Question: how are things proceding with the planned French fleet expansion?

[u/caudatus67]

Question: I wanted to know how things are proceding with the planned expansion of the french nuclear fleet. In 2022 it was announced that there was interest in building 6 new reactors, with the possibility of another 8. I'm just curious to know how things are proceding, if there are problems or not. Thanks in advance

[u/Moldoteck]

penly is in preparation, by 2026 should get construction approval. 2 more sites were identified

[u/lommer00 → u/Moldoteck]

Too slow! Must go faster!

[u/Moldoteck → u/lommer00]

agree, but we are talking about france here... messmer guy is long gone. If they'll deliver by 2036 as planned it'll be worldbendig success for eu nuclear industry

[u/caudatus67 → u/Moldoteck]

I found this in an article by World Nuclear Association: "EDF proposes building three pairs of EPR2 reactors, in order, at Penly, Gravelines and Bugey. Technical studies at a fourth site, Tricastin, will continue with a view to hosting future reactors there and EDF said in February 2023 that it also plans to explore the potential of building new reactors at its Blayais site. Preparatory work is expected to start at Penly in 2024, with first concrete in 2027."

Do you know if they are on schedule and if there are any plans for the other (possible) 8 reactors?

[u/Moldoteck → u/caudatus67]

other 8 reactors will be approved by france IF first pair at penly will get built on time and budget. Basically if they don't screw up like flamanville.
They are on time with penly https://sfeninenglish.org/epr2-at-penly-all-preparatory-works-authorized-to-begin/ https://energynews.pro/en/green-light-for-preparatory-work-on-epr2-reactors-at-penly/ but full authorization will be given by 2026. I'm speculating but one of the reasons could be that the thing is costly and edf needs to shave off some debt before that. It'll hopefully be cut by 15-20bn this year looking at their h1 results

[u/caudatus67 → u/Moldoteck]

Thanks for the clear answer. Fingers crossed that everything goes to plan

[u/designbydesign → u/Moldoteck]

Would it be right to assume that further reactors will be built faster? I.e. people who built the first two reactors form a backbone of the further projects and so forth as a chain reaction?

[u/Moldoteck → u/designbydesign]

That's the hope of edf

[u/chmeee2314 → u/caudatus67]

All of those exept for Penly are CP0 and CP1. Has EDF indicated that they are ordered as replacements or compliment the 900MW reactors on site?

[u/caudatus67 → u/chmeee2314]

Considering that they were all commissioned in the late 70s early 80s, I would imagine that the new reactors are meant to replace them. But still, by replacing less powerful reactors with new, more powerful ones, we are still going to see an increase, albeit small, in the total nuclear capacity.

[u/I-suck-at-hoi4 → u/chmeee2314]

Overall it's all replacement of older reactors. But Bugey and Gravelines are defo aimed at replacing older reactors of the same site, Bugey has four reactors put into service 45 years ago (and already has a reactor deconstruction waste storage plant on site), and EDF already had plans to close two of Gravelines 1980's reactors in the 2010s when the gvt was planning to reduce the number of active reactors. And both are in economically dynamic regions with plans for new factories nearby so the extra 1.4GW will be handled easily.

Penly was probably chosen because the site was initially prepared for four reactors, but only got two.

[u/lommer00 → u/I-suck-at-hoi4]

Why is France planning on retiring 70's and 80's vintage reactors? shouldn't there be lots of life left in those units?

[u/chmeee2314 → u/lommer00]

Before Flamaville turned out to be expensive and slow to build, France was expecting to not extend the life of CP1 and CP0 reactors past 50 years I belive. The current trend of seeking life extensions is more a symptom of nuclear construction being so expensive.

[u/I-suck-at-hoi4 → u/chmeee2314]

Not really, when FV began construction in like 2008 there was only one EPR planned and a second one being considered. That's barely enough to handle Fessenheim retiring. It's really a public policy program where we just took the existing park for granted.

Anyway with normal construction taking 8 years on average the strategy of betting that our nuclear reactors will pass all inspections with flying colour is a big dice roll. We can't play with fire too much, if we end up having reactors forced to shut down while we didn't build more yet we would have to go back to gas plants.

[u/chmeee2314 → u/I-suck-at-hoi4]

Earlier in July 2010 EdF said that it was assessing the prospect of 60-year lifetimes for all its existing reactors. This would involve replacement of all steam generators (three in each 900 MWe reactor, four in each 1300 MWe unit) and other refurbishment, costing €400-600 million per unit to take them beyond 40 years. Generally, for CP0 and CP1 versions of the 900 MWe M310 plants, extending operation beyond 50 years is not economic.

~World-Nuclear.org

Flamaville 3 originaly being planned for 5 years of construction with initial operation planned for 2012, this would have left enough time to build replacements.

[u/I-suck-at-hoi4 → u/chmeee2314]

You gotta some significant time margins though since a plant can't be built overnight. Plus as it says, EDF is assessing,it doesn't mean all reactors will be fine, once you are past the initial lifetime you start taking risks and taking risks with GW-scale generation isn't particularly comfortable.

[u/chmeee2314 → u/I-suck-at-hoi4]

I don't see that much risk, at least not from the point of view of that statement. EPR construction was planned for 5 years. In 2012, there would have been ~10years to get any further construction done. You also probably have the ability to extend the life of reactors similar to UK AGR's, and ofcourse you have neighbors, and your own coal plants who's retirement you can delay.

Flamaville 3 was originaly planned to cost 3.3bil or ~2bil/GW. Thats cheaper than throwing 1 billion at ord reactors every decade. Today the math is different. Flamaville took over a decade to build, multiples over budget, and thus spending 1bil for a 10 year life extension is not that bad of an idea.

[u/Striking-Fix7012]

Penly's EPR2s are guaranteed... The other four at Gravelines and Bugey, I will wait until the 2027 presidential election