It works so "well" that the French taxpayer will have to pay the UK so they can deliver their guaranteed energy prices the over-due and over budget reactor they desperately try to finish will generate.
It's so fantastic that every summer they have to buy dirty coal energy from Germany because their rivers get too hot and every winter because...it's too cold and their ageing fleet is breaking down all the time.
The success is so staggering that they plan to reduce their fleet by 50% until 2030 and replace that with renewable energy.
Hooray...
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Edit: since the Astro-Turf reached me and I can't reply anymore due to downvotes, here are the answers to Bayart:
> I don't down where you get that broadly France relies on German coal in the summer and winter.
Why do you try to lie about something everybody can google. This is the first result for "France river hot":
> Pretty much the entirety of the problems we've had with the EPR program has to do stopping building nuclear power plants for decades and losing the associated skill-set and industrial base.
Weird because EPR didn't stop building. They just stopped building in France so this can't be right. Also: the reactors currently still under construction started construction when all the people from the peak construction times where still there. They still can't manage to build on budget or on time. Not even close.
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@corban1:
Only because Germany doesn't hide their subsidies doesn't mean that the French taxpayer is not paying for their ageing fleet (or overpriced projects abroad) with their taxes...
Also the fact that coal is an important job motor in troubled regions of Germany which is why it's still there (but is being phased out completely soon).
??? we're talking about the economic cost and carbon output of energy vs. how it is generated. Do you think there's some other common factor that explains France using lots of nuclear power and having a low carbon footprint and energy costs?
Imports and exports help to smooth out the load curve, but I don't down where you get that broadly France relies on German coal in the summer and winter. French net CO2 emissions remain stable and low the entire year, that's it. As far as I'm aware, heat waves have very little impact on nuclear energy production. Their impact on river temperatures is a few tenth of a degree and they can function on fairly high water temperatures (bellow 28c). I've read that over the last decade, which had several heat-waves, they accounted for an average production loss of 0.3%.
>It works so "well" that the French taxpayer will have to pay the UK so they can deliver their guaranteed energy prices the over-due and over budget reactor they desperately try to finish will generate.
Pretty much the entirety of the problems we've had with the EPR program has to do stopping building nuclear power plants for decades and losing the associated skill-set and industrial base.
> much the entirety of the problems we've had with the EPR program has to do stopping building nuclear power plants for decades
In 1999 a new reactor started in France (Civaux-2).
In 2005 a new building site started (at Olkiluoto, Finland).
Even by considering start dates (Civaux-2: 1991) and neglecting that skills are needed during the building (and not only when it started) they only are 14 years apart.
Moreover many skills are needed for the maintenance of the existing fleet (in France).
Olkiluoto was planned as soon as in 2000, when its builder Areva NP created an agency in Finland in order to sell the project.
Also: most skills (concrete, welding...) aren't completely specific to the nuclear industry: part of those are shared with many other fields.
How a huge and well-organized heavy industry which sells projects could let key skills evaporate in a few years (no, not 'decades')?
looks like you missed the most important part of your own source : "Atomic power from France’s 58 reactors accounts for over 75 percent of its electricity needs. Available nuclear power supply was down 1.4 percentage points at 65.3% of total capacity compared with Wednesday."
this missing capacity is less the usual slowdown of reactors because of the hot rivers (which by the way is done for environmental and not technical concern) and maintenances process, than a consequence of a previous nuclear plant closing (for political/electoral reasons). another consequence of this missing plant was to reopen two charcoal power plant _this_winter_.
a large part of the EPR slowdown in fr is due to security concern that changed while the project was already started, china EPRs which was similar but a lot less constrained was done in time.
on the price: 25% of the energy produced by nuclear in fr is sold under the market price to private retailers because of anti-monopolistic EU laws and stupidity of our governement. the electricity price in EU is usualy indexed on the worst gaz plant available, with the actual price of gaz raising and all of the 25% already acquired, a lot of them are just closing.
given those constrains, yes this model works more than well...
the project to close "50%" (in fact 15 reactors) until 2030 is another political subject which will probably never become a reality given that most renewable alternatives projects end up being blocked/hated everywhere.
funny fact: replacing ALL the current transport and electric energy supply in fr by wind turbines has been evaluated to require one of the most efficient available turbine for each km² on ALL the french territory...
Moreover it leaked (shouldn't happen!) due to defective combustible rod(s). This is relatively minor but in order to analyze they had to temporarily shut it down.
> this missing capacity is less the usual slowdown of reactors because of the hot rivers (which by the way is done for environmental and not technical concern) and maintenances process, than a consequence of a previous nuclear plant closing (for political/electoral reasons). another consequence of this missing plant was to reopen two charcoal power plant _this_winter_.
And I mean seriously...this is France we're talking about. Those informations are easy to google. Please stop spreading misinformation.
> a large part of the EPR slowdown in fr is due to security concern that changed while the project was already started, china EPRs which was similar but a lot less constrained was done in time.
Yeah they should just look away more like in China...it's just a nuclear reactor after all! France should also get some Tofu-dreg experience from China. This is the way.
Sorry...but I can't take such statements seriously. It's madness.
> funny fact: replacing ALL the current transport and electric energy supply in fr by wind turbines has been evaluated to require one of the most efficient available turbine for each km² on ALL the french territory...
Why would you even evaluate such a narrow scenario? This is beyond stupid. Renewables are not just wind.
Also I doubt this has been done seriously since there was a study years ago that you could power the whole of Europe if you take just the available building space on the coast and use wind.
> The report was from 2019 because it was the first search result
yes and all your sources are post 2019 (the fessenheim reactor has been slowed since 2017, the project/idea to close it started in 2012, and the effective (not reversible) closing has happened on feb 2020 while it was stopped since more than 2 years) dont really see what's your point here...
> This is why you diversify your energy.
no, our electric mix was simply not build on nuclear, hydroelectric and charcoal was our first power source, nuclear allowed us to close charcoal mines and plants while fullfilling the growing electric needs. nuclear is'nt without constrains that hydroelectric dont have, however there is not much more places to have new hydros. "renewables" will maybe goes up to 8% in the coming years and has already cost us more than 50billions€ (governement subvention) which is nearly two time our current non running EPR cost :) note that those 50billions was only for deployment they does'nt include exploitation cost, that's a big difference between wind turbines and nuclear, nuclear cost is mostly capitalistic (start investment for 60years in the case of an EPR) while wind turbine cost must be evaluated over their full lifetime including market fluctuations, try to evaluate that for the 60 years comming, good luck!
> Yeah they should just look away more like in China...
what's your point here again ? changing a project constrain while it is already started add cost and delay, however once done, acquired expertise usually reduce cost and delay. we have choosen our way to do it, probably for good reasons.
> but I can't take such statements seriously. It's madness.
actually this is your statement, your making a straw man here.
> there was a study years ago
what let you think that an old study with probably outdated constrains and knowledges would be more serious than actual studies from recognized sources (ecole polytechnique, les mines) ? and more important, those studies to be comparable must have the same subject, replacing nuclear with wind turbines is not the same as replacing nuclear + transportation(gas) for example. with the current urge (climatical and political) to reduce gas based transportations, there is also an urge/need to grow electric supply up to two time the actual production (unless your looking for economical collapse by replacing gas with nothing). from this point of view, current renewable are just a joke in france since we have no industries on renewables (they poorly failed/died) which means we will be fully dependent on external supply, and yes that's madness.
ho one last point, those studies are usually done with wind turbine because solar panels end up using a lot more surface than wind turbines, that let you think of the surface needs with a mix of the two...
> this is France we're talking about. Those informations are easy to google.
actually i'm french and in france (in case my poor english was'nt a sufficient hint), those subjects are a perpetual technical and political debate here, i dont really need google press report to explain me what i'm living (actually its a known fact that press is'nt an opposable source in techical subjects, try google schoolar maybe...) :)
How can that be? The whole discussion is not that long and you picked up this specific argument I was supporting with sources. Yes other sources were after 2019 and I can give you even more from before. This supports my argument but you don't even know what that was??
> no, our electric mix was
Says "no" continues to agree with what I said...man...
> however there is not much more places to have new hydros
Why did you chose hydro? I mean...what? I didn't even mention it and the most obvious things are solar AND wind. Hydro is our battery in the Nordics and alps.
> and has already cost us more than 50billions€ (governement subvention) which is nearly two time our current non running EPR cost
That is half of what EPR needs to invest to keep your ageing fleet from falling apart...
> nuclear cost is mostly capitalistic (start investment for 60years in the case of an EPR) while wind turbine cost must be evaluated over their full lifetime including market fluctuations
Yeah but only because you just accepted to ignore all the costs generations will have to come up with just to cover nuclear waste processing and storage. You just hide it while you complain about transparent costs on renewables. This is hilarious.
> what's your point here again ?
It's not my point. It's your point. You said that safety costs too much and we should look to China...a country known for terrible safety.
> actually this is your statement, your making a straw man here.
It's not my point. It's your point. You said that safety costs too much and we should look to China...a country known for terrible safety.
> what let you think that an old study with probably outdated constrains and knowledges would be more serious than actual studies from recognized sources
The fact that while nuclear only gets more expensive, renewables not only got cheaper but also better and there are now other studies which look much better than what you suggest.
Why don't you link your study? You've obviously found it now.
> actually i'm french and in france
That makes it even worse. You must know about the energy shortages caused by either broken or not running nuclear reactors. It's known all over Europe and you still chose to lie about it? Why?
> this specific argument I was supporting with sources
none of thoses sources is contradictory of what i explained on the history of our shortages.
> Why did you chose hydro?
because you talk about mix, today its fr secondary electricity production, and hydro plants are older than fr nuclear plants/projects.
>That is half of what EPR needs to invest to keep your ageing fleet from falling apart...
i'm not sure of what your talking about again, that's probably half or even less of what we must invest to keep our ageing (not EPR) nuclear fleet yes, which provide 75% of our production, in other words: 8% production for 50billions imported external products + exploitation cost on 20years vs 75% for 50billions local supply one shot to add 20 years to the current fleet, the choice is easy technicaly speaking (not politicaly). our ageing fleet is not linked to EPR at all which may be considered as a prototype for an eventual next fleet, we will see, and as already explained, the cost of our first EPR is not the cost of an EPR in a future fleet. side note: most of our ageing fleet have been build in only 10 years after 20 years of research and "prototypes".
> you just accepted to ignore all the costs generations will have to come up with just to cover nuclear waste
we started a project in 2000 for longterm deep storage which will provide waste stockage for more than 100years of our current dangerous waste production ( https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratoire_de_Bure ), for less dangerous product we are already treating not only our waste but most of the EU nuclear waste.
> You said that safety costs too much and we should look to China...
no i said our safety changes extended cost and delay, while china without changes respected cost and delay. which imply that our acquired expertise _with_ safety changes will probably respect and reduce cost like delay if we produce more EPR. this does'nt mean and i never said that we must do like china, that's your straw man.
> The fact that while nuclear only gets more expensive
source ? for the same type of product nuclear does'nt get more expensive, what get more expensive is more efficient, more secured, better and new/first try nuclear plants
> renewables not only got cheaper
renewable cost is a market cost not a local/production cost, like lithium for batteries, china got a mostly exclusive (quantitavely speaking) market on solar and parts of wind turbines (and for a time lithium) not by lowering cost but to acquire the market. we will talk about renewables production cost when they will be produced with renewables energy sources and not charcoal, gaz, gas and nuclear sources. yes nuclear actually rely on the same energy sources with one big diffence: it does'nt rely on it all it's lifetime.
> Why don't you link your study
because you have'nt link your "contradictory old study" and like i already said, to compare them they must apply to the same subject. but if you really want sources on this topic and a lot more about the same subject, there is the 20 hours
videos of courses of the "ecole des mines", one of the two or three most recognized schools in fr (largely better than any master or ph.d) :
you may find the site of the professor in the link which will provide a lot more ressources on nuclear and climate data and expertise, and probably some sources in english.
> You must know about the energy shortages
yes and you seem to not realize that those energy shortages are only on our own production, most of them where usually compensated by introducing/buying energy from others EU country with some minor exceptions like lowering the max available power on smalls customer populations and in rare case short cuts; no critical supply was ever stoped, no home get total shot down for more than a few hours, if those happens that was for small sets, nothing comparable to (for example, even if not linked to production i think) what happened in texas last winter, even occasional energy cut for technical problems which happen to all electry energy supply in all countries are worse than those "production shortages".
> you still chose to lie about it ? why ?
i'm not lying, you just seem to simply not knowing what you'r talking about, building some sort of fantasy disaster looking everywhere on google to confirm your bias (which will always be a success whatever may be the topic of your fantasy).
It works so "well" that the French taxpayer will have to pay the UK so they can deliver their guaranteed energy prices the over-due and over budget reactor they desperately try to finish will generate.
It's so fantastic that every summer they have to buy dirty coal energy from Germany because their rivers get too hot and every winter because...it's too cold and their ageing fleet is breaking down all the time.
The success is so staggering that they plan to reduce their fleet by 50% until 2030 and replace that with renewable energy.
Hooray...
---------------------
Edit: since the Astro-Turf reached me and I can't reply anymore due to downvotes, here are the answers to Bayart:
> I don't down where you get that broadly France relies on German coal in the summer and winter.
Why do you try to lie about something everybody can google. This is the first result for "France river hot":
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-electricity-heatwa...
> Pretty much the entirety of the problems we've had with the EPR program has to do stopping building nuclear power plants for decades and losing the associated skill-set and industrial base.
Weird because EPR didn't stop building. They just stopped building in France so this can't be right. Also: the reactors currently still under construction started construction when all the people from the peak construction times where still there. They still can't manage to build on budget or on time. Not even close.
----------------
@corban1:
Only because Germany doesn't hide their subsidies doesn't mean that the French taxpayer is not paying for their ageing fleet (or overpriced projects abroad) with their taxes...
Also the fact that coal is an important job motor in troubled regions of Germany which is why it's still there (but is being phased out completely soon).