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Greenpeace Fuels Concern About Nuclear Power

Greenpeace Fuels Concern About Nuclear Power
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Δευ, 5 Δεκεμβρίου 2011 - 18:48
Even though it was short-lived and ended peacefully, Greenpeace activists' infiltration of one of France's nuclear plants Monday proved a point: the country's nuclear plants' security might not be as tight as it should be.
Even though it was short-lived and ended peacefully, Greenpeace activists' infiltration of one of France 's nuclear plants Monday proved a point: the country's nuclear plants' security might not be as tight as it should be.

At least, as the French opposition Green party put it, the plant's owner and operator, state-controlled behemoth Electricite de France got a free security audit out of the demonstration. It's probably a good thing, considering the group is already faced with looming costs to increase safety at its 58 reactors, after the Fukushima disaster in Japan .

Not to mention the 59th it is building in the north of the country for EUR6 billion, by no means a final amount if one considers the precedent set by the reactor's predecessor, a safety and security-enhanced third-generation reactor, which went massively over budget. EDF has constantly refused to provide precise figures, but the extra safety costs will add to those needed to finance the extension of some of its reactors' life-span, a cost experts estimate at around EUR600 million to EUR650 million per 900 MW reactor.

And even if the group has been successful at cutting its debt and getting itself out of some potentially expensive ventures, such as the U.S. and Germany , over the past two years, it still needs to develop its capacities.

EDF announced Monday a EUR1.8 billion investment and also plans to build four reactors in the U.K. Add the current environment of economic downturn and EDF might find itself once more faced with the financial constraints its chairman and Chief Executive Henri Proglio has been so focused on getting rid of.

The Greenpeace demonstration is also a wake-up call for the French authorities, in charge of nuclear plant security, and who until very recently smirked at the very idea that French plants were unsecure. The action could well revive the impassioned public debate about the atomic risks in a country which before Fukushima took the energy use for granted.

The reaction of EDF in that regard has been in line with the potential public image disaster and the growing concern: several statements and a press conference to reassure that the Nogent-sur-Seine plant's core security compound hadn't been reached by the activists. Even if some of the demonstrators managed to climb on the roof of one of the two reactors during their action.
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