Companies

Taiwan may ship nuclear waste to France

Sunday, January 20, 2008

TAIPEI - Taiwan is mulling transporting its nuclear waste to France for reprocessing as two of the island’s radioactive waste storage sites will reach capacity by 2011, a report said Sunday.

State-run Taiwan Power Company (Taipower) last year applied to expand the storage facilities but has so far not received approval from the Atomic Energy Council over environmental impact considerations, the China Times said.

Posted in | »

£7.4 million ventilation overhaul

Friday, January 18, 2008

NEI, 18 January 2008 - UK firm JGC Engineering and Technical Services has won a £7.4 million contract to replace an old ventilation network at the Dounreay nuclear plant in Scotland.

The old system, in the site’s fuel cycle area, is not up to modern standards and has been earmarked for upgrading for some time, partly due to radiological contamination.

Posted in | »

German nuclear reactor row goes to higher court

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - A court ruled on Wednesday that a dispute between the German government and a power group about whether to close a major nuclear reactor will be referred to the country's Federal Administrative Court.

The decision prolongs a dispute between the operator, Vattenfall Europe, which last year applied to keep the 806 megawatts plant open beyond 2010, and the Environment Ministry, which threw out the application.

Posted in | »

Power failure: What Britain should learn from Finland's nuclear saga

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

It was hailed as the template for all future reactors – but then they tried to build it.

The island of Olkiluoto, off Finland's west coast, seems like the perfect picture of Nordic serenity. Surrounded by the still, idyllic waters of the Gulf of Bothnia, it looks like an ideal spot for a peaceful retreat away from it all. Anyone wanting to visit the island has to travel down a long, lonely road, hugged tightly on each side by a thick forest of spruce and birch, and avoid the many elk that roam freely.

Posted in | »

Areva in deal to open uranium mine in Niger

Tuesday, January 15, 2008

By Matthew Green in Nairobi

Areva, the French nuclear company, has secured a key source of uranium needed to supply its global expansion plans with a deal to open a new mine in Niger.

Posted in | »

How the nuclear industry lost its power

Monday, January 14, 2008

Nuclear power is back on the agenda in Britain. If more nuclear stations are ordered, which is far from certain, it will mark a fresh start for an industry in which Britain once hoped to lead the world, but which was crippled by a series of misjudgments on the part of politicians, managers and investors.

Posted in | »

France shows the nuclear way

Friday, January 11, 2008

By Peggy Hollinger in Paris

When Anne Lauvergeon took over France's nuclear group Cogema in 1999, one of her first acts was to install cameras in the fuel and waste treatment chambers of La Hague, France's highly sensitive reprocessing site on the north coast.

Posted in | »

Germany to remain anti-nuclear stronghold

Thursday, January 10, 2008

FRANKFURT, Jan 10 (Reuters) - Germany will uphold staunch political opposition to atomic energy, unperturbed by the mood swinging back in favour of nuclear power elsewhere.

Oil at record highs, climate worries, and the need to cut dependency on energy imports is due to move the British government to back new nuclear power plants on Thursday.

But Germany, Europe's biggest and most central power market, will not follow suit.

Posted in | »

Areva’s power play sets off sparks

Thursday, January 10, 2008

FT, January 10 2008 19:59: The new year has hardly begun and already the first salvoes over the future of the world’s biggest nuclear group, Areva, have been fired.

Last week it emerged that Areva had held preliminary talks with French construction group Vinci about a partnership to build nuclear power stations in the UK and elsewhere.

Posted in | »

Olkiluoto-3 completion targeted for summer 2011

Tuesday, January 8, 2008

Olkiluoto-3 will be completed in "summer 2011," Finnish utility Teollisuuden Voima Oy said. TVO said the Areva-Siemens consortium, which had previously targeted 2011 after a two-year delay on the original
schedule, had informed it December 28 of the summer target.

Posted in | »