The news out of the United Kingdom on Monday was that they’re going to be giving the go-ahead to start the process of building 10 new nuclear power plants in England and Wales.  According to the BBC, most of the new plants will be built on sites where there are already nuclear power plants in operation.  They’re hoping to fast-track the plants so that they’re ready to start operating by 2018.   As a world leader in nuclear energy AREVA’s EPR™ reactor technology is  already under consideration for a number of these new  plants. 

Energy Secretary Ed Miliband says that developing the plants will create 9,000 jobs and be an important part of the UK’s climate-change plans, along with an increased use of renewables and development of clean coal technology.

The UK gets it: Nuclear power has an essential role to play in the world’s CO2-free energy future.  They’ve decided that investing in the nuclear renaissance is a necessary part of combatting climate change and improving the economic situation for thousands of Britons. 
Will the USA be the next nation to announce a big investment in clean, reliable, CO2-free nuclear energy?  As the discussion about the climate change bill heats up on Capitol Hill, we’re hoping that it will.  The economic and environmental benefits of the nuclear renaissance are apparent.

• For more analysis on this move, we highly recommend Dan Yurman’s excellent write-up.

The nuclear safety authorities in Finland, France and the United Kingdom have raised common questions regarding the respective I&C (instrumentation and control) certifications for the EPR™ reactor in each country. AREVA pointed out in a statement today that the authorities have not called into question the safety of the EPR™ reactor.

This constant dialog between operators, constructors and nuclear safety authorities is an integral part of the certification and construction processes for new reactors. AREVA is currently working with the regulators in each country to make the necessary adaptations, if any, to meet local standards.

The EPR™ reactor is currently the most powerful reactor in the world and meets the highest safety standards. EPR™ reactors are currently being built in Finland, France and China and the certification process is underway in the United States. AREVA is working closely with the authorities in each country to determine how its model can respond to various local issues.

AREVA guarantees the safety of its reactor and welcomes the approach made by the safety authorities to introduce a global standardization for its I&C model.

by Jarret Adams

Antinuclear activists lately have been trotting out that old chestnut that nuclear energy is not really CO2-free and that this claim is some type of deception. Here’s the short version: nuclear power plants do not produce CO2 while they are producing electricity. For each new AREVA EPR™ reactor that we build, we can avoid 10 million tons of CO2 emissions per year compared to a coal-fired plant.

Chart courtesy NEI.

Here’s the longer version: all power sources, including nuclear energy, renewables, fossil fuels and everything else, produce CO2 at various points during their respective lifecycles. There are emissions during the construction of new facilities, manufacturing of components, obtaining and refining the fuel, transportation to and from the facility, and so on. On the basis of lifecycle emissions, there is no energy source that does not produce some CO2 emissions when one includes full lifecycle and all related activities.

Nevertheless, even when one considers the lifecycle emissions of nuclear energy and renewables, they are very comparable. Reputable studies confirm this. A 2002 University of Wisconsin study showed that nuclear energy had 17 tons of CO2 emissions per Gigawatt-hour (GWh) of electricity compared with 14 tons of CO2 emissions per GWh for wind. For comparison, coal had 1,041 tons of CO2 emissions per GWh.

Several other studies, including 2008 study by the International Energy Agency (OECD), and a 2006 study by the U.K. Government, offer similar conclusions: nuclear energy lifecycle emissions are similar to wind and lower than solar photovoltaic. Here also is a great article from a UN International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) publication that lays it out well.

This should take nothing away from renewables – AREVA supports renewables. We are currently installing our M5000 offshore wind turbines off the coast of Germany and recently announced an agreement to build 80 more. These 5 MW turbines are the world’s biggest, and we hope to build hundreds of them around the world, including here in North America.

The point is that nuclear energy and renewables are complementary and are key elements in helping us move toward a low-carbon future. Anti-nukes seem to believe that a dollar spent on nuclear energy is a dollar taken away from renewables. This is not true. We need to begin investing more in both if we are serious about addressing our energy and climate change goals.

A recent Toronto Star article presented some misleading figures about cost competitiveness of nuclear energy, in regards to the bid in progress for two new reactors. This also made it to the Climate Progress Blog—so we figured that we should “clear the air,” because this is something the nuclear energy industry is already very good at.

Now what is true about nuclear energy is that it’s a growing as a source for clean, viable, and economic energy all over the world. Look at the cases of India and China, two booming countries for which access to energy is not a question of prestige, but a matter of social stability and sustainable development. Do you think these countries would have chosen nuclear energy if it weren’t a cost-effective solution? Major European states, such as the United Kingdom, France, Italy, and Sweden, are taking progressive steps or are already launching new nuclear energy programs. In the U.S., there are already approximately 30 new nuclear power plants proposed. It’s unlikely that these utilities’ consideration of building new nuclear power plants was guided by philanthropic concerns.

Facts are stubborn things. Nuclear energy produces electricity at a competitive and predictable price—especially if we add in carbon pricing. Once construction costs are amortized, the operating costs of a nuclear facility are among the lowest of any generating source. This includes the fact that nuclear energy is the only major source of electricity that incorporates the cost of managing its own waste materials, unlike fossil-fuel plants that just allow their smoke and other byproducts to escape into the air.