nuclear-news

France turning against nuclear energy, as its costs soar

to fulfill its safety recommendations will cost over $13 billion, no small sum considering French operators were already planning to spend $52 billion over the next three decades to consolidate or upgrade existing infrastructure. As always when adversity hits business in the pocketbook, the final cost will be passed all the way down to the French consumer’s monthly electricity bill—

 62% of French respondents supporting a gradual phasing out of nuclear power—over 20 to 30 years—and 15% calling for a rapid halt. 

The Fukushima Effect: France Starts to Turn Against Its Much Vaunted Nuclear Industry TIME, By BRUCE CRUMLEY | January 4, 2012 “……..The recent French introspection about the merits of nuclear power is posing some serious questions about the nation’s energy independence, industrial future, and role as one of the world’s biggest business proponents of civil nuclear technology.

The newest development in France’s post-Fukushima mulling came Tuesday, when the country’s independent watchdog agency delivered a government-commissioned audit of the nation’s 58 nuclear power plants, calling for significant safety upgrades. Though the Nuclear Safety Authority’s (ASN) said current security standards at French reactors allowed it “not to request any immediate shutdown” of any of facility, it nevertheless warned “continuing operations require existing safety margins to be strengthened as swiftly as possible.”

The beefed up security recommendations involved what seems like basic stuff: ensuring sufficient back-up power capabilities, and creating “bunkerized” crisis control centers at plants; assuring necessary cooling capacities—even in emergencies—to prevent a Fukushima-style melt-down; and generally tightening all means of preventing or mitigating potential damages from earthquakes, floods or fires. It also called for a centralized “rapid reaction force” trained to intervene in nuclear emergencies to be formed and operational by the end of 2014. The ASN gave reactor operators—led by state-owned electric giant EDF—until June 30 to deliver proposals meeting the enhanced security standards of sites they run.

The ASN recommendations, moreover, come at a cost. According to ASN estimates, investment required to fulfill its safety recommendations will cost over $13 billion, no small sum considering French operators were already planning to spend $52 billion over the next three decades to consolidate or upgrade existing infrastructure. As always when adversity hits business in the pocketbook, the final cost will be passed all the way down to the French consumer’s monthly electricity bill—a fact no one was trying to hide. “I don’t see how this cannot have an impact on prices,” warned ASN president Andre-Claude Lacoste. If so, nuclear energy will no longer seem like the cheap energy date the French have been so hot for over the years…….

French polls taken after the Fukushima drama in March showing a new desire to wean France off its nuclear fix. Surveys taken last June found 62% of French respondents supporting a gradual phasing out of nuclear power—over 20 to 30 years—and 15% calling for a rapid halt. Only 22% of people favored continued development of France’s nuclear sector. Despite the passage of time—and arrival of other crises closer to home—that French skepticism over atomic energy has endured, with the future of nuclear power now shaping up as a significant issue in this spring’s presidential and legislative elections.

Read more: http://globalspin.blogs.time.com/2012/01/04/the-fukushima-effect-france-starts-to-turn-against-its-much-vaunted-nuclear-industry/#ixzz1icgtaCWC

January 5, 2012 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | business and costs, France