as part of his £525 million pledge to the nuclear industry, details 16 Small Modular Nuclear Reactors (SMRs), essentially scaled down versions of the technology drawing criticism at the UK’s Hinkley Point C and Sizewell C developments. Both of these white elephant…