nuclear-news

Heatwaves caused cuts in France’s nuclear power production.

(Montel) Heatwaves in July and August provoked a 430 GWh cut in nuclear output at four EDF nuclear power plants – double last summer’s amount but slightly below the nine-year median, a French consultancy said on Tuesday.

EDF summer heat cuts double but below 9-year median

Reporting by: Sophie Tetrel, 01 Oct 2024 .
https://montelnews.com/news/70ed2eeb-e06c-4494-abca-42207139db11/edf-heat-cuts-double-from-summer-2023-but-stay-below-9-yr-median

This summer’s cut represented less than 1% of the country’s total atomic generation and was below the 600 GWh median recorded over the 2015-2023 period, said Thibault Laconde, head of analysis consultancy Callendar.

Last year’s climate-related cuts amounted to only 217 GWh due to several reactors being offline for maintenance, he added.

He said the noteworthy aspect of this year was that high temperature levels caused the outages, rather than a lack of water supply due to drought.

Production cuts or stoppages were concentrated between 29 July-3 August and 11-15 August, corresponding with the summer heatwaves, he said.

The cuts amounted to 279 GWh at Golfech, 93 GWh at Bugey, 55 GWh at St Alban and 7 GWh at Tricastin.

However, they were well below the 3 TWh record seen in 2020, Laconde added.

Many French nuclear plants use river water to cool reactors and EDF is required to reduce their output if river temperatures or low flows break legal limits.

October 6, 2024 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | climate change, France