EDF seeks to end its U.S. nuclear misadventure

NRC file photo of Calvert Cliffs nuclear power plant on the shoreline of the Chesapeake Bay in Lusby, MDAs reported by the Baltimore Sun, Exelon/Constellation Nuclear will pay Electricite de France (EDF) a $400 million "special dividend" payment, in exchange for severing partnerships at three U.S. nuclear power plants, totaling five reactors, including Calvert Cliffs Units 1 & 2 on the Chesapeake Bay in Lusby, Maryland (photo, left), and the Ginna and Nine Mile Point Unit 1 & 2 nuclear power plants on the Lake Ontario shore of Upstate, New York. EDF then has the option to sell its 49.99% stake in the nuclear power plants to Exelon between 2016-2022.

When Constellation abandoned the project, not wanting to risk its own skin in the game in exchange for a $7.5 billion federal nuclear loan guarantee offered by the Obama administration, EDF was left holding the bag as majority owner of the proposed new reactor, Calvert Cliffs Unit 3. But foreign ownership is illegal under the Atomic Energy Act, and no other American partner stepped up. The proposed new reactor was to have been a French Areva EPR (1,600 Megawatt-electric Evolutionary Power Reactor). Numerous additional proposed new EPRs have been indefinitely postponed or outright canceled across the U.S. and Canada.

As reported in the article, 'EDF Chief Financial Officer Thomas Piquemal said Tuesday that the deal represents what he hopes is "the last chapter of our U.S. adventure with Constellation," Bloomberg reported.

The Baltimore Business Journal also reported on this story.

As reported by Power Engineering International, EDF's CEO, Henri Proglio, speaking at a news conference in Paris, stated: "The circumstances for the development of nuclear in the US are not favorable at the moment. We are a major player in nuclear, but we are not obsessed by nuclear. Our development in the US will focus on renewable energy – that will be our vector of growth in the US.” (emphasis added)

New World Nuclear Industry Status Report shows industry in decline

The newly published World Nuclear Industry Status Report 2013 (WNISR) provides a reality check of the current situation and trends of an industry in great difficulties. Nuclear power generation experienced a record drop of 7 percent in 2012. The 140-page report provides many different health indicators of the global nuclear industry and, for the first time, an essential status report on the complex situation that arose from the triple meltdowns in Fukushima. Some of the key findings:

• A record decline in world nuclear power generation (–7% in 2012).

• A long term, steady drop of the nuclear share in global electricity production from 17% in 1993 to 10% in 2012.

• Rapid aging: average now 29 years with 190 units 30+ years in operation.

• Poor renewal with 6 units shutdowns vs. 3 startups in 2012 and 2 shutdowns vs. 1 startup in the first half of 2013.

• 800,000 tons of water in precarious storage at Fukushima contain 2.5 times the radioactivity released at Chernobyl. 

• China, Germany, India and Japan, in 2012, generated more power from renewables than from nuclear plants.

Download the full report.

30 Greenpeace activists breach security at French reactor

Between 20-30 Greenpeace activists successfully broke into a nuclear power plant at the giant Tricastin nuclear facility in southern France on July 15 prompting calls for an examination of security at French nuclear facilities. The action exposed the very real vulnerabilities of France, the longtime illusory nuclear “poster child” of nuclear power industry boosters. The activists screened messages on the side of the reactor building, including one that asks "ready to pat the price," pictured left. Read more.

1,000 rally in China to defeat planned uranium processing plant

From Bloomberg: "Plans to build a uranium-processing facility in China’s southern Guangdong province were scrapped by the local government after more than a thousand people protested against the 37 billion yuan ($6 billion) project last week. The proposed Longwan Industrial Park project won’t be approved “in order to fully respect the opinion of the masses,” the Heshan government said in a statement on its website yesterday. A “social-stability risk assessment” of the proposal that was released for public awareness generated “much opposition,” it said." Read the full article.

Former NRC commissioner says illusion of nuclear revival "in ruins"

Former NRC commissioner, Peter Bradford (pictured left),  penned a column which appeared last week in the British daily, The Guardian, showing how the rhetoric and obedience on which the alleged nuclear "renaissance" depended was an illusion that "is all in ruins now.” The only four US reactors under construction are “hopelessly uneconomic,” Bradford wrote. "For various reasons, in many nations the nuclear industry cannot tell the truth about its progress, its promise or its perils. Its backers in government and in academia do no better," he wrote, describing the willingness of the media to lap up the propaganda. Read the full article.