Nuclear power in Europe

The European Union and India are to co-operate more closely on civil nuclear research and development as a way of strengthening a partnership that has often been seen as falling short of its potential.

Nicolas Sarkozy, France’s president, and Manmohan Singh, India’s prime minister, announced the agreement on Monday at an EU­-India summit that also produced promises of closer co-ordination of climate change and energy security policies. (more…)

Paris, 17 September: Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico and French President Nicolas Sarkozy today signed an agreement on cooperation in nuclear energy and agreements on strategic partnership which is expected to enhance all-round relations between the two countries.

“France and Slovakia have clearly opted for nuclear energy. It covers 50 per cent of electric energy consumption in Slovakia,” the French presidential office said on the meeting. (more…)

Sylvie Eymard’s Provence farmhouse kitchen should be the picture of French rural calm. But the stockpiles of bottled water, disinfectant rinse and disposable paper plates hint at something strange.

For the past two weeks, Eymard, 41, and her children, 13 and seven, have had a phobia of taps. To wash up, they go out to the yard and fill a bowl from a specially delivered plastic tank of purified water on a fork-lift tractor. They carry the water up to the bathroom to wash. Even the dog drinks bottled water, and it is left out for the birds. (more…)

The French government on Thursday ordered an investigation into the water table around all of France’s 58 nuclear reactors in an effort to dispel fears raised by a leak from a treatment plant run by Areva in southern France.

Jean-Louis Borloo, ecology minister, has asked an independent committee to carry out the probe to stem mounting public concern over nuclear waste management after a low-grade leak at the Socatri treatment plant at Tricastin focused public attention on a still unexplained, older contamination of the water table. (more…)

Britain must build “at least” eight new nuclear power stations during the next 15 years to replace its ageing plants and contribute to a “post-oil economy” that is cleaner and much more efficient than in the era of “cheap energy and careless pollution”, Gordon Brown signalled last night. The first new reactors could feed electricity into the national grid by 2017.

Ministers want the private sector to make the running, but fear that the parallel contraction of the UK’s coal and oil-fired generating capacity, on environmental grounds, will trigger a serious energy gap unless the government moves decisively. (more…)

France’s two biggest energy groups, EDF and GDF Suez, are vying to build the country’s latest nuclear power plant, casting fresh doubt on their participation in Britain’s planned nuclear renaissance.

Last week President Nicolas Sarkozy gave the go-ahead for a second new-generation European pressurised reactor (EPR) on an existing site. It will be France’s 60th nuclear power plant. (more…)

LE CREUSOT, July 3: President Nicolas Sarkozy announced on Thursday that France will build a second third-generation EPR nuclear plant, arguing that nuclear power was France’s best answer to soaring energy prices.

“We are going to build a new EPR nuclear reactor, separate from the one in Flamanville,” Sarkozy said in a speech on energy policy as he visited an ArcelorMittal steel factory in central France. (more…)

PARIS, July 4 (Reuters) - French alternative power supplier Poweo on Friday said it was interested in taking part in the construction of new-generation European Pressurised nuclear Reactors (EPR) in France.

“Poweo has long expressed its interest in co-investing in an EPR, and today confirms its interest in being associated either to the Flamanville site under construction, or to the new project along with other energy players involved,” the company said in a statement. (more…)

France and Algeria have signed an agreement on civil nuclear co-operation during a visit to Algiers by the French Prime Minister, Francois Fillon.

Mr Fillon described the agreement as a sign of a “transformation” in the countries’ ties.

Relations were very bad for years after the Algerian war of independence forced France to abandon its treasured colony. (more…)

“It’s time to look to the French,” New York Times columnist Roger Cohen wrote in January. “They’ve got their heads in the right place, with nuclear power enjoying a 70 percent approval rating.” Similarly, presumptive Republican presidential candidate John McCain has wondered, “If France can produce 80 percent of its electricity with nuclear power, why can’t we?” Even Southern Republicans are becoming Francophiles, with Georgia State Rep. Amos Amerson, chairman of the Georgia House Science and Technology Committee, asking how the French system might help the United States in its “efforts to obtain cleaner, cheaper, more stable energy.” (more…)