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US role in Kiev’s artillery warfare identified – media

Rt.com Feb 10 2023

The American military is “controlling every shot” with Pentagon-supplied rockets, a Ukrainian official told the Washington Post

The Ukrainian military requests precise coordinates from the Pentagon for almost every rocket fired from US-made artillery systems, and would not fire a shot without getting them, according to a report by the Washington Post.

Three Ukrainian officials and one senior US official spoke to the newspaper, on condition of anonymity, about America’s involvement. One Ukrainian source implied that Washington has the final say on every action, making the case for the delivery of longer-range rockets to Kiev………………………. more https://www.rt.com/russia/571265-us-coordinates-ukrainian-strikes

February 11, 2023 Posted by | Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Did Volodymyr Zelensky call for ‘preventive nuclear strikes’ against Russia? Not exactly

Social media users have been circulating a video of Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, claiming that the footage shows him calling on NATO to launch preventive nuclear strikes against Russia. It turns out, however, that this footage isn’t new – Zelensky made these statements back in October 2022. Moreover, the translation of his statement, originally in Ukrainian, leaves out some nuance.

  • Far-right Twitter accounts have been sharing a video of Volodymyr Zelensky speaking in Ukrainian. According to the English subtitles on the speech, Zelensky is calling on NATO to “launch preventive strikes against Russia” and “use nuclear weapons”. These accounts said the footage was evidence of a risk of “nuclear war.”
  • The video also circulated in French-language accounts and was even shared by a French senator. 
  • Turns out, however, this footage isn’t new. It was actually recorded on October 6, 2022 – and Zelensky’s comments did create a bit of a stir. However, the subtitles on the video that has been circulating recently are a little off, making Zelensky’s words sound even more menacing than the reality……………………….

Old footage and inexact translations 

If you type “Zelenskyy preventive strikes” into Google, then one of the first things that comes up is an article published by Politico on October 7, 2022. 

The article says that Zelensky participated in a discussion at the Lowy Institute, an Australian think tank. During that discussion, Zelensky said through an interpreter that NATO should take “preventive strikes”, before the interpreter corrected himself to say “preventive action”.

………….. The FRANCE 24 Observers team also consulted with the Ukrainian-language team at RFI.  The team said that the subtitles on the video weren’t quite accurate. 

The interviewer asks Zelensky what more he would like NATO to do to deter Russia. 

Zelensky doesn’t say that “they could use nuclear arms against Russia”. What he actually says is that they should “prevent Russia from using nuclear weapons”. 

Essentially, he says the opposite of what the subtitles indicate. ……………………

In the video posted by the Lowy Institute (at 25:30), you can hear the interpreter correct himself. He starts by saying “preventive strikes” before correcting himself, saying “preventive action”. However, the Ukrainian word that Zelensky uses, удари, does mean strikes. 

So what did the Ukrainian president mean? At one point he mentions the period “before February 24”. That would mean the time before Russia invaded Ukraine. 

While the president’s word choice is confusing, it is possible that he meant using economic or diplomatic sanctions to dissuade Russia from using its nuclear weapons.

That’s the interpretation taken by a number of Ukrainian officials, including Zelensky’s adviser Mykhailo Podolyak. Podolyak was interviewed by a Ukrainian media outlet on October 6, 2022. 

“Zelensky was referring to Russia’s nuclear threats and suggesting that the world should make clear the consequences for Russia [if they do use nuclear weapons] and intensify strikes against the Russian Federation, like sanctions and providing armed assistance [to Ukraine].”

Back in October, Russian authorities did criticise Zelensky’s choice of words, believing they were a call to strike Russia. Dmitri Peskov, spokesperson for the Kremlin, said that Zelensky’s words were a call to “kick off a global war with disastrous and impossible-to-predict consequences”. 

In summary, this footage doesn’t show Ukrainian President Zelensky calling on NATO to strike Russia using nuclear weapons in 2023. The footage is from 2022 and the translation isn’t accurate; it makes his statements seem more threatening.  https://observers.france24.com/en/europe/20230210-zelensky-ukraine-preventive-strikes-nuclear-russia-nato-debunked

February 11, 2023 Posted by | Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

No to US nukes in Britain: CND is returning to Lakenheath, 20 May 2023!

 CND is returning to the US airbase at Lakenheath in Suffolk, to say no to the return of US nuclear bombs to Britain!

With reports last year that the nuclear weapons bunkers at the US-run Lakenheath airbase were undergoing multi-million pound upgrades, alarm bells rang: the US is planning to deploy upgraded B61-12 nuclear bombs to Britain. We must oppose this dangerous and destabilising development!

Hundreds of you joined us for two demonstrations at the base last year. On Saturday, 20 May, we will return with our biggest protest yet! More information to follow. Coaches are being arranged from around the country, please let us know if you are coordinating transport. For all queries, contact information@cnduk.org

February 11, 2023 Posted by | opposition to nuclear, UK | Leave a comment

Greenpeace will sue the European Commission over its decision to include gas and nuclear as “clean”

Greenpeace will take the European Commission to court over its decision to
include gas and nuclear energy in the EU’s list of investments that can be
labelled as “green”, the campaign group said on Thursday.

Greenpeace requested a formal review in September of the Commission’s decision,
arguing the European Union had violated its own climate laws by labelling
some gas and nuclear energy investments as green.

Reuters 9th Feb 2023

https://www.reuters.com/business/sustainable-business/greenpeace-sue-eu-over-green-label-gas-nuclear-2023-02-09/

February 11, 2023 Posted by | EUROPE, Legal | Leave a comment

TODAY. The evil of the nuclear industry – France to transfer public interest savings funds to the nuclear industry?

Just when I think that the nuclear industry can’t sink any further into hypocrisy and depravity – it comes up with a new trick against the poor and against the public good.

France – such a leader in many good things – philosophy, cheese, etc – has also been a leader in nuclear evil – nuclear colonialism. And now the nuke-obsessed French government comes up with an evil trick against its own population – to transfer Livre A social benefit savings to the nuclear industry.

France’s Livret A savings accounts are a unique system that enable any adult or child in the country to have a simple tax-free savings account . The system has been going for 200 years, and is used to provide funds for social benefit measures, especially social housing.

What’s a Livret A in France? Livret A is a simple savings account with instant withdrawal access that’s historically been very popular in France, a kind of on demand tax free savers account. In May 2022, there were 55 million accounts holding a total amount of 358,8 billion euros between them.  French families felt confident in these government backed accounts that are easy to open while making a difference for the country. They are a great idea for kids and grand kids; for the first car or a deposit on a house later.

February 11, 2023 Posted by | Christina's notes, France | 4 Comments

Here are eight reasons why the US has no interest in pushing for peace in Ukraine

Washington’s priority is to contain Russia and how the fighting ends for Kiev is a sideshow to the main objective

By Andrey Sushentsov, Valdai Club program director, 10 Feb 23, https://www.rt.com/news/571220-eight-reasons-us-war-ukraine/

It now appears that the US is not even remotely interested in supporting a peaceful resolution to the Ukrainian conflict, preferring to see the military campaign continue. Overall, strategic planning in Washington gives little thought to the parameters for ending the crisis: Whether Ukraine will remain within its current borders, lose its territories or disappear altogether. 

Despite mounting casualties and the destruction of Ukraine’s military, appetite for military action has not diminished, neither in Kiev nor in Washington. Many international experts rightly identify the US as the key player in a large coalition advocating for continued hostilities in Ukraine. In less than a year of crisis, Kiev has exhausted its own military resources and the means to replace them, and is totally dependent on external assistance.

Though the US is taking the lead in coordinating and strategizing support from the West, it would be wrong to equate Ukrainian and American interests. While continuing to pay lip service to Kiev’s political demands, Washington is carefully assessing the right moment to initiate negotiations. The need for diplomatic efforts to resolve the conflict has been increasingly emphasized by US military leaders, most notably the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley. The idea continues to circulate in the British press that the American tactic is to escalate the conflict in order to later de-escalate it: to pressure Russia with a wave of large-scale deliveries of military equipment and to put Kiev in a more favorable negotiating position. 

However, it cannot be overlooked that the continuation of the military crisis in Ukraine is in line with US military and political interests. There are a total of eight arguments suggesting that the Americans intend to prolong this conflict.

First, there is the relative weakening of Russia, which has had to devote considerable resources to eliminating the military threat from Ukraine, as well as to achieving its political objectives of securing equal status in post-Cold War European security architecture. The Western media narrative that Russia is on the verge of defeat, while far from reality, gives the impression that all the West needs to do so is adopt a wait-and-see attitude. The lack of decisive Russian military victories leads to the perception that Ukraine is winning.

Second, the US has a vested interest in breaking up EU-Russian energy cooperation. This has developed over many decades, beginning during the Cold War. The sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines, apparently conducted with the assistance of another NATO state, was the culmination of a long-term American strategy to dismantle the extensive links between Moscow and key West European economies. The Americans want to shift European energy consumption away from Russia and create a more difficult environment for broader European industry, so that American goods face less competition, thus strengthening their own position.

Third, the US wants to eliminate any impulse for strategic autonomy among EU states. The Ukrainian crisis provides a golden opportunity for this, as the US and its allies in Eastern Europe have managed to create a moment of moral panic in the information space, preventing any reflection on the causes and consequences of the crisis. Strategic decisions on arms transfers are being taken under pressure from the media and a radicalized section of the public, without any analysis of the consequences. Leaders and elites who might have been able to reflect with detachment and sobriety on the consequences of the slide of EU-Russia relations into a deep crisis, are now outnumbered and essentially voiceless.

Fourth, the US does not want to see the defeat of Ukraine, into which much financial, political and symbolic capital has been invested over the past year. In the eyes of the West, Ukraine is its “champion”. The old narrative of European civilization struggling against the barbaric East, going back to the days of ancient Greece and its confrontation with the Persian hordes, is being played out here. Ukraine’s defeat would be a sensitive symbolic defeat for the West and would leave an “open wound” in the minds of many intellectuals.

Fifth, the US has not retreated from the ideological imperative to defend what it interprets as “freedom”. In the situation around Ukraine, there is a Manichean presentation of the struggle for “freedom against unfreedom”. Washington also sees this ideological imperative manifest in the domestic situation in Ukraine, which of course is only possible if you look at the political processes in Kiev “through your fingers”. By playing along with this narrative, Vladimir Zelensky’s government seeks to present itself to the West in such ideological categories.

The sixth US objective is to encourage Western Europe to remilitarise. Washington is aware that prolonged military competition is not possible using American forces alone. Moreover, the US is conscious of the growing threat from China and realizes that its resources will soon be diverted to a confrontation in the Pacific. In the European theater, Washington is therefore looking for ways to strengthen the EU’s military-industrial complex so that national defense budgets can be raised to at least 2 percent of GDP. 

Seventh, the US seeks to consolidate its European allies around a platform of fighting its “rising” adversaries such as Russia, China and Iran. Here, the US is trying to be resourceful in building coalitions willing to produce and sell expensive, high-tech weapons.

Eighth, the US is also pursuing its own re-industrialisation through Ukraine. The expansion of the military-industrial complex is seen as an important goal for America. After the Cold War, it was reoriented to produce a limited number of high-tech products, whereas modern conventional warfare requires the large-scale production of relatively inexpensive generic artillery, tank and aircraft systems.

All this makes the US extremely uninterested in working for a peaceful solution to the conflict in the short term. The Americans believe that time is on their side and that the eight objectives listed above will be achieved. This makes their strategy rather flexible and demonstrates that their priority is to contain Russia rather than secure the future security and prosperity of Ukraine.

February 11, 2023 Posted by | Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Highlands Against Nuclear Power (HANP)

A NORTH campaign group, which was set up ten years ago to oppose the
transport of nuclear material from Dounreay, plans to broaden its remit and
change its name. Highlands Against Nuclear Transport (HANT) is set to
become Highlands Against Nuclear Power (HANP) in a bid to extend its role
to include proposed new nuclear plants, nuclear weapons and the proposed
Geological Disposal Facility (GDR).

However, HANT chairman, Tor Justad,
stressed the new body would continue to campaign on nuclear transport
issues as well. He said: “Producing electricity with nuclear power is twice
as expensive as with renewables, poses unacceptable risks of accidents,
provides bi-products for nuclear weapons, produces carbon at all stages of
development and is the technology of the past with no solution to dealing
with the 100 tonnes of UK nuclear waste stored at Sellafield as the
proposed GDR is only at an early consultation stage.”

John O’Groat Journal 9th Feb 2023

https://www.johnogroat-journal.co.uk/news/north-nuclear-campaign-group-plans-to-widen-its-remit-and-ch-302714/

February 11, 2023 Posted by | opposition to nuclear, UK | Leave a comment

When the Great Tide returns

Seventy years ago, on the night of 31 January/1 February, the ‘Great
Tide’ surged down the Essex Coast from Harwich all the way round to London,
bringing floods, death and destruction to communities and environments
along the sea, rivers and creeks that compose the 350 mile coastline.


Passing almost silently and unexpectedly in an age where phones were rare,
radios silent and police relied on foot and bicycle, the Great Tide exacted
its toll on poor communities like Jaywick and Canvey; our biggest peacetime
catastrophe, barely remembered beyond the older generation today.

Such a fate awaits any new nuclear development at Bradwell, harbouring dangerous
wastes into the far future on a battered, exposed and diminishing
coastline. It must not happen. As far as possible we must try to avoid the
calamity that overwhelmed our Essex shores on that fateful and perilous
night seventy years ago.

BANNG 7th Feb 2023

February 11, 2023 Posted by | climate change, UK | Leave a comment

UK’s Nuclear Free Local Authorities send seven magnificent suggestions to the new Secretary of State

‘Magnificent Seven’ suggestions sent to new Secretary of State 10th February 2023

On hearing the news that Grant Shapps has been appointed to head up Rishi Sunak’s new Energy Security and Net Zero Department, the Nuclear Free Local Authorities lost no time in sending him their ‘magnificent seven’ wish list of urgent priorities.

Councillor Lawrence O’Neill, Chair of the NFLA Steering Committee, said:

“The new department is rightly called Energy Security and Net Zero. It is the NFLA’s belief that it can achieve both if it focuses on reducing energy demand through a UK-wide emergency programme of home insulation and energy efficiency measures and upon increasing generating capacity using the renewable technologies we have from the sustainable sources we find in nature, such as solar, wind, tidal, and geothermal, coupled with green hydrogen and other innovative storage solutions.

“We should also be investing in local, divested energy networks by encouraging households, communities, local authorities and energy co-operatives to become energy-independent by generating their own sustainable clean energy, rather that indulging in vast expenditure on large nuclear power plants that are reliant on overseas contractors, money, technology and uranium, and that leave behind the deadly costly legacy of radioactive waste and contaminated reactor buildings.

“The NFLA is calling on the British Government to abandon the nuclear nightmare. Every pound spent on the nuclear energy folly is a pound that could be redirected to creating a renewable energy future.”

February 11, 2023 Posted by | politics, UK | Leave a comment

Much-hyped tanks for Ukraine are in short supply– WSJ

 https://www.rt.com/news/571237-nato-tanks-ukraine-shortage/ 10 Feb 23

European NATO members are “dragging their feet” on sending Leopards to Kiev, the outlet says.

NATO members have developed “sudden misgivings” about sending tanks to Ukraine because they don’t seem to have any to spare, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday. Finland, which pressured Germany to approve exports of Leopard 2 tanks, may only be able to send “a few” of its own – and most likely not until it formally joins the US-led military bloc.

This has left Berlin as the only major supplier of tanks to Kiev, something Chancellor Olaf Scholz had been keen to avoid, the Journal noted

There are more than 2,000 Leopard 2 tanks in the stocks of various European NATO armies, but only Berlin and Warsaw have committed to sending any. Germany and Poland have promised about 14 apiece. Warsaw will also throw in 60 of its modified T-72s, while Berlin is buying up almost 190 decommissioned Leopard 1s for refurbishment, some of which may need to be cannibalized for parts.

In a December interview, Ukraine’s top general asked for 300 tanks right away. Canada has promised four tanks, while Portugal wants to send three.

“The fact that there are so few operational battle tanks and that they are so incompatible with each other should be taken as an alarm signal in Europe,” Nico Lange, a former German defense official who is now a senior fellow at the Munich Security Conference, told the Journal.

The Netherlands and Denmark will not send any of their tanks, but agreed to help Germany fund the purchase and refurbishment of around 100 older Leopard 1 models, which were retired 20 years ago and are currently in various states of disrepair. 

Denmark only has 44 Leopards and the Dutch operate 18 that are on lease from Germany, noted Minna Alander of the Finnish Institute of International Affairs. Finland faces a different “limitation” due to its own need to protect the country’s long border with Russia, she added.

Finland will be “part of the Leopard 2 cooperation in some way,” an anonymous senior official told the Journal, but declined to give any details. Helsinki has “signaled” it would “most likely” avoid tank deliveries until it officially joins NATO, according to a senior bloc official, likewise unnamed. Even then, it may only be able to spare a few of its 240 operational tanks.

The UK has promised 14 of its Challenger 2 tanks, saying they ought to be delivered by the end of March. The US pledged 31 Abrams tanks as well, but getting them to Ukraine might take up to two years. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has already moved on, demanding fighter jets on his trip to London, Paris and Brussels.

The US and its allies have spent over $120 billion to prop up the Kiev government over the past year, while insisting they are not a party to the conflict. Moscow has warned them that supplying Ukraine with weapons only prolongs the fighting and risks direct confrontation.

February 11, 2023 Posted by | Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Illegal organ market is a lucrative business in war-torn Ukraine

 https://maps.southfront.org/most-lucrative-business-in-war-torn-ukraine/ 10 Feb 23,

Any military conflict provides the most lucrative opportunities for so-called black transplantologists. This criminal business particularly thrived in Kosovo, from where there was a prodigious flow of organs to Europe. Today, Ukraine is the number one base for black transplantology.

The illegal organ market was created in Ukraine long before the outbreak of hostilities. After Kiev unleashed a war in the Donbas in 2014, this criminal business began to flourish, and today the war-torn country has become “a gold mine”. Years ago, OSCE representatives confirmed that dozens of military and civilian bodies with the organs cut out had been found in the war-torn territories of Donbass.

During a war, a huge number of people go missing, get injured and often end up on the operating table, where organs can be extracted from them without any legal procedures. Their bodies are then sent to the crematorium and these persons are reported missing. Often, dying soldiers become unwitting donors, but also their wounded comrades whose lives could have been saved. Civilians are not exempt from this practice.

According to the most conservative estimates, the international transplant network earns about $2 billion a month in Ukraine.

Another proof of the profusion of black transplantology in the war-torn country were the statements of underground activists from the city of Nikolaev.

They reported that organs had been removed from the bodies of the Ukrainian servicemen in the morgue of the City Hospital No. 1. Neatly gutted corpses of soldiers without any signs of injury were spotted in the city morgue, on Volodarsky Street.

This criminal business is also burgeoning on the front lines.

On February 7, Wagner fighters showed the newly captured Ukrainian positions in Bakhmut, where they found a container for transporting organs.

Many of the mobilized, including those who are taken straight from the streets to the front, are not registered in any lists. Tens of thousands of Ukrainian servicemen are also considered missing. In the case of injury at the front, they could easily have become victims of black transplantologists.

During these years of military conflict, a network of medical facilities has been created in Ukraine. Contacts have been established to work with the European and US markets. High-ranking political and military officials will certainly be involved in this lucrative, but criminal, business.

February 11, 2023 Posted by | secrets,lies and civil liberties, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Three years without one single on-site US nuclear weapons inspection at base for Northern Fleet ballistic missile submarines

The State Department says Russia has denied the United States its right to conduct inspections under the New START Treaty.

Barents Observer, By Thomas Nilsen 10 Feb 23

Concerns are growing as the last remaining key arms control agreement between the two, by far, largest nuclear weapons states is weakened due to a lack of on-site verifications.

“Russia has failed to comply with its obligation to facilitate U.S. inspection activities,” the State Department’s latest Report to Congress on the implementation of the New START Treaty reads.

Not since before the COVID-19 pandemic have U.S. inspectors been in Gadzhiyevo, the Russian Northern Fleet’s base for ballistic missile submarines on the Kola Peninsula.    

Here, both the Delta-IV and the newer Borei-class submarines load missiles armed with nuclear weapons before sailing out on deterrence patrols in Arctic waters.

The storage bunkers for missiles in both Gadzhiyevo and Okolnaya Bay have been substantially upgraded and expanded in recent years, the Barents Observer previously reported based on studies of satellite images.

The Russia-US treaty on reduction of strategic offensive arms was signed by the two presidents Dmitri Medvedev and Barack Obama in 2010 and limits the number of deployed warheads to 1,550 in each country. The limit on deployed missiles and bombers is set to 700 on each side

………………………………………………………………. Director of the Nuclear Information Project with the Federation of American Scientists, Hans Kristensen, writes in an analysis together with Matt Korda that the lack of inspections does not mean Russia has deployed more nuclear weapons than is limited by the Treaty. The two, however, are worried about the future of the arms treaty itself.

“It is clear that the longer that these compliance issues persist, the more they will ultimately hinder US-Russia negotiations over a follow-on treaty, which is necessary in order to continue the bilateral strategic arms control regime beyond New START’s expiry in February 2026,” Kristensen and Korda noted…………………… more https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/security/2023/02/b2b

February 11, 2023 Posted by | EUROPE, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Outline of Greenpeace’s legal arguments against including gas and nuclear in the EU Taxonomy

Greenpeace’s legal arguments against including gas and nuclear in the EU
Taxonomy. This briefing provides a short outline of Greenpeace’s request
for internal review (RIR), sent to the European Commission on 8 September
2022, concerning the Delegated Regulation (EU) 2022/1214 of 9 March 2022
which qualified economic activities in the nuclear energy and in the gas
energy sectors as “sustainable” for the purpose of the EU Taxonomy
Regulation.

Greenpeace 9th Feb 2023 https://www.greenpeace.org/eu-unit/issues/climate-energy/46567/media-briefing-greenpeaces-legal-arguments-against-including-gas-and-nuclear-in-the-eu-taxonomy/

February 11, 2023 Posted by | EUROPE, legal | Leave a comment

France in new row with Germany and Spain. France wants to call nuclear-derived hydrogen “clean”

By Michel RoseBelén Carreño and Kate Abnett

  • Summary
  • France wants EU to recognise nuclear-derived hydrogen as clean
  • Paris says Germany and Spain had committed to support it
  • Berlin and Madrid say no such promises were made
  • Spat is delaying EU renewables legislation, threatens pipeline

PARIS/MADRID/BRUSSELS, Feb 8 (Reuters) – A new row has erupted between France, Germany and Spain over nuclear energy, with Paris furious about a lack of support from Berlin and Madrid for its efforts to have nuclear-derived hydrogen labelled as ‘green’ in EU legislation, sources said………. (Subscribers only)

Reporting by Michel Rose in Paris, Belen Carreno, Aislinn Laing in Madrid, Kate Abnett in Brussels, Andreas Rinke in Berlin and Sergio Goncalves in Lisbon; Editing by Kirsten Donovan  https://www.reuters.com/business/sustainable-business/france-new-row-with-germany-spain-over-nuclear-derived-hydrogen-2023-02-08/

February 10, 2023 Posted by | climate change, EUROPE | Leave a comment

France’s Latest Nuclear Halt Is a Reminder of Long-Lasting Nature of Problem

By Carolynn Look and Josefine Fokuhl, February 7, 2023  https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2023-europe-energy-crisis-updates-fra

Despite France’s efforts to overcome a months-long maintenance crisis of its troubled nuclear fleet, another reactor has been taken offline for most of the rest of this year.

The nine-month planned halt of Electricite de France SA’s Chinon-1 nuclear reactor raises questions about whether the state-backed nuclear operator will be a millstone around Europe’s neck next winter, too. France’s nuclear plants form a backbone of Europe’s integrated power system, and an outbreak of safety-related incidents and repair delays over the past year could not have hit at a worse time.

As a result, French nuclear generation slumped to the lowest in more than three decades in 2022, just as the region struggled with throttled gas shipments from Russia and soaring fuel and power prices. The hope was that EDF would get its fleet in order by the time the next winter comes around, with Europe likely to source even fewer gas supplies from Russia this year, and Germany putting its last remaining nuclear plants to rest in April.

However, Chinon-1 will only return to the grid by Oct. 30, after being halted early on Tuesday, according to the French utility. The lengthy outage is because the reactor needs extra heavy checks and upgrades for EDF to get permission to extend its life from 40 to 50 years, it said.

Maintenance is Weighing on French Power Production

Total amount of power generated by nuclear power plants in France [graph on original]

The risk is that recent improvements in generation will be short-lived, especially if further disruptions pop up over the course of the year. Fresh maintenance this month is likely to curb output to historically low levels, with eight other reactors due to be taken off the system.

At the moment, the world’s biggest nuclear-plant operator has only 44 reactors available out of 56. Normally, those units could generate more than two-thirds of France’s electricity needs.

About a quarter of Europe’s electricity is produced by nuclear reactors in thirteen countries. But with France typically contributing more than half of the total, getting its reactors back up to speed will form a key part of how Europe guarantees its energy security for years to come.

February 10, 2023 Posted by | France, politics | Leave a comment