PARIS—France's nuclear-safety watchdog ordered immediate upgrades to nuclear reactors to guard against natural disasters, which Électricité de France SA said could require €10 billion, or roughly $13 billion, in additional costs.
In a review following last year's Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan, the Autorité de Sûreté Nucléaire concluded that no plants needed to be shut down immediately but that steps should be taken as "soon as possible" to improve safety at France's 58 reactors.
Nuclear safety authorities in four countries are assessing the significance of undocumented welding on primary circuit piping for the EPR reactor under construction at Olkiluoto-3, Petteri Tiippana, director of the nuclear reactor regulation department at the Finnish Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority STUK, told Platts in an interview Thursday.
But Tiippana said that contrary to a statement made Wednesday by Marie-Pierre Comets, a commissioner of French nuclear safety authority ASN, regulators from Finland, France, the UK and the US are not preparing a joint statement on the piping qual
