The Flamanville EPR is still shut down: we know more after the visit of the nuclear regulator
Shut down since mid-June 2025 due to a leak on a protection valve, the Flamanville EPR received a visit from a team from ASNR, the nuclear regulator.
The Flamanville EPR is still shut down: we know more after the visit of the
nuclear watchdog. Shut down since mid-June 2025 due to a leak on a
protection valve, the Flamanville EPR received a visit from a team from
ASNR, the nuclear regulator.
La Presse de la Manche 22nd July 2025, https://actu.fr/normandie/flamanville_50184/lepr-de-flamanville-est-toujours-a-larret-on-en-sait-plus-apres-le-passage-du-gendarme-du-nucleaire_62944598.html
EDF shifts nuclear strategy to focus on domestic projects
The company will
reduce its international sales team by 60, including ten managerial roles.
France’s state-run utility EDF is planning to reduce its overseas workforce
and withdraw from certain international nuclear projects to concentrate on
a domestic construction programme under its new CEO Bernard Fontana, as
reported by Reuters. Once a global leader in nuclear power, France is
retreating amid rising global demand, allowing new competitors to emerge as
high costs and design challenges hinder its international competitiveness.
Power Technology 23rd July 2025, https://www.power-technology.com/news/edf-nuclear-strategy-focus-domestic/
Pushing Military Spending and Neoliberal Austerity, French PM Emulates Trump
Both the left and the far right in France see the government budget plan as something of a class war budget.
By C.J. Polychroniou , Truthout, July 17, 2025
On July 4, U.S. President Donald Trump signed the “One Big Beautiful Bill“ Act into law, implementing his reactionary policy agenda. This megabill is the most sweeping legislation in modern U.S. history and elevates neoliberalism to a new stage with huge tax cuts for the rich and equally huge cuts to the social safety net, including food programs and Medicaid coverage. Indeed, those who somehow interpreted Trump’s policies as representing an end to the neoliberal order in the U.S. could hardly have been more wrong.
Now, it is the turn of the French government to show the world that neoliberalism remains the dominant organizing principle for advanced capitalist societies. Confronted with a faltering economy, big budget deficits, and record-high debt levels, the government of Prime Minister François Bayrou has unveiled a budget plan that shares some uncanny similarities with Trump’s megabill, although it is surely not as brutal as the “Big Ugly Bill” will be for most U.S. citizens.
with proposals that include slashing thousands of civil service jobs, shutting down so-called “unproductive” national agencies, cutting prescription drug subsidies, reducing health care expenditure by €5 billion, and freezing pensions and virtually all other benefits paid out by the government to 2025 levels. The controversial budget plan proposed by the French prime minister also includes abolishing two statutory holidays from the country’s annual calendar — Easter Monday and May 8. The latter, known as Victory Day, is a pivotal holiday that commemorates the victory of the Allies over Nazi Germany. The government claims that abolishing those two public holidays would generate several billion euros in additional state revenues through increased economic activity. The French prime minister has also left open the possibility of additional statutory holidays receiving the axe…………………………………………………..
………………………………………………there is more obscenity included in the French government budget plan than already mentioned. Just like Trump’s megabill, Bayrou’s budget plan slashes the social safety net but expands the defense budget. …………………………………..
……………………Bayrou’s budget plan will add €3.5 billion to the 2026 defense budget and €3 billion to the 2027 budget. Bayrou himself declared the defense budget to be “sacrosanct” and exempt from budget cuts.
Neoliberal economics is of course tightly linked to militarism and warmongering. Most NATO countries are boosting their military spending to 5 percent of GDP, largely because the alliance remains subservient to the United States and European leaders want to appease Donald Trump, who has threatened to disengage from NATO over the U.S. paying an “unfair share” as member. But in so doing, the European governments become full and willing partners in the militaristic adventures of the United States, which now views China, not Russia, as the biggest threat to its supremacy. In any case, the idea that Russia somehow has strategic aims to militarily attack Europe is as ludicrous as it is nonsensical. To what end? A question never asked by European leaders and therefore never answered………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… https://truthout.org/articles/pushing-military-spending-and-neoliberal-austerity-french-pm-emulates-trump/
Nuclear: more than 3,000 radioactive drums discovered off the coast of Brest!
More than 3,000 radioactive drums have been discovered in the waters off Brest. Very old nuclear fuel.
Jean-Baptiste Giraud, July 17, 2025,
https://lenergeek.com/2025/07/17/nucleaire-3-000-futs-radioactifs-brest/
In the nuclear sector, the issue of radioactive waste storage is posing increasing problems. During a mission off the coast of Brest, Ifremer and the CNRS counted more than 3,000 drums deposited on the seabed. They could pose a threat to France.
Nuclear waste is accumulating at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean
The return of a scientific mission off the coast of Brest has shaken the scientific community. After a month of intensive research, a team of experts revealed they had located more than 3,000 radioactive drums submerged in the Atlantic Ocean , a discovery that inevitably raises the question: should we be worried?
Behind this large-scale mission, a specific objective: to understand the fate of nuclear waste dumped between 1946 and 1993 by several European countries . During this period, more than 200,000 drums containing radioactive waste were dumped in international waters, at depths reaching 4,700 meters in the abyssal plain of the northeast Atlantic. The NODSSUM (Nuclear Ocean Dump Site Survey Monitoring) project has mapped an area of 163 km² where these drums are concentrated, some of which are in an advanced state of degradation.
The mission, led by the CNRS and Ifremer with the support of several national and international partners, used cutting-edge technologies to study the abyss. Aboard the ship L’Atalante, scientists deployed an autonomous submarine, UlyX, equipped with a sophisticated sonar system, allowing them to probe the seabed and obtain precise images of the condition of the 3,350 barrels.
No worrying radioactivity… for now
After several weeks of research, the good news is that the mission did not observe any “anomalous radioactivity” in the areas analyzed. For the researchers, there is therefore, as of yet, no reason to panic. However, not everything is that simple. Although the radioactivity does not appear to have crossed any worrying thresholds, some drums have shown signs of advanced corrosion, suggesting that material leaks may be occurring. The mission reveals that these leaks, although still difficult to identify precisely, could be due to the presence of bitumen, a material often used to seal waste in drums.
However, this is only a hypothesis. Future sampling will be necessary to better understand the exact nature of these substances and their impact on the marine environment.
This discovery raises many questions about nuclear waste management. Why were these drums submerged at a time when radioactive waste management was not as strictly regulated? While the practice of dumping waste has been banned since 1993, the question of the environmental impact of these repositories remains open. The results of this mission, still preliminary, underline that special attention will need to be paid in the future.
The next stage of the research will be to analyze the sediment, water and marine organisms in the area to detect possible contamination . In addition, a new mission is already planned for the coming years to study the barrels more closely and take additional samples , particularly of marine fauna that could be affected by this waste.
“They want to impose a whole nuclear world on us without asking our opinion”: activists fight against the Orano nuclear fuel pools project.
by Lucas Hobe, 07/20/2025 , https://france3-regions.franceinfo.fr/normandie/manche/on-veut-nous-imposer-tout-un-monde-nucleaire-sans-demander-notre-avis-des-militants-luttent-contre-le-projet-des-piscines-d-orano-3190563.html
Nearly a thousand people marched on Saturday, July 19, 2025, in Vauville (Manche) to protest against the Aval du Futur project at the Orano La Hague site, which plans to install three new nuclear fuel storage pools.
” FukushiManche, no thanks! “, ” Stop Downstream of the Future ” could be read this Saturday, July 19, 2025 on placards held during the march organized in Vauville (Manche) against the project for new nuclear pools .
Monitored by law enforcement, the 1,000 people present marched to the beach, expressing their anger at the “world’s largest industrial project,” namely the expansion of the Orano site at La Hague to store spent nuclear fuel.
” It’s a project that’s pretty crazy,” laments Gilles, an activist . “We’ve been told for 40 years that scientists will find solutions for waste. And in the end, we haven’t found any solutions. La Manche is a department that’s already heavily nuclearized, so we’re fed up with these malfunctioning power plants and these high-voltage lines that disfigure the landscape .”
“Nuclear power can cause disasters”
Participants in the Vauville demonstration, which was part of the Haro anti-nuclear festival, are concerned about the future of the English Channel coastline if new 6,500-ton swimming pools and nuclear power plants are built. They are also concerned about their safety and health, given the potential for problems at these types of high-risk sites.
We see with the Flamanville EPR that it took years to build, there are still problems, and it cost us a lot of money. Nuclear power can cause disasters. We saw it at Fukushima and Chernobyl. – Gregory , Anti-nuclear activist opposed to the Aval du Futur project on the Orano site
Activists believe that the issue of the new nuclear pools at La Hague ”
is part of a larger picture. They’re still trying to sell us nuclear power as the energy of the future. They want to impose a whole nuclear world on us without asking our opinion. It’s scary. It’s important to fight against it .”
” We’ve taken up this Norman legend of the little fairies of La Hague who defend themselves when someone offends their land. We’re out in force, determined to show our anger, ” concludes the co-organizer of the anti-nuclear Haro festival.
2027, the calendar date for new factories
Announced in October 2024, the “Downstream of the Future” program has been launched. However, the exact timeline remains to be determined. According to Orano, more clarity should become available within two years, in the summer of 2027.
” The current plants are designed to last until 2040 ,” says Nicolas Ferrand, a specialist in nuclear waste reprocessing
. “We’re seeing if we can extend them beyond that, until 2050, 2055, 2060. By the end of 2026, we’ll have their lifespan and based on that, we’ll be able to schedule the commissioning of the new plants .”
Corrosion-hit Civaux most modulated 1.5 GW French unit – study
French utility EDF’s Civaux 2 unit, where EDF recently detected fresh
stress corrosion, was the most modulated of France’s four 1.5 GW nuclear
reactors last year, according to a study by analytics firm Kpler requested
by Montel.
Montel News 3rd July 2025, https://montelnews.com/news/b24ca2fd-a322-4b72-9fc1-de737f3e9fe0/corrosion-hit-civaux-2-most-modulated-1-5-gw-french-unit-study
France and Switzerland shut down nuclear power plants amid scorching heatwave
By Euronews, 02/07/2025, https://www.euronews.com/2025/07/02/france-and-switzerland-shut-down-nuclear-power-plants-amid-scorching-heatwave
To cool down, nuclear power plants pump water from local rivers or the sea, which they then release back into water bodies at a higher temperature. However, this process can threaten local biodiversity if water is released which is too hot.
Due to a scorching heatwave which has spread across Europe in recent days, a number of nuclear power plants in Switzerland and France have been forced to either reduce activity or shut down completely as extreme temperatures have prevented sites from relying on water from local rivers.
To cool down, nuclear power plants pump water from local rivers or the sea, which they then release back into water bodies at a higher temperature.
However, Europe’s ongoing heatwave means that the water pumped by nuclear sites is already very hot, impacting the ability of nuclear plants to use it to cool down. On top of this, nuclear sites run the risk of posing a dangerous threat to local biodiversity, by releasing water which is too hot into rivers and seas.
In light of the heat, Axpo – which operates the Beznau nuclear power plant in Switzerland – said it had shut down one of its reactors on Tuesday, adding that a second reactor was operating at limited capacity.
“Due to the high river water temperatures, Axpo has been increasingly reducing the output of the two reactor units at the Beznau nuclear power plant for days and reduced it to 50 per cent on Sunday,” said the operator.
The Beznau nuclear power plant’s reactors are located directly on the River Aare, where temperatures have reached 25 degrees Celsius in recent days, leading Axpo to curtail its activities to prevent “excessive warming of the already warm water” which could strain local biodiversity.
Although Switzerland has decided to phase out nuclear power by 2033, existing plants are able to continue to operate as long as they are safe.
Meanwhile, on Monday French electricity company EDF shut down the Golfech nuclear power plant, located in the southern department of Tarn-et-Garonne, amid extreme heat warnings in the region and concerns that the local river could heat up to 28 degrees, even without the inflow of heated cooling water.
France has a total of 57 active nuclear reactors in 18 power plants. According to EDF, the country obtains around 65% of its electricity from nuclear energy, which the government considers to be environmentally friendly.
Output has also been reduced at other sites, including at the Blayais nuclear power plant in western France, as well as the Bugey nuclear power plant in southern France, which could also be shut down, drawing their cooling water from the Gironde and Rhône rivers.
Although the production of nuclear power has had to be curtailed in light of extreme heat, the impact on France’s energy grid remains limited, despite the fact that more electricity is being used to cool buildings and run air conditioning systems.
Speaking to broadcaster FranceInfo, French grid operator RTE ensured that “all the nuclear power sites which are running are able to cover the needs of the French population. France produces more electricity than it consumes, as it currently exports electricity to neighbouring countries.”
EDF shuts down Golftech nuclear plant due to high river temperature
French utility EDF said it shut down the No. 1 reactor at the Golftech
nuclear power plant in southwestern France late on Sunday, ahead of an
anticipated rise in the temperature of the Garonne river that supplies the
plant’s cooling water.
Reuters 30th June 2025, https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/edf-shuts-down-golftech-nuclear-plant-due-high-river-temperature-2025-06-30/
EDF chief weighs asset sales as Paris pushes for new nuclear focus
a “complicated economic equation
… unless someone has found a magic wand”
Insiders say Fontana’s stance signals he is aligned with the French
government unlike his predecessor. EDF’s new boss is conducting a
portfolio review that could lead to the French energy group selling some
assets, as he seeks to meet government demands to focus on building new
nuclear reactors in France.
Bernard Fontana has told insiders that he
wanted to assess which assets were not profitable or did not fit with the
state-owned group’s strategic priorities, according to several people
with knowledge of the situation. Fontana, who took over as chief executive
of the state-owned group last month, told the people that sales could come
after the review, although he has not yet concluded which parts of the
business should be sold off.
The state “has said that we have to make the
new nuclear programme in France a success, and exploit the current nuclear
centres. For the rest, if there aren’t the means, we’ll have to
arbitrate”, said one of the people.
Its other assets and subsidiaries
include the construction engineering division Framatome — of which
Fontana was previously CEO
— renewable installations in France and across
the world, Italian utility business Edison and services company Dalkia.
Several people familiar with EDF said Dalkia and Edison are among the
business units that could be sold. Renewable assets, with the exception of
EDF’s hydraulic power projects, could also be under consideration, the
people said.
Still, the company’s aims could be complicated if it tries
to sell assets during a difficult economic environment, potentially forcing
it to offload some assets at deep discounts, especially in the US where it
has a number of offshore wind and solar projects.
Asset sales would also do
little to meet the enormous costs of delivering the new EPR2 programme,
people familiar with the business said. The government and EDF recently
agreed a funding mechanism for the project, but the total cost is yet to be
determined.
Building the EPR2s and meeting EDF’s other priorities such as
guaranteeing low energy prices to consumers and industrial groups, and
completing Hinkley Point make for a “complicated economic equation
… unless someone has found a magic wand”, said one of the people.
FT 25th June 2025
https://www.ft.com/content/e2c4ba72-b40a-4d7b-a820-70957b06958e
Nuclear power plant warning as heatwave hits France.
Independent Forrest Crellin, Friday 20 June 2025
France’s electricity supply faces potential disruption as soaring river temperatures, driven by an impending heatwave, threaten to curtail nuclear power generation along the Rhone.
Nuclear operator EDF announced on Friday that high water temperatures are expected to impact electricity production from 25 June, particularly at the 3.6-gigawatt Bugey nuclear power plant in eastern France.
This marks the first such warning for high river temperatures in France for 2025.
The issue stems from environmental regulations governing the discharge of cooling water, which can be breached when river temperatures become excessively high due to heatwave conditions.
The alert comes as state forecaster Meteo France predicts a significant heatwave will sweep across the country this weekend.
European Power Costs Surge on Fresh Fears of French Nuclear Reactor Corrosion
Power prices across Europe jumped as nuclear giant Electricite de France
SA reported signs of “stress corrosion” at a reactor, renewing fears
that generation may be curtailed once again. The French utility in 2022 and
2023 was forced to halt part of its atomic fleet, the backbone of western
Europe’s electricity market, to fix cracked pipes.
That sent energy prices soaring as the repairs coincided with dwindling Russian gas supplies
to the continent. On Tuesday, the ASNR nuclear safety authority said
“hints” of corrosion had again been found on pipes at the Civaux 2
reactor in central France. That drove French year-ahead power up as much as
8.4% on Wednesday, the most in two years, according to the European Energy
Exchange. The contract for August, when demand for cooling peaks, climbed
13%. Prices also rose in Germany and the UK, which often rely on exports
from neighboring France to keep the lights on. Europe’s power markets
have largely emerged from the energy crisis of a few years ago, when
Russian gas supplies all but stopped. Yet prices remain sensitive to any
issues affecting the region’s largest nuclear fleet, exposing the fragile
nature of the recovery.
Bloomberg 11th June 2025, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-06-11/european-power-surges-on-fresh-fears-of-french-reactor-corrosion
Paris wants to manufacture drones in Ukraine
9 June 25 https://www.rt.com/news/618818-paris-renault-produce-drones-ukraine/
The French Defense Ministry has asked Renault to set up military production for Kiev.
Paris is pushing France’s largest automaker, Renault, to establish a military drone production operation in Ukraine, the company has confirmed. Kiev has been significantly intensifying drone attacks on Russian infrastructure.
During the final week of May, 2,300 Ukrainian UAVs were shot down after being sent across the border to target Moscow and other regions, according to the Russian Defense Ministry.
“We have been contacted by the [French] Defense Ministry about the possibility of producing drones,” Renault said in a statement to several media outlets, including Reuters, on Sunday. Although “discussions” on the issue have taken place, the company insisted that “no decision has been taken at this stage,” and that it is awaiting further details from the ministry.
French Defense Minister Sebastien Lecornu first revealed the plan on Friday, describing it as an “unprecedented partnership” in an interview with broadcaster LCI.
“We are going to embark on a completely unprecedented partnership… to equip production lines in Ukraine to… produce drones,” Lecornu said, noting that the project would involve both a major carmaker and a smaller defense contractor.
Renault could be tasked with setting up drone assembly lines “a few dozen or hundreds of kilometers from the front line” in Ukraine, France Info reported on Sunday.
According to the newspaper Ouest-France, the project could also involve Delair – a Toulouse-based drone manufacturer that supplies UAVs for border surveillance, reconnaissance, intelligence, and special operations forces. The company has previously delivered kamikaze drones to the French Defense Ministry, which were later sent to Ukraine.
Lecornu described the initiative as a “win-win” for Paris and Kiev, claiming no French personnel would be deployed to Ukraine.
The production lines would be operated by Ukrainian workers, and the drones built for the country’s military would also be used by the French Armed Forces for “tactical and operational training that reflects the reality” of modern warfare, he said.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov condemned the strikes as deliberate attempts to sabotage peace talks. Moscow has repeatedly warned that any weapons production facilities in Ukraine are considered legitimate military targets and subject to “unequivocal destruction.”
Nuclear Power will ruin France
Nuclear power will ruin France , by Laure Nouahlat, published by Seuil , May 16, 2025, 224 p., 13.50 euros.
Neither the French population, nor any parliamentarian or senator had their say, as if nuclear power were democratically held above ground.
Reporterre 16th May 2025,
https://reporterre.net/Le-nucleaire-va-ruiner-la-France
Despite the staggering cost of all-nuclear power, France is stuck in this impasse. Here are the excerpts from the investigative book ”
Nuclear Power Will Ruin France
.” Laure Noualhat dissects the mechanisms of this waste.
Is nuclear revival reasonable ? According to Emmanuel Macron and many others, the nuclear ” holy grail “ would be the only solution to slow climate change and preserve our comfort. While the government is making savings at every turn, the sector seems to benefit from an unlimited budget.
It was announced Monday that the Cigéo nuclear waste disposal facility in Bure will cost up to €37.5 billion. To revive the industry, the bill will climb to at least €80 billion. As delays mount, these amounts are continually revised upwards. All this while EDF is already heavily in debt.
Where will the tens of billions of euros for these new EPRs be found ? And the necessary investments in the existing fleet ? It will be the State, that is, the taxpayer, who will pay.
This is what journalist Laure Noualhat demonstrates in her relentless investigative book, Nuclear Power Will Ruin France . The result of six months of investigation, it is published today in the Seuil- Reporterre collection and will be accompanied by a documentary broadcast on YouTube in early June. Through this extensive work, Reporterre is tackling a crucial issue for the future of the country, largely absent from public debate. Because these choices are made in total secrecy, Reporterre is shedding light on a subject that concerns us all.
Here are the previews of “ Nuclear Power Will Ruin France ”:
What were you doing on February 10, 2022 ? For the small world of energy, it was a memorable day. On that day, presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron stood behind a lectern under the immense tin roof of the General Electric plant in Belfort. His voice echoed like a cathedral. Behind him, GE teams had positioned a gigantic Arabelle turbine, 300 tons of gleaming steel lit as if it were an industrial museum piece.
A group of masked employees, all wearing the same electric blue construction jackets, listens learnedly to the president. Four years earlier, these women and men were part of Alstom’s energy division, the industrial flagship that former Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron had conscientiously dismantled during his time at the Ministry of Finance.
No matter, on this Thursday, February 10, the now President has just announced the ” rebirth “ of French nuclear power, boasted of national ” sovereignty “ and praised the merits of ” planning “ to address the challenges of the moment: reducing our CO2 emissions by 55 % by 2050, ensuring France’s industrial development, and controlling the French people’s energy bill.
No law regulates presidential will
Regardless of the background—environmental, energy, nuclear, activist, industrial, or political—this speech hit the mark and is historic. With its delivery, President-candidate Macron has just rescued France from decades of uncertainty by relaunching the mass construction of nuclear reactors. Since its approval in 2003 by the National Assembly, the Flamanville EPR project has been mired in endless setbacks. In 2012, President Hollande chose a contrary path by enshrining in law the reduction of nuclear power’s share to 50 % of the electricity mix by 2025 (compared to 65-70 %) and to 30 % by 2030. In short, the socialist planned a slow phase-out of nuclear power, allowing for the preparation of the decommissioning of the oldest reactors, the ramp-up of renewables, and an unprecedented effort toward energy efficiency.
In February 2017, candidate Macron – a former minister under Hollande – took up this promise.
”
I will maintain the framework of the energy transition law. I am therefore maintaining the 50
% target,
“ he confided to the
WWF during a Facebook Live broadcast watched by 170,000 people and interviewed by… Pascal Canfin, who will join the President’s list for the 2019 European elections.
Five years later, facing General Electric employees, the Jupiterian president performed an about-face. Six
EPR2s will emerge, he promises, built in pairs on three sites: in Penly in Normandy, in Gravelines in the North, and in Bugey in the Ain. And eight more will be under consideration. Neither the French population, nor any parliamentarian or senator had their say, as if nuclear power were democratically held above ground. Since this announcement, the program of the six EPR2s
has still not been validated by any legal decision, much less by an ”
energy and climate programming law
” (
PPE ), which should have been revised for the occasion.
To date, in 2025, no law governs the presidential will shaped by long years of lobbying (by associations such as Xavier Moreno’s Cérémé or Bernard Accoyer’s Nuclear Heritage & Climate, but also Voies du nucléaire or the French Nuclear Energy Society) since his arrival in power.
A colossal cost
Knocking down walls or hiding the misery, insulating here or repainting there, moving the pipes, changing the door… it’s difficult to ask a tradesman for a quote for work if you don’t know what you’re going to do. It’s the same with nuclear reactors.
As these lines are being written, in March 2025, three years after the Belfort speech, no one knows how much the EPR2 will cost . This is normal: their detailed design has not been completed despite the 10.5 million hours of engineering already devoted to the project.
In February 2022, the government had put forward a construction cost of 51.7 billion (2020 euros). In 2023,
EDF made two updates to the costing, noted by the Court of Auditors in its report on the
EPR sector in January 2025:
”
The overnight construction cost [as if the reactor were completed in a single night] of three pairs of
EPR2s rose from 51.7 to 67.4 billion euros [2020 euros], an increase of 30
% under unchanged economic conditions and excluding the effect of inflation.
“ In 2023 euros, the bill reaches 80 billion. For comparison, this figure of 80 billion already represents four times the annual deficit of the Social Security…
They Dumped 200,000 Radioactive Barrels Into the Atlantic: 35 Years Later, French Scientists Are Going After Them.
For decades, radioactive barrels have sat hidden beneath the Atlantic, untouched and untracked. Now, French scientists are setting out on a mission unlike any before.
Arezki Amiri, May 29, 2025, https://indiandefencereview.com/they-dumped-200000-radioactive-barrels-into-the-atlantic-35-years-later-french-scientists-are-going-after-them/
For decades, they lay untouched and largely forgotten—hundreds of thousands of barrels filled with radioactive waste, scattered across the abyssal plains of the Atlantic Ocean. Now, more than 30 years after the last were submerged, a French scientific mission is preparing to search for them, raising fresh questions about the long-term impact of nuclear dumping at sea.
Decades-Old Barrels, Deep-Sea Mysteries
Between 1946 and 1990, over 200,000 barrels of radioactive waste were deliberately sunk into the Atlantic by various nations, including France. Packed in bitumen or cement, the containers were lowered into what scientists at the time considered to be lifeless zones, thousands of meters below the ocean surface and far from any coastline.
The practice was permitted until 1990, when it was banned under the London Convention following growing awareness of deep-sea ecosystems and the potential environmental risks of radioactive leakage. The barrels were never retrieved, and no comprehensive effort has since been made to assess their state—or their potential impact on marine life.
An Ambitious Mission Beneath 4,000 Meters
This summer, a group of French researchers will head into the Atlantic to do just that. The mission, called Nodssum, is a collaboration involving CNRS, Ifremer, and the French Oceanographic Fleet. Their immediate goal is to map a 6,000-square-kilometer section of the seafloor where a significant number of barrels are believed to be resting.
To locate them, the team will deploy a high-resolution sonar system and the autonomous submersible UlyX, one of the few underwater vehicles capable of operating at depths greater than 4,000 meters. UlyX will scan the ocean bottom, helping to establish the precise location of the containers and assess their current condition.
Questions of Leakage and Contamination
So far, the environmental effects of the submerged barrels remain unknown. As the article notes, “no one knows what impact the dumping of these barrels may have had on deep-sea ecosystems, or whether they still represent a radiological risk.” Part of the challenge lies in the vastness and inaccessibility of the ocean floor where the barrels were dropped.
Once the mapping phase is complete, a second campaign will be launched to collect samples of sediments, seawater, and marine organisms near the barrels. These samples will help determine whether radioactive materials have begun to escape their containers and what effect, if any, that may be having on surrounding ecosystems.
Unknowns Beneath the Surface
The mission represents one of the first large-scale scientific efforts to investigate this Cold War-era dumping ground. While scientists long assumed that the deep sea was barren and isolated, more recent research has shown that it is home to complex ecosystems, many of which remain poorly understood.
The researchers hope that the project will provide new insights into the long-term stability of radioactive waste in deep-sea environments and offer a clearer understanding of how past nuclear policies continue to shape today’s oceans.
France spent €90,000 countering research into impact of Pacific nuclear tests
Radiation-related thyroid, breast and lung cancers, as well as leukaemia and lymphoma, are prevalent across the islands.
Documents suggest campaign to discredit revelation that tests contaminated many more people than acknowledged
Jon Henley Guardian, 27 May 25
France’s Atomic Energy Commission (CEA) has spent tens of thousands of euros in an effort to counter research revealing that Paris has consistently underestimated the devastating impact of its nuclear tests in French Polynesia in the 1960s and 1970s.
Days before a parliamentary inquiry presents its report on the tests, documents obtained by the investigative outlet Disclose, and seen by Le Monde and the Guardian, suggest the CEA ran a concerted campaign to discredit the revelations.
A 2021 book, Toxique, which focused on just six of the 193 nuclear tests that France carried out from 1966 to 1996 at Moruroa and Fangataufa atolls, drawing on 2,000 pages of declassified material and dozens of interviews, concluded that they contaminated many more people than France has ever acknowledged.
The latest documents show that a year after the book’s publication, the CEA published 5,000 copies of its own booklet – titled “Nuclear tests in French Polynesia: why, how and with what consequences?” – and distributed them across the islands.
As part of an operation costing more than €90,000, the commission also flew a four-man team by business class to French Polynesia, where they stayed at the Hilton hotel, to meet local dignitaries and give interviews to the media.
The CEA’s booklet, printed on glossy paper, claimed to provide “scientific responses” to the “allegations” contained in Toxique, whose authors it said did not have “the same level of expertise”. It claimed contamination had been limited and that France always behaved transparently and with respect for local inhabitants’ health.
The publication of Toxique – based on the investigation by Disclose, Princeton University’s science and global security programme and Interprt, an environmental justice research collective – caused a furore in France, prompting visits to French Polynesia by a minister and the president, Emmanuel Macron, who acknowledged France’s “debt” to the region.
In one 1974 test alone, the scientific research found, 110,000 people – the population of Tahiti and its nearby islands – could have received a radiation dose high enough to qualify them for compensation if they later developed one of 23 different cancers.
Toxique alleged the CEA has long underestimated the radiation levels involved, significantly limiting the numbers eligible for compensation: by 2023, fewer than half the 2,846 compensation claims submitted had even been judged admissible.
The parliamentary inquiry, which has so far called more than 40 politicians, military personnel, scientists and victims, is due to report before the end of May on the social, economic and environmental impact of the tests – and whether France knowingly concealed the extent of contamination.
The CEA’s military division, CEA/DAM, the inventor of France’s atomic bomb, has repeatedly called this a “false assertion”. But France’s nuclear safety body, the ASNR, has since acknowledged “uncertainties associated with [the CEA’s] calculations” and confirmed to the parliamentary inquiry that it was impossible to prove people received radiation doses lower than the compensation threshold.
The CEA said in a statement that the aim of its booklet “was to provide Polynesians in particular with the elements to understand” the tests and their impact. It said the booklet applied “the necessary scientific rigour” to explain “the health and environmental consequences of the tests” in a “factual and transparent manner”……………………..
The inquiry has heard that the CEA/DAM has so far declassified only 380 documents in the four years since Macron demanded “greater transparency” around the tests and their consequences – compared with 173,000 declassified by the army.
Jérôme Demoment, the director of CEA/DAM, told the parliamentary inquiry earlier this year that it was “highly likely, if we were to have to manage [nuclear tests] today, that the system put in place would respond to a different logic”.
Forty-six of France’s nuclear tests were atmospheric, exposing the local population, site workers and French soldiers who were stationed in Polynesia at the time to high levels of radiation before the testing programme was moved underground in 1974.
Radiation-related thyroid, breast and lung cancers, as well as leukaemia and lymphoma, are prevalent across the islands. For its part, the French army has said up to 2,000 military personnel could have been exposed to enough radiation to cause cancer.
“The notion of a ‘clean bomb’ has generated controversy, which I fully understand,” Demoment told the parliamentary inquiry. “No nuclear test generating radioactive fallout can be considered clean.” https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/may/27/france-spent-90000-countering-research-into-impact-of-pacific-nuclear-tests
-
Archives
- February 2026 (199)
- January 2026 (308)
- December 2025 (358)
- November 2025 (359)
- October 2025 (376)
- September 2025 (258)
- August 2025 (319)
- July 2025 (230)
- June 2025 (348)
- May 2025 (261)
- April 2025 (305)
- March 2025 (319)
-
Categories
- 1
- 1 NUCLEAR ISSUES
- business and costs
- climate change
- culture and arts
- ENERGY
- environment
- health
- history
- indigenous issues
- Legal
- marketing of nuclear
- media
- opposition to nuclear
- PERSONAL STORIES
- politics
- politics international
- Religion and ethics
- safety
- secrets,lies and civil liberties
- spinbuster
- technology
- Uranium
- wastes
- weapons and war
- Women
- 2 WORLD
- ACTION
- AFRICA
- Atrocities
- AUSTRALIA
- Christina's notes
- Christina's themes
- culture and arts
- Events
- Fuk 2022
- Fuk 2023
- Fukushima 2017
- Fukushima 2018
- fukushima 2019
- Fukushima 2020
- Fukushima 2021
- general
- global warming
- Humour (God we need it)
- Nuclear
- RARE EARTHS
- Reference
- resources – print
- Resources -audiovicual
- Weekly Newsletter
- World
- World Nuclear
- YouTube
-
RSS
Entries RSS
Comments RSS
nuclear-news 