Nuclear Monitor #925
Jan van Evert
France has delayed the start-up date for six new nuclear reactors from 2035 to 2038. The French government plans to build six new nuclear reactors. The State-owned company EDF and the government plan to seek approval from European competition authorities for the state support. The delay aims to ensure that EDF is better prepared to launch multibillion endeavours as long delays and cost overruns at reactor projects in France (Flamanville) and the UK ( Hinkley C) have sent its debt soaring.
A subsidized state loan will cover at least half of the construction costs of the new reactors.EDF must ‘amplify actions’ to present a binding cost and timetable assessment for the project by the end of this year, president Emmanuel Macron’s office said in a statement following a nuclear policy meeting in March. That is understandable since France’s state auditor had said in a report last January that a final investment decision on the six reactors should bemade only once their design is well advanced and funding finalized. It said the estimated bill for construction, excluding financing costs, had ballooned to almost €80 billion ($ 87 billion). That is over € 13 billion per reactor.
The auditor also said that once the funding model is announced, there is likely to be a delay of at least one year while approval from the European Commission is sought for the state funding.
At the same time the new French reactor Flamanville 3 is experiencing serious teething problems. It was shut down on February 15th and will remain so until the end of March. It has already been shut down twice since it was connected to the grid on December 21st. The latest shutdown is caused by a temperature sensor in the primary circuit, which is responsible for transferring heat from the reactor core to the steam generators. A week later problems with the bearings of the alternator extended the shutdown. On top of that, there are issues with a second temperature sensor in the primary circuit. The operator still expects to reach full power output by the summer, despite these interventions.
Nevertheless, Flamanville 3 so far has used more power than it has produced (source: energy-charts.info).
