nuclear-news

France’s EDF faced with ‘sluggish’ nuclear revival in USA

before it can proceed with building and operating new plants, unlikely before 2012, the French state-controlled utility will have to line up a new partner with the endurance necessary for an increasingly sluggish U.S. nuclear renaissance…..

EDF’s Expensive U.S. Divorce – WSJ.co, 27 Oct 10, By MATTHEW CURTIN Paying to get out of a marriage that isn’t working isn’t unusual. But in the U.S. nuclear industry, where foreign operators require local partners to build and operate new plants, going it alone isn’t a long-term option.

Electricité de France has plenty of work ahead to make good on a multibillion-dollar trans-Atlantic gamble that just got more expensive. It has paid $250 million in cash and stock to part ways with partner Constellation Energy Group.
CEG can feel pleased with the outcome. It has relinquished its share of the utilities’ joint venture committed to developing as many as four new nuclear-power stations, which could cost $15 billion or more. CEG has also given up a $2 billion put option that would have forced EDF to buy 11 non-nuclear facilities that it didn’t want……
The marriage went sour this year. CEG, a midsize U.S. utility, pulled out of talks with the federal government over loan guarantees for the first of the new nuclear plants that Unistar would build on the grounds the investment no longer made sense. In addition to the loan terms, it cited regulatory uncertainty, low gas prices, falling power prices, and rising nuclear construction costs…..

before it can proceed with building and operating new plants, unlikely before 2012, the French state-controlled utility will have to line up a new partner with the endurance necessary for an increasingly sluggish U.S. nuclear renaissance…..

HEARD ON THE STREET: EDF’s Expensive U.S. Divorce – WSJ.com

October 29, 2010 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | business and costs, France | antinuclear, EDF, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear renaissance, nuclear secrecy, nuclear spin, reactors