A storm of unexpected problems swirls around France’s beleaguered nuclear fleet
Ed note: and that’s not counting the damaging effect that climate change’s heat wave is doing to the reactors’ cooling systems !!
French Nuclear Power Crisis Frustrates Europe’s Push to Quit Russian Energy. France typically exports electricity, but now it risks blackouts and a need for imported power because of problems at the state nuclear operator. Around half of France’s atomic fleet, the largest in Europe, has been taken offline as a storm of unexpected problems swirls around the nation’s state-backed nuclear power operator, Électricité de France, or EDF.
EDF, already 43 billion euros (about $45 billion) in debt, is also exposed to a recent deal involving the Russian state-backed nuclear power operator, Rosatom, that may heap fresh financial pain on the French company. The troubles have ballooned so quickly that President Emmanuel Macron’s government has hinted that EDF may need to be nationalized.
The few new nuclear reactors that EDF has built have been dogged by huge cost overruns and delays. An EDF-made pressurized water reactor at Hinkley Point, in southwest England, won’t start operating until 2027 — four years behind schedule and too late to help Britain’s swift turn from Russian oil and gas. Finland’s newest EDF nuclear power plant, which started operating last month, was supposed to be completed in 2009.
New York Times 18th June 2022
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