Why French Nuclear Energy Failed

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Into Europe: France's nuclear industry faces a problem, in the midst of an energy crisis, half of its reactors are offline and it is struggling to turn them back on. It's an industry that was a source of pride for the French but that now faces existential difficulties.
So what happened to France's nuclear industry, and can it be saved?
00:00 Introduction
00:37 France's nuclear build-up
02:41 The post-cold war world
03:27 Sponsored Segment
04:31 EDF vs Liberalism
06:22 The fall of France's nuclear Industry
07:36 The plan to revive nuclear in France
© All Rights Reserved.
Contact information:
Email: [e-mail]
Twitter: / europeinto
Patreon: / intoeurope
Main Sources:
France's Nuclear Build-up
Grubler, A. (2010). The costs of the French nuclear scale-up: A case of negative learning by doing. Energy Policy, 38(9), 5174-5188. doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2010....
Rapport Folz
Folz, J.-M. (n.d.). Rapport - vie publique. Retrieved November 7, 2022, from www.vie-publique.fr/sites/def...
The ARENH Mechanism:
The ARENH, regulated access to France's historic nuclear energy. Magnus Commodities. (2022, August 17). Retrieved November 7, 2022, from www.magnuscmd.com/the-arenh-r...
The difficulties of EDF (3 part series by Le Point):
EDF, Les Racines d'un crash : "Une entreprise normale ferait faillite". LExpansion.com. (2022, October 4). Retrieved November 7, 2022, from lexpansion.lexpress.fr/actual...
EDF, Les Racines d'un crash : "C'est l'union soviétique, avec un peu plus d'argent". LExpansion.com. (2022, October 4). Retrieved November 7, 2022, from lexpansion.lexpress.fr/actual...
EDF, Les Racines d'un crash : Les "Trahisons" De l'Etat Actionnaire. LExpansion.com. (2022, October 5). Retrieved November 7, 2022, from lexpansion.lexpress.fr/actual...
Overview of Europe's nuclear future:
Hernandez, A. (2021, March 12). Europe's Sputtering Nuclear Renaissance. POLITICO. Retrieved November 7, 2022, from www.politico.eu/article/europ...

[@IntoEurope]

Skip the waitlist and invest in blue-chip art for the very first time by signing up for Masterworks: masterworks.art/intoeurope Purchase shares in great masterpieces from artists like Pablo Picasso, Banksy, Andy Warhol, and more. 🎨 See important Masterworks disclosures: masterworks.io/cd

[@dantetre]

2:41 Chernobyl happened in 1986!

[@FrizzelFry]

@@dantetre Chernobyl is not in France

[@ai_product_manager]

masterworks sounds like a scam, did you do your research before promoting them?

[@ieslodzitais]

Why does masterworks need to advertise if they’re so in demand there’s a waiting list?

[@glike2]

Dispatchable nuclear with relatively easy thermal storage in sand or bricks and multiple steam turbine generators could do base load and peak power generation. Next generation must be designed with this capability to be competitive.

[@TheSpecialJ11]

France's choice to pursue nuclear was one of the best ever made. It's so sad to see underinvestment in such a huge advantage.

[@dinamosflams]

in fact I say the only weak link right now is germany and their energetic tourret syndrom

[@TremereTT]

france is reliant on Russian Uranus for its powerplants, even in war times! There is a reason why Uranium is not on the sanctions list against Russia!

[@NaumRusomarov]

They’ve been dumping huge amounts of public money into their failed nuclear program. It’s just that their gen.3 reactors are a complete mess.

[@MTobias]

@@TremereTT Russia is only the 6th largest producer of Uranium in the world...

[@TremereTT]

@@MTobias I know. But France relies on the Russian Uranium exclusively, for now! If it would have been otherwise , we would have banned Russian Uranium in the EU! The world marked is saturated with long running contracts on Uranium. Other producers have nothing left to replace Russian Uranium in France. And without it France would be in trouble...more than it allready is... It has lengthened the live times of a lot of it's nuclear powerplants that should have been powered down allready and whose frequency of new defects found are allready uneconomically high. We all need to find a solution for France! Maybe opening old Uranium mines in East Germany or watching for a corrupt country in Africa that has Uranium whos government could get bought.

[@DoraEmon-xf8br]

As a French citizen, it still amazes me to see how our politics turned to dung what was before one of our best industries and what allowed us to have pretty cheap energy. Everytime I think they've reach some kind of bottom in their silliness, they manage to dig even deeper.

[@bismuth6558]

And let's not talk about Alstom

[@stormshadow5283]

Yea coz you guys milked the blood of West Africans for your cheap energy. Now that they are throwing you out no wonder your cheap energy is gone.

[@felineboy1586]

Its has more to do with market forces bro and the public demands in this case

[@witoldschwenke9492]

Ahem. French never had cheap energy. The reactors ran on tax money all this time, your electricity prices never reflected the costs of production.

[@mortenlund1418]

Are any of you sure - that if in charge - you could do any better?

[@7adzius]

Interesting to see that the privatization of the electricity market had dire consequences in France as well. In Lithuania this year the government decided to go forward with the liberalization of our electricity market which spiked the prices to one of if not the highest in the entire union, as well as a collapse of one of the non - government "providers" of electricity, leaving many people screwed.

[@baronvonlimbourgh1716]

It's a shitshow everywhere. The wanted to liberalise it in order to create a european wide network instead of the domestic networks we used to have. And it did succeed in that. But it created a whole new list of problems in the process. What they should have done is turn it all into one big european company with every eu country being shareholder and run by the eu. Same thing is going to happen with the railroads, they made the exact same mistakes there.

[@hagalathekido]

surely that must have freed up some tax money no?

[@baronvonlimbourgh1716]

@@hagalathekido these industries are probably the most subsedised in europe. A government entity can simply keep selling their reserves for the price they bought it for and by the time prices come down fill their reserves back up again. Insulating them from market instability. Private companies simply charge the market rate since they are just middle men buying it at the same time they sell it to the public forcing market rates onto the public.

[@zaurenstoates7306]

Short term gains long term consequences

[@JustAGuyWhoLikesStuff.]

@@hagalathekido Why would it? Even then is that really worth it?

[@FrizzelFry]

40 years of cheap energy with no acidents - I don't see how that is not a succes

[@lucaj8131]

It is, the incapacity to make it to 60 years is just a massive shame.

[@witoldschwenke9492]

"cheap".. no tax funded subsidized energy hiding its true cost. but it was a good idea back in the day. it just no longer is.

[@paxundpeace9970]

The problem it isn't cheap.

[@paxundpeace9970]

It is highly taxfunded and will still cost billions in the future. Even reactors finished in the last 20 years were far more expensive to build and to operate then other typs of power generation in europe. Reactors that are about to get started will be costing about 5 times as much to build and 3 times as much to operate then other power generation.

[@lucaj8131]

@@paxundpeace9970 it is

[@troymcmahon488]

This is what happens when you try to fix something that isn't broken.

[@lucaj8131]

Exactly, why did France need a liberal market for its electricity?

[@jaystrickland4151]

@@lucaj8131 Something something EU something something.

[@MB-em9ek]

@@lucaj8131 UE made it mandatory to open the market in France to competition. As a result, EDF, the company in charge of producing the electricity, has to sell the last one to the competition (competition that doesn't produce it btw, they're only distributors.)

[@stevens1041]

@@lucaj8131 Same nonsense happened in Japan. Exactly the same.

[@matouskulhanek3320]

I wouldnt blame the EU it was the neoliberal wave of stupidity that infected evereyone, it created the oligarchy in Russia, it opresses workers rights in America. I think we agree that EU is better than those examples.

[@jaimemozas2452]

As a spaniard, we've also been benefiting by French nuclear energy policies during decades, also lowering our energy prices thanks to french energy sales trought our northern electrical interconection (same with Portugal). Nuclear power is one of the best tools we have to gain energy independance as a union, and to allow us to grow our renewable energy park

[@stevens1041]

Italy is the same. We also buy the nuclear power from France.

[@dersven4122]

@@stevens1041 We had our own nuclear reactors. All shut down.

[@noah-ni3ee]

Building nuclear reactors takes a lot of time and is really expensive (not a cheap energy source). The french reactors have a lot of issues. How come that you think it is a good way to get to renewable energy?

[@jaimemozas2452]

@@noah-ni3ee A nuclear power plant is really expensive as you say, but it also produces huge amount of energy 24/7 for more than 40 years, so the levelized cost of energy (€/MWh) is one of the lowest in the market. Also, as nuclear plants provide an stable power of 1 GW per reactor, they are one of the best resources to keep the grid stable with the integration of intermittent power generation plants such as renewables

[@noah-ni3ee]

@@jaimemozas2452 everything i have read has it among the most expensive forms of energy. Almost no county is building new ones and those in France and Finland are much more expensive than planned. Sadly renewables and nuclear aren't great together. You can't really control them. For nuclear to be economical it has run on full power and renewables are dependent on weather. I am not saying one or the other is the solution. If we take france and Germany i think both are making huge mistakes. A mix of diverse sources of energy is probably the best until we have good options to store the energy from renewables

[@robbebrecx2136]

We should do what France did in the 80's again on a EU wide level, we develop and standardize a new more flexible reactor type for current and future grid service. We go on a building spree to replace all base-load electricity production by nuclear energy this we must do in combination with renewebles. The costs will be the lowest and we will create a new industry that can competitively produce green molecules to replace oil and gas for the chemical industry and ofcourse those profits stay in Europe. We can't do it without nuclear if we try Europe will become obsolete.

[@RK-cj4oc]

Yeah no. Europe is way to filled with people for a large amount of reactors. at least the west. 1 nuclear reactor going Chernobyl. ( yeah now repeat the bot response of " but its so rare to happen" Yeah, it only needs to happen once tho.) could cause half a country to be evacuated. 1 nuclear reactor in the Netherlands or Belgium breaking down mean you now have 5 million refugees in a single day. good luck with that.Europe does not need nuclear. Or at the very least. not at a much higher extent than we already have.

[@pxidr]

@@RK-cj4oc Comparing soviet-designed Chernobyl (RBMK) reactors, with defective safety systems and NO containement structure vs. western-designed PWRs with advanced safety features AND a containement structure is beyond moronic.

[@RK-cj4oc]

@@pxidr Good bot.

[@lucaj8131]

@@RK-cj4oc The irony🤣. How much do you actually know about Chernobyl or western designs?

[@witoldschwenke9492]

Bro i have a degree in business and energy and delt with the costs of energy a lot. Nuclear is not cheap at all. If we did what you suggested, firstly we'd need decades to do it and don't have the capacity to do it, secondly it would be extremely expensive and cost more than any alternative except for the underdeveloped wave power. Thirdly it would increase demand for uranium so the costs and emissions for mining uranium would grow much faster than they already do. That's right with every passing year uranium gets harder and harder to mine and more and more polluting and energy intensive. By the mid of a new nuclear plants lifespan, if we built one today, starting its operation in 15 years (realistic construction time) and then 15 more years.. and voila at that point even with current demand for uranium, it would consume so much energy that the energy needed in the entire nuclear plant supply chain and construction and dismantling would bring the life cycle emissions of nuclear power ABOVE gas power plants. Not to mention the costs. If it was possible I'd be all for it but its not feasible, we don't have easily accessible uranium anymore. It would be so simple so easy if nuclear was an option. Would solve all the problems. but it can't. it's impossible. it is a finite ressource and unless there's some significant nuclear power breakthrough we won't have much nuclear power left in the world by the end of this century.

[@MrAlexandriou]

5:00 Small precision. EDF was forced to sell electricity *at a loss* to competitors , allowing these actors to artificially compete... In an ironic move, the French government completely undermined its own energy sector, giving in to the pressure of other European countries which could reasonably not compete on the energy sector, having dismantled their own reactors.

[@FernandoWINSANTO]

During the night demand is LOW, y cannot stop these things every 12 hours

[@harrytheprince6951]

Don‘t listen to the sponsoring. When bond markets are up - which they currently are - all alternative modes of investment usually devalue. Also, by investing in Masterworks you do not hold parts of the artwork, but a derivative denominating your share in the value of the art piece. These derivatives are currently the focus of new regulation by many lawmakers due to the rise in fraudulent behaviour on those markets resulting from underregulation. Worst case: Platform goes down, you lose all your money invested, 2nd worst case: Government decides the contracts are illegal and reimburse owners with the initial amount invested -> no protection from inflation, nothing gained It is sad to see how many channels - even if they have good content - do not screen their sponsors.

[@ErikBramsen]

Yes. I acknowledge that youtubers have to take on some dodgy sponsors if they want to make money, but this art scammery is a next level rip-off. The art market is a scam even before you add all the shit you describe, mostly there to launder money.

[@lynxlecher9547]

@@ErikBramsen Almost every ad on KZbin is crap. Meanwhile, they censor the users and prevent them from expressing themselves and calling out liars as they should be called out, with curse words and insults

[@shamicentertainment1262]

Honestly sick of sponsored videos. It’s the same bunch of companies all the time

[@felineboy1586]

Man you really need to make more uploads to make the channel grow you guys are so good

[@IntoEurope]

I am trying! Have been optimising my process the past couple of weeks so I should be able to produce faster in the future :)

[@felineboy1586]

@@IntoEurope well i will be looking closely 🤣🤣🤣

[@IntoEurope]

😅

[@dantetre]

@@IntoEurope 2:41 Chernobyl happened in 1986!

[@ruben5154]

Yes, but I care more about the story than seeing the guy's face all the time. But keep up the good work!

[@stevens1041]

France's nuclear energy was an incredible achievement in this world. Its not only a technical and environmental achievement, but a marvel of national financial accounting. Look how Japan's trade balance went to hell the moment they turned off all their nuclear plants, for example--energy imports are often the top import item in a nation's current account. Nuclear energy in that way pays dividends. Plus, look at asthma rates in France vs Germany. France has half the per capita pollution as Germany simply because of its nuclear energy. France should invest the money to replace and upgrade its nuclear power stations. The investment will pay for itself environmentally and through the balance of trade too. I hope this can be done.

[@Purple_flower09]

British people who go to live in France always complain about the very high cost of electricity there.

[@Muhsaft86]

The Masterworks ad is hilarious. They claim to have a huge waiting list but also pay for ads promoting links to "jump the waiting list". You have to be an idiot to invest there.

[@TheFalseShepphard]

You have to be a smooth brained lobotomite to think any sponsorship on KZbin are actually made by Good companies with a usable product

[@thetaomega7816]

Yup it is a ponzi scheme

[@Duck-wc9de]

I like sponsorships because they pay the bills of my favourite youtubers, but I imidiatly know that the product is shity. And sometimes I try to ignore the product completly, specially those for VPNs, wich tend to have a lot of missinformation, and make me sad

[@maxkaufmann833]

A big thing to take away is economic liberalism is not always the solution. Especially not the golden boy everyone thought it was after the collapse of the USSR.

[@da_revo5747]

How on earth is that the takeaway? Nuclear was hampered by the public through the legislative process.

[@da_revo5747]

Now, we can talk about stupid moves like giving away dividends to shareholders for no good reason. But simply saying that forcing a monopoly is the solution is frankly brain-dead.

[@maxkaufmann833]

@@da_revo5747 Public services should be owned and regulated by the government. Profit motive should be second especially in something as basic as electricity.

[@baronvonlimbourgh1716]

It rarely is. Longterm and sustainable anything just doesn't go together with libralism. It is great for quick and dirty consumer goods and stuff. Anything important it will eat itself from the inside out and when it all collapses in on itself the public can have it back. It happens over and over again and still people keep saying it is the way forward.

[@da_revo5747]

@@maxkaufmann833 Fixing prices is a great way to burn money. I don't even need to make this argument anymore. People will just mine Bitcoin and pocket the difference.

[@joaomramalho1]

Nationalize energy production and grid in all European countries! Free market competition makes no sense when each country has only 1 grid...

[@baronvonlimbourgh1716]

We now have a european grid. Which is what was the original point of the privatisation. But it created many new problems. We need one big european utility now. With renewables we need the ability to diversify and deploy resources where they make sense all over europe. It makes the conversion to renewables so much easier and cheap. It is the obvious thing to do.

[@joaomramalho1]

@@baronvonlimbourgh1716 Good for German industry, terrible for the French public (and many others). That ARHEN scheme is the fakest artífice to simulate competition. Away with this charade.

[@baronvonlimbourgh1716]

@@joaomramalho1 but nationalizing it on the country level would be stupid. There now is an integrated european grid, lets use it in the most efficient way. That way spain where it is sunny can provide most the energy during the day for europe. And norway can supply spain at night with hydro, and netherlands can supply bulgaria with their excess wind capacity etc. Going full renewables on an individual level is near impossible, on a continent wide level it becomes orders of magnitude easier and cheaper. And otherwise you get disparity where some country with little access to good resources to use for renewables need to import energy from other countries who are along the north sea for example and can exploit wind in a massive way. Then it would again bennefit the northwestern countries a lot more and make the eastern countries dependends again. Forcing them to go nuclear which are massive pits that absorb massive amounts of public money.

[@Duck-wc9de]

Speak for yourself. God, I dont want to return to the time where there only was a regulated market, with prices set politically, and subsidized by our own taxes. If we had all consumers in a regulated market we would have terrible shortages rigth now or, if there was no shortages, we would be puting up huge amounts of public debt, and with the dificulty of borrowing in southern europe and the raising in interest rates in northern europe we would have huge interest payments every year, wich means, of course, raising taxes in corporations and industries (because a goverment that wants nationalization of the energy market is likelly to also want that) meaning that we would turn the european products even less competitive and chronically crpile our economies even further than they alerady are. Oh god, and imagine states setting the energy mix with their populism... We wouldnt even have nuclear energy rigth now

[@baronvonlimbourgh1716]

@@Duck-wc9de this was never the case when utilities where national industries. Not even trough the 70s and all the oil embargos. Non of that happened and there is no reason things would be different now. They are all theorethic doom scenarios that have no relation to reality at all. All the same theorethical doom scenarios can be made for any market structure. It's just a bunch of nonsense.

[@vinniechan]

Here in the UK, the media often bemaons the fact that France manages to keep the energy cost down without mentioning there's a price at the back end We have been exporting power to France through the interconnector while we would normally be importing from them. Norways hyrdo power isnt doign so well due the decreased waterfall from drought and I really hope we sort it out soon as we are all in this together in the European Grid.

[@Elias-xu7uw]

Hello norwegian here. Our power companies always says that there has been little rain and thats why electricity is expensive meanwhile rainfall is as much as its ever been and we produce way more energy than we need..

[@AMachine2020]

The biggest issue will be finding qualified specialized workers in the pipe welding industry! I did an internship as a quality control tech in one of the leading nuclear welding company back in the 90s (yeah I am old) and already then, the most “nuclear accredited” senior pipe welders - who were imbued with crazy “magic” welding skills, and paid twice as much as the CEO of the company!!!! - couldn’t find apprentices or anyone to replace them… It’s so sad to see how all these skills went to waste! It will be hard to “retrain” new people…

[@Croz89]

We do have very capable pipe welding robots nowadays that can mitigate the issue somewhat.

[@benjaminthorsen2848]

It's great to see the industry getting investment again, France has been a beacon of European energy independence for many years, and the decline of its nuclear industry seemed worrying.

[@nevco8774]

Do not underestimate French: when it’s a matter of national pride and security they’ll find a way out for sure.

[@deangregoric4735]

People scared for no reason, Foget this video, it's useless. French nuclear plan is on the right track

[@gig2734]

The Chernobyl acident was in 1986 and Fall of The Berlin Wall was in 1989.

[@IntoEurope]

Fall of Soviet Union was in 1991, Chernobyl is a dumb mistake on my part 🤦🏻‍♂️

[@willeisinga2089]

A Windturbine produces 40.000 kWh a DAY. France needs more Windturbines. Almost non existent in France. A kWh cost one euro. A Windturbine makes 40.000 euro per DAY. Cheap and Easy profits with Clean Energy.

[@fredbcf1255]

Wind is not clean. It cannot function with out a fossil fuel buffer. Wind & solar cost in Europe are 6x that of traditional electricity sources.

[@willeisinga2089]

@@fredbcf1255 Wind is Clean and Makes a lot of money Everyday. Uniper is Fossil and Gas. No Windparks no SolarParks and Lost 40 Billion Euro. Saved by Government Tax Money. I have Rooftop Solar, in the Netherlands, production 11.000 kWh a year. No Gas. A kWh is 1 euro per kWh. My Profit 11.000 euro a year. Simple. How many Panels do you have and what is your profit?

[@willeisinga2089]

@@fredbcf1255 Fred Flintstone I presume?🙂

[@fredbcf1255]

@@willeisinga2089 Yeah, you go off grid and see what your solar costs. Last calc I did for Kansas(avg US location) was 82 cents/kwh and you still need >20% diesel.You are being massively subsidized for a low grade mostly useless form of energy. Ridiculous, the poor have to subsidize you, pay 1 euro/kwh for your low grade electricity whereas high grade nuclear gets 5 cents/kwh. And if your electricity rate is 1 Euro/kwh then your wind/solar is a total ripoff, you went for wind/solar buffered by Russian gas, 80% gas/20% wind+solar, so now you are paying 10X what US customers pay. Brilliant.

[@johnwotek3816]

Windturbine material are also impossible to recycle and far bigger than whatever the nuclear industry produce.

[@cameronmclennan942]

Great stuff, really well explained

[@dedse3]

Isn't a French company that provides electricity to London? I once heard it from a video 'joking' about the higher prices of electricity in London and how French was taking advantage of the free energy market in UK...

[@vinniechan]

I think EDF opeates a few projects in the UK and our nuclear power plant in particular. If you check on the power generation of the grid, when the wind blows we have been exporting power to them while we would normally be buying so I pray the wind keeps blowing all through this winter

[@anteeko]

Yet those reactors have help seriously reduce CO2 emission.

[@punditgi]

Un video tr'es important. Merci d'avoir e'clairci cette situation difficile!

[@dodiewallace41]

Now we're seeing what happens when policymakers are influenced by activists, they get what they thought they wanted: a forced reduction in fossil fuel usage causing energy problems. This kind of action never ends well. We've spent decades wasting time and resources on dilute intermittent power sources while penalizing dense reliable sources, and we are now suffering energy shortages and seriously weakened infrastructure due to our obsession with RE. The pain and suffering of this crisis - a crisis of not enough reliable electricity - is happening right now. As usual the poorer parts of the world suffer the most as coal, oil and gas that was slated for them is now being diverted to wealthier countries. How can we talk about reducing emissions when wealthy countries are throwing their climate targets out the window to keep warm this winter? Like fossil fuels, nuclear can produce nation-scale electricity reliably year-round, regardless of time of day or season. Unlike fossil fuels it does so cleanly. if we are going to successfully decarbonize, energy must be secure and reliable first.

[@halleffect5439]

Where were policymakers influenced by activists? Examples?

[@dodiewallace41]

@@halleffect5439 Germany, Australia, USA, EU, everywhere that has set Renewable energy as their goal. Even electricitymaps has a tag for % of renewables. Renewable or not is utterly irrelevant, its actually nothing but a misleading marketing term like all natural or chemical free. Calling something Renewable tells us absolutely nothing about its sustainability, functionality, environmental impact or any useful criteria at all yet thats what we've decided to base energy policy on, is % of renewables. 🤦‍♀️ Renewables includes wildly different systems that have nothing in common except that we decided to call them renewables. We need to critically examine each option individually and stop thinking that being called renewable matters at all. Reliable electricity supply is crucial for social and economic stability and growth which in turn leads to eradication of poverty. Energy policy should not favor wind, solar, biomass, geothermal, hydro, nuclear, gas, or coal but should support all energy systems in a manner which avoids energy shortage and energy poverty. All energy always requires taking resources from our planet and processing them, thus negatively impacting the environment. It should be our goal to minimize negative impacts, to base our energy policy on the three objectives, energy security, energy affordability, and environmental protection. What's important is reliable, affordable, and low environmental impact. Focusing on renewable instead is counterproductive. Ideology blinds people to facts and politicians are no exception. This isn't a sporting event or popularity contest and we should stop acting like it is. We need more involvement with engineers and energy infrastructure experts and stop depending on those that have no training or experience in any relevant field shaping policy because of the popularity of useless buzzwords like renewable. "For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." Richard Feynman

[@mists_of_time]

Great video! Sadly for french nuclear industry Poland has signed a contract with South Korea and the US only. Their offer has been rejected.

[@AngelicaAtomic]

Having said that, the EPR design really seems troubled. France should clean house and focus on building successfully domestically and in the UK with the Hinkley C and Sizewell C plants before it can be trusted with more export orders.

[@meneither3834]

@@AngelicaAtomic The EPR works in Finland though

[@AngelicaAtomic]

@@meneither3834 very glad to see Olkiluoto come through tho very late and out of budget

[@annarboriter]

I knew that there would be some mention of privatization of national industries to explain much of the ongoing problems

[@FranceBernardof0609]

As a Frenchman, I do agree with most of your analysis. We are now at the lowest point of our nuclear energy industry. Due to excess confidence, pride, and monopolistic abuses, EDF, Framatome, and AREVA are today in a sort of meltdown. However, you fail to mention the great potential still ahead and already taking shape, we have small and medium mostly private Companies eager to enter the fray of a completely nuclear new era. I am thinking about the Thorium Molten Salt Reactor undertakings that will bring in decentralized abundant and cheap energy, in every corner of the country and abroad. Thank you for your presentation

[@Walterwaltraud]

In how many years? You need a solution now. Go solar will ease the daytime load issue. And is much quicker.

[@subtropicalken1362]

@@Walterwaltraud go solar? In france?? Oh I get it. Just install solar and the electrons will get so excited they will blow the power grid. Like, like you know, like yeah … going to Davis this year?

[@erwannthietart3602]

@@Walterwaltraud "need a solution now. Go Solar" sorry im to busy laughing my a** off considering Solar is only worth it when the location is PERFECT because we dont truly master this source of energy itll take decades until we do, itll take just as long to build enough Solar panel just to ease the problem of helping 65million French during the day as fixing the Nuclear problem which really is only a big problem because maintenance wasnt done properly and because in Summer the old nuclear plants dont have enough water during the hottest period. Solar and renewable are NOT the easy fix or whatever miraculous solution to our problems, they simply arent fit to feed an entire country worth of population for now, which is why Nuclear IS the best source of energy currently until we find a proper solution that could truly get rid of fossil energy, weither by develloping the renewable to a point where they can be worth it in more terrain, produces far more for less land covered in them, or by finding an alternative thats pretty clean while producing far more than even Nuclear or really anything

[@Walterwaltraud]

@@erwannthietart3602 We fully master it, roll it out in masses (check out how many GW globally per year for starters...), it sheds the load at the highest peak of needs, especially in France (I have lived in Lyons for years - have you?), and it's plain and simply physics and economics. LCOE with the solar radiation is perfect to cover all summer droughts, installing it in a decentralized way over all parking lots and commercial sites at the edge of towns eases the load locally immediately etc. Whatever France wants to do it will do, but the facts are blatantly obvious: According to the Cour des Comptes the new EPR at Flamanville will end up at 19 billion €, how many GW could France have installed for that? With such a huge ressource all in one basket, they set themselves up for failure when a certain type of reactors develops cracks and they all have to be checked simultaneously. I don't mind NPP, I lived 2 km from one for 2 years and dragged every visitor I had into the visitor center there, but the cost is just prohibitive, they are not flexible enough for our needs, having too many of them right now is a major contributor, one of two to be exact, of the European electricity crisis we see right now, in short: It just makes perfect sense to roll out PV at warp speed right now. And probably some peaker gas plants for the worst days in January, since it's impossible to install 10 - 20 million heat pumps in poorly insulated French homes that heat directly with electricity. Sorry fanboy, those are the hard facts.

[@tomshackell]

Personally I’m a big fan of the potential of MSRs .. but I think thorium is hugely over hyped. That said I’m still very excited for the possibilities of advanced nuclear going forward.

[@paulmanners1364]

The issue is that the privatised company cut back on maintainence so that 1/2 are not certified If all were online france would export current to germany belgium and italy

[@carthkaras6449]

Meneer Hugo, I don't think it's a "disaster" it's a tightrope, a margin that the French government hopes to reach in the event of difficult winter conditions. The margin for winter was supposed to be between 45 and 50 gigawatts according to the CEO of EDF, it is now close to 45. It could be a disaster for Germany if France is not able to provide electricity to their country. The reactors are old but if you look inside these reactors, almost everything is new. We have the same kind of problems in Belgium. A few years ago, certain political groups complained about our reactors and made a big deal of MICRO-cracks inside the concrete of equipment that was part of a multilayer of security; we no longer hear them. But again, French citizens can bring down their own country with their ultra-individualistic mindset, go on strike at the most inopportune moment and then blame their government...

[@schnelma605]

Marco and Scholz agree that France will help Germany with gas (if needed) while Germany will help France (if needed) with electricity this winter kzbin.info/www/bejne/a4mZiaOXaruBnKM

[@Sagoner]

But it’s the fault of the government, they joined the EU electricity market. Which is the main reason why price are so high the production cost in France is at around 60€ mWh (normally it’s at 40€) but we paid it 100€ to 200€, because like he says EDF is force to sell its electricity at loss to « reduced an unfair monopoly » as Brussels bureaucrats say. And since price are high people who had a contract with alternative providers prefer to turn back to EDF but EDF doesn’t have that electricity because it’s obligated to sell it’s energy at production cost (production cost which since then have rise by a quarter) so EDF as to buy it’s own electricity from it’s concurrent at market price. So it’s not our fault if this is happening and if we don’t show displeasure the government will do nothing about it and even worsen the situation Macron wanted dismantle half of nuclear powers plants but then he saw all the manifestation and he backdown And we are not ultra individualistic we want the best for our country and our people

[@fredbcf1255]

The fact that is kept top secret is who is paying all these anti-nuclear protesters? Where does Greenpeace get its 400Meuros per yr from? Why do they refuse to release that important information.

[@VanPeRsIeForeVeR1]

Très bonne vidéo précise sur le sujet, à la fois sur l'impact des marchés, du politique et du technique

[@kornenator]

I'd definitely welcome a European plant design, but they need to come up with something more reasonably priced and perhaps modular as well. Oh yeah, and they need to do it fast. Where are MSRs? Not long ago yt was full of it as the new saviour of nuclear.

[@Tealice1]

MSRs have never left the prototype stage, so while they may be great in theory, we need something that we know will work today.

[@baronvonlimbourgh1716]

Nuclear is dead. An economic dead end. Time to move on.

[@fredbcf1255]

@@Tealice1 Nonsense, China just started an MSR, the most difficult type a thorium LFTR, it took them 3yrs to build. The IMSR 200MWe by Terrestrial Energy is just finishing its 2nd stage CNSC approval in Canada. Has already bid on a new Darlington build.

[@corvus_monedula]

The huge dependence on oil and the oil shock is a great perspective on the current gas crisis. While Europe seems to have forgotten some of the lessons learned, the dependance on gas is still les severe than back then.

[@jeffbenton6183]

That's a good point. I wonder if there's a neat article somewhere laying out all the similarities and differences between how the oil crisis affected Euorpe and how the gas crisis affects them now.

[@HugoLafarge]

The biggest problem with a renewable nuclear energy mix. It's that there's a lag time between the moment when renewable energy produces less or more and the reaction of the reactors. If we want such an energy mix, we need to automate the electricity networks from production to consumption, and that's very complicated.

[@ciarand2823]

Privatisation shouldn't occur unless there is a firm commitment to sustained investment and development and a willingness to adapt to meet the changing needs of the nation. Failure to meet any of the expectations should result in tax penalties for these energy companies to the point that they become worthless to shareholders.

[@960john]

He also said the government milking big unsustainable dividends (for tax revenues puroposes) was part of the problem. That's typical of state-owned enterprises

[@ieslodzitais]

Why does masterworks need to advertise if they’re so in demand there’s a waiting list?

[@untempspourtout]

Chernobyl disaster took place in 1986...not 1984 :)

[@patrickdegenaar9495]

There is a more fundamental problem! Nuclear is 10x more expensive than renewables and 5x more expensive than oil or gas. So while the reactors should be run as long as they are safe, it is cheaper to build solar links to north Africa and deep geothermal as a baseboard.

[@redroyce4590]

Hmmm seems like the video isn't getting picked up by KZbin

[@bretzel30000]

as an Austrian i am annoyed at my own government and the green party in it (which i voted for mind you) because atomic energy is still better for the environment then fossil energy. It would be better if our energy minister would focus on more important issues!

[@stefanreiterer6152]

The complaint is that both nuclear AND gas are considered green, though. The reasoning is that while nuclear is better than fossil, subsidize them is also the wrong signal as the focus should still go to renewables. From this perspective it makes sense.

[@cyobytm]

yes, austrian government is a pain in the ass for eu , and now with this war, austria try more to be fiend with putin insted of keeping close with europe

[@johnkingsize]

@@stefanreiterer6152 This is a good point, but the way Austria is making it is misleading. In this context, the main problem of nuclear fission is that it relies on non-renewable fuel, not that it isn't green. Including it as a green alternative should, therefore, not be a problem. Especially considering how ungreen sun and wind can be in comparison. The responsibles are showing that they care more about ideology than facts, which is very dangerous for the future. "Green" and "renewable" should not be held as synonyms.

[@randygelton2402]

Ben je van mening dat we in Nederland het voorbeeld van Frankrijk moeten volgen en ook hier meer nucleaire centrales zouden moeten bouwen ?

[@Tealice1]

Just build them on stilts, so the rising sea level won't be a problem.

[@definitelydaniel69420]

Waarom zouden we dat niet doen, het is enkel positief, want we gaan in 2050 echt nog niet genoeg groene energie kunnen opslaan en opwekken, vooral in de winter niet

[@baronvonlimbourgh1716]

Tuurlijk niet. Dr moeten 50 of 60 jaar gigantische subsidies in anders wil niemand die electriciteit kopen. Als overdag the strike price 3 of 4 cent is en zo'n centrale een vaste operationele prijs heeft van 30 cent moet er voor iedere kwh die die produceert over t hele leven van de centrale 25 cent belasting geld bij. En elektra van renewables word ieder jaar alleen maar goedkoper. Dus moet er ieder jaar meer bij. T is een idioot idee.

[@Kruimeldief]

The sound quality of the sponsor lmao.

[@lijolorance]

nice videos ...

[@lucemiserlohn]

All you nuclear fanboys out there... There is a limited supply of fissile material out there. Building more reactors will only deplete the supply faster. Building nuclear reactors is not a solution, as the available supply of materials will not last very long. Plus, we still have no idea on what to do with the waste. Where would that go? Not to mention the inherent risk of incidents going up with more facilities being operated. Even if modern reactors are much safer than older generations, run enough of them and incidents will occur - it's just the law of large numbers at play. No, nuclear energy is not a solution, not even close. (Not to mention that nuclear only looks cheap; if you combine all the costs associated with it, it's not. Really not cheap at all.)

[@stefanreiterer6152]

And please don't tell them that Russia is worlds #1 supplier of nuclear fuel and that energy independence of Russia with nuclear is a pipe dream from the current standpoint.

[@user-mb1qy2cd7p]

@@stefanreiterer6152 А вы дружите с нами -- и будет всё хо-ро-шо)

[@chat-1978]

Hope this help video production. Something with the lighting and maybe the clothes makes you look weird. You can notice the shadows from the fabric on the clothes. Could be a subjective thing as well. Hope it helps.

[@christophermeraz-mata6834]

Maybe because the back light is stronger than the key light.

[@aboukirvienne5352]

Nuclear is back in France and this trend will only strengthen. Prepare for cheap energy Europe.

[@ab-vi4wg]

One year later of this video, edf made it's biggest exports of electricy in Europe 😂

[@miguelsousa9802]

This is a great video summarizing the history of Nuclear in France. One thing that could be more explored would be the EU's influence on it. ## Germany and Austria are big voices in the EU, and are proudly active against any type of nuclear. Austria went as far as to request the EU for "less penaltys" in case a country fails to reach net-zero by not using nuclear, as "it is a harder path, yet the right one to make". Ideology > Facts and Planet. This reflects even the latest EU Taxonomy - which is decades overdue - only considers certain nuclear technologies as "green", and labeled it TOGETHER with Natural gas, a rising fossil fuel. It doesn't really show a will to develop the industry. Meanwhile, many Asian countries that have steady support, and kept the industry going show very good track records: literally half the time AND half the cost. Both Asia and African countries can rely on their technologies, and so do some countries in Eastern Europe. EU is on a track to becoming even more dependent on external expertise. There's a huge ideology that NetZero can be achieved only with renewables by Germany and Austria. Everything is being left in the in-debt EDF, which does not currently have enough expertise for their own operations in France and in the UK, much less for the whole continent. This will be made worst in 2040, with many reactors decommissioning. And yet, any nuclear future is put solely on their shoulders. If the EU does not offer it, countries that truly need nuclear will look elsewhere to get the projects going. This is already seen in Eastern European countries, with Slovakia close to commission a Russian reactor, and plans to build another one soon, Poland having deals with both USA and South Korea, Czech Republic and Estonia with all the above, and RollsRoyce UK, ....

[@rey_nemaattori]

Depending on how cold this winter actually becomes, we'll see if they keep true to their word. Renewables go a long way, but supplemented with nuclear the EU could be netzero in like 2-3 decades if they put their backs into it.

[@NaumRusomarov]

The widespread corrosion problems aren’t a result of mismanagement. They’re indicative of a design or a manufacturing problem.

[@Co-ho3s]

Wait, you live in the same house as Money Macro?

[@LilaKuhJunge]

Doing the math always helps. Check the cost to construct a nukular power plant: 1:56 cost to build from 5 Francs to 12 Francs per kW. 12 Francs is about 1 Euros, same price as home solar. This is before the EPR cost explosion and before considering costs of waste treatment and storage.

[@yjlom]

well waste storage is easy enough, just dump it in an abandonned deep mine, line the walls with concrete if you're paranoid plus there are some promising avenues for actually making something useful out of it solar is pretty nice, but not sufficiently scalable (outside of deserts), because, sure, you can and should cover rooftops with it, but then you still need a lot more space to meet energy demand and you don't really want to use wild or arable land for it

[@LilaKuhJunge]

@@yjlom There is the Homer Simpson Paradoxon - the most dangerous technology is operated by the least responsible people. Also, how to pass information onwards 100.000+ years? Paper? Floppy disk? Engraved stone?

[@johnkingsize]

@@LilaKuhJunge Where is that coming from? The Simpsons is a comedic cartoon. This is not how power plants are handled in real life, especially in France.

[@LilaKuhJunge]

@@johnkingsize By todays standards, working in a nuclear power plant is one of the least attractive job propositions. So this is why you don't get the best. You get the leftovers who are incapable of getting better jobs.

[@johnkingsize]

Do you have actual evidence of this, besides cartoons? While it is true that the field has known a lowered popularity thanks to the anti-nuclear propaganda of ideologists, this meant that there were less candidates to sort into the formations, not that the ones exiting them weren't adequately trained.

[@Kannot2023]

Private monopolies are worse than state monopolies

[@kolerick]

well... you carefully avoided talking about the elephant in the room... 2 times, in the late 90's early 2000's and from 2012 to 2017, there were left coalitions including the "greens" governing France... both time, there was a deal to make the green work together within the coalition: slow down, stop projects or close nuclear power plants ... if you're looking for the reason why the industry lost its competency, well, that's a pretty good point to start from...

[@ShannonWare]

IMAO, if doing nuclear, state led nuclear is the way to go. Like the original plutonium enrichment reactors, on the whole nuclear is a matter of state security rather than one of open market economics.

[@antonmakkonen]

You are heavily underrated

[@simon2493]

France didn't profiled much in terns of selling as they were selling energy in summers when prices are lowest in year

[@firefox39693]

I support France's move to go all-in on nuclear. If anything, France should go much, much further. They should work with Spain, the UK, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark, Romania, Bulgaria, the Baltics, Poland, Slovenia, and Croatia to boost nuclear around Europe, not just France. This past year, I learned that with climate change wreaking havoc on rainfall levels, we can't rely on rivers to always be there when we need them. All of the countries I listed have coastlines. Access to abundant cooling will be important for energy security. France should lobby that the entire nuclear industry be government-owned, not private.

[@baronvonlimbourgh1716]

That would make europe completely uncompetitive economicaly. Europe will slowly bleed to death.

[@firefox39693]

@@baronvonlimbourgh1716 Why is Hydro Quebec such a massive money maker for Quebec? Why is Saudi Aramco such a money maker for Saudi Arabia? Why is Equinor a massive success story for Norway? If anything, Norway should revert back to the 60s, and mandate 100% government ownership over Equinor, and 50% of all oil production licenses in the country.

[@baronvonlimbourgh1716]

@@firefox39693 why are they profitable? Because they don't use freaking nukes. Quebec is mostly hydro and figured out in the 70s already that nuclear was a dead end and decided to never build one again.. Normay is also mostly hydro and not nuclear.. And saudi arabia probably is mostly fossil fuels and not nuclear i imagine. The trend here is they do not use nuclear. Nuclear needs insane amounts of public money to keep them afloat. It is extremely expensive.

[@SC-yy4sw]

Spain still plans to shut down their whole fleet and nuclear is downright illegal in denmark. I guess France and others have already done their part by lobbying hard to get nuclear included into the so-called "green taxonomy". But french nuclear industry is already way to busy trying to fix/extend the service life of its fleet (+ a few EPR in the UK). The rest of EUrope will probably have to get contracts with Korea and the US for their future reactors.

[@dofusquentin]

damn your french is incredible you sure you're dutch?

[@Hepad_]

I've always found that dutchmen tend to nail the French pronunciation because we share a lot of diphtongs

[@Arturino_Burachelini]

It's not so undersightedness, as underprivatisation that is the culprit for the crisis

[@arnaudpayet6173]

La France est capable d'accomplir de grandes choses lorsqu'elle décide d'y aller à 100%, notamment dans les secteurs clefs des transports, du militaire ou de l'énergie. Les exemples de ces réussites sont nombreuses. Tant mieux si cette crise que le pays taverse permet au gouvernement et aux français de prendre conscience des erreurs des dernières années et de les corriger

[@jankompos2330]

we already begun to save electricity power in our factory in slovenia ,but truth be told,if that is saving,couple of lights turned off helps? than i dont know why such paranoia ...

[@stefanreiterer6152]

Let's be real: We actually waste so much energy for unnecessary luxury. Why do businesses keep all their lights on in the night is a mystery to me. "Light pollution" is a thing and we should start assessing which energy is really needed. E.g. why do all electric devices not automatically fully power off? We waste tons of megawatts every year with standby alone.

[@Schroinx]

So we are ignoring GErmanys gas dependence, to harp on Frances nuclear. The problem with Frances nuclear was that Hollande wanted to cut the nuclear output to 50% and further and they also put an environmentalist as energy minister. So what ever was wrong, was the the fault of nuclear technology, but of the politicians.

[@firco1897]

Why did you change the thumbnail?

[@IntoEurope]

To see if it would improve the click rate :)

[@robkerr5635]

brilliant video as always... but a word of advice starch the collar on your shirt, it keeps it looking freshly ironed for longer

[@IntoEurope]

Noted!😅

[@yellowgreen5229]

The problem is NIMBYS I recently went to a local film where the local French celebrated stopping a reactor being built.

[@jevgenijliogkij7849]

EDF is building nuclear power station in Finland 20 years sorry its a little bit long 😂

[@hoogyoutube]

first

[@IntoEurope]

Of course you are :P

[@Alex-bc1hx]

No mention of Fessenheim closed because the germans wanted it , what a great Friend they are :)

[@Hepad_]

No friendship possible with Germany. Serfdom of antagonism

[@hugotritz7345]

Bravo, une vidéo qui vise juste et donne les bonnes clés de compréhension pour saisir l’état actuel de la filière nucléaire française

[@MichaEl-rh1kv]

There are different aspects involved. 1) Nearly all attempts on privatizing state monopolies in the last decades failed more or less - especially if the former monopolist was forced to subsidize their competitors and/or selling them services at a fixed price. The only way to privatize such corporations would be to split them up equally - but that is often not possible. 2) Backbone infrastructure should never be controlled by private owned companies or by companies operating like private owned companies. Maintaining backbone infrastructure does only work if it is nationalized - at least within a capitalist market-based economy. 3) In the long run fission technology will not be economically feasible. It is based on consuming limited ressources and therefore not sustainable, and it can not compete with renewables. Without subsidies by the state electricity generated by any new reactor would be very expensive, it becomes cheap only after decades, but then the reactors start to break down due to the immanent wear.

[@jeffbenton6183]

I liked your comment for #1 and #2, but #3 is demonstrably false. You forgot about fast breeder reactors. France has one such reactor which produces energy by reprocessing spent fuel from all its other reactors (as well as some from other countries). Currently the US has enough spent fuel to power *all* the country's electricity needs *only* with fast breeder reactors for the next 150 years. Breeder reactors create more fuel than they consume, making uranium - effectively - a renewable resource. Nuclear reactors, in general, produce huge amounts of energy for the amount of fuel used, so actually using up all the accessible uranium in the Earth's crust would actually take a really long time. It's not really a scarce resource (unless you waste so much of it building a needlessly large nuclear weapons stockpile like - sadly - we do here in the US)

[@MichaEl-rh1kv]

@@jeffbenton6183 France has currently no fast breeder. The last one, Phénix, was shut down in 2010; it was small-scale prototype reactor, which was however more reliable than his bigger and younger brother Superphénix which had to be shut down 1996/1997 due to many malfunctions. Germany stopped constructing its own fast breeder in 1991 for technical and economical reasons; the buildings are now part of a theme park. The UK decided in 1988 to stop funding for fast breeders, 1994 was the last reactor shut down. The US closed down their last "fast flux test facility" in 1992 (hot standby until 2002) - afaik they never had a commercially used fast breeder. Currently only China and India are constructing fast breeders, and only China, India and Russia are operating fast breeders (and the Indian and Chinese ones are test facilities). There is a reason for not using this technology: fast breeders are far more prone to nuclear meltdown than "normal" reactors (even if such a meltdown can be easier contained by constructing the reactor within a pool filled with sodium coolant). Another problem is the need of most concepts for plutonium (fuel rods from uranium-plutonium mixed oxide or thorium-plutonium mixed oxide) as starter. Fast breeders do not making uranium as such a renewable resource, since they only convert non-fissile uranium-238 into fissile uranium-235 (respectively in theory alternatively thorium-232 into uranium-233) - the fissile uranium is then used to generate heat by fission, which has then to be converted into electricity, which is not a very efficient way to produce electricity. A closed-loop economy of fast breeders and other reactors could increase the amount of harvestable energy from uranium by factor 60, which is not very much - only with including thorium (which is currently still mostly a theoretical option, not a proven technology) the increase would be significant. But economically it is still the most expensive option. Electricity from nuclear reactors can only compete economically with electricity from solar and wind if heavily subsidized by the state (directly and indirectly) - new "conventional" reactors are all over the world only built if at least partly funded by the government, and fast breeders would be even more expensive to construct.

[@jeffbenton6183]

​@@MichaEl-rh1kv Looks like you didn't forget - sorry if my tone was combative. I was under the impression that France's FBR was still operational. I'll have to do more research. I was also under the impression that The United States' FBR had been decommissioned much earlier than that on the grounds that FBRs were a proliferation risk if positioned in certain countries (and the US shouldn't use what it wouldn't give). Perhaps there was some other problem - I'll have to do more research on that. Thanks for pointing that out. The plutonium requirement isn't a huge dealbreaker, as many conventional reactors produce some plutonium as part of normal operations. (Not to mention that the US has a bunch of plutonium locked away in a weapons stockpile that's far larger than necessary to deter Russia and China from using theirs). It sounds like you're already familiar with the solution to the meltdown issue, so I won't belabor the point there. I didn't say it made uranium renewable, I said it made it *effectively* renewable. For all intents and purposes, we will never run out of fuel for it - the same is true renewables (which don't require fuel at all). The US alone has more spent fuel than it could realistically use in 150 years. Using FBRs for that would be less efficient than using conventional reactors, but it would still be more efficient than all other energy options. That's without even considering all the uranium that hasn't been used yet. There is likely enough untapped natural uranium in the ground to - after enrichment - to meet *current* consumption rates for another 230 years. Though it's more expensive to extract, there's enough uranium in the oceans to meet current demand for 60 years. That's without resorting to FBRs making use of thorium. Practically speaking, nuclear fuel will *never* run out. Nuclear and renewables don't really compete with each other - they complement each other. Wind and solar are intermittent power sources. Nuclear power is quite good at providing "base load" power, all day and all night (and newer reactors are flexible enough to ebb and flow with wind and solar). I'm not actually sure that nuclear truly is the most expensive option as everyone says it is. The levelized cost of a conventional reactor is about $175 per kilowatt-hour. Wind and solar by themselves have a levelized cost of about $30 to $40 per kilowatt-hour, last I checked, but pumped-hydro storage - the cheapest option - adds $100 - $150 per kilowatt hour to that figure. Pumped hydro isn't available everywhere, so most plants would cost more than that (at least with existing, proven technologies). Geothermal and hydropower are great, but not available everywhere. That would leave coal and gas, but not really. Statistically speaking, nuclear power has caused fewer deaths per kilowatt-hour than any other source of power (even including the Chernobyl disaster). Currently proposed carbon capture systems alone may cost $1 billion per plant, and they only capture 80% of emissions. Imagine how expensive it would be if fossil fuel plants were required to cause as few excess deaths as nuclear ones. They would need to capture *all* of their emissions, not just most of them, and they'd have to find some place to store them (or find a way to reuse them). It just wouldn't be feasible, let alone affordable. That, by the way, is the real reason why nuclear power is so expensive. It's not in the inherent costs of maintaining the nuclear chain reaction, it's all the safety procedures. These include reinforced concrete containment structures capable of sustaining weeks of artillery bombardment - or an airliner crashing directly into it - together with regulations that cause it to take from 5 years (S. Korea) to 10 years (US) or more to produce one plant. All these regulations are the reason why nuclear power has a better safety record than *any* other source of electricity (Chernobyl was the product of *much* looser regulations). Nuclear isn't expensive because it's nuclear - it's expensive because it's the *only* source of power that we treat the way we *should* treat *all* sources of grid electricity. I wouldn't say that nuclear requires more subsidies than wind or solar - or any source of power for that matter - because wind and solar receive far *more* subsidies than nuclear currently does. For that matter, at least in the United States, fossil fuels also receive far more subsidies than nuclear. Wind and solar also require far more land use than nuclear. If the people owning the required land object, then it may take government money to convince them to sell (or the heavy hand eminent-domain). Off-shore wind and solar helps with this problem, but it too, increases the price. In spite of how much more subsidies other forms of power receive, nuclear power still provides 20% of the United States' electricity. This may be because of large subsidies 40 years ago, but that's another point in nuclear power's favor: nuclear power plants last for decades. There's a very high upfront cost, but operating costs are lower for other sources of power. Given that reality, government *subsidies* may not be required (except for R&D). For existing reactor designs, governments could provide loans to cover the upfront costs of construction, which utilities could pay off over the course of 40 years, using the savings in operating costs. It's also worth noting that grid-scale electricity will *always* attract subsidies, just by the very nature of what it is. It really can only be done responsibly by a government agency, a government corporation, or a heavily regulated private company. Considering your earlier points, I think you already agree with me on that. Sorry this ended up being so long. I wanted to respond to each of your points, if there was a response. To the best of my knowledge, everything I said in this reply is correct, but of course, I need to do more research, as you have already demonstrated. Feel free to point out anything that I - in your opinion - got wrong.

[@MichaEl-rh1kv]

@@jeffbenton6183 Only one point: In many countries (including for example Germany) new wind and solar plants are in general not any longer subsidized (except maybe if you include general subsidies for the grid and electricity in general, which are not specific to the means of generation, and privileged building permits for wind turbines), because they can produce electricity now cheaper than any other method. Storage facilities however are still subsidized. Baseload power plants like nuclear plants can reduce the need for storage, but not completely replace it. France is the country with highest nuclear share in electricity production in the world (around 72% of electricity, which corresponds to 37% of primary energy). Therefore there are times when they have to throttle some of the plants (which is why they have constructed some of the plants explicitly for this scenario, which however made them more complex and expensive) and times when they have to import electricity from neighboring countries (especially in the summer when the rivers providing cooling water start to dry out or become to warm for the fish living in them). They use also pumped-hydro storage in the French and Swiss alps. (In former decades they also advertised and subsidized the use of electrical night storage heaters to make use of nightly overcapacity, but this has led sometimes to power outages at cold winter days.) This examples shows imho that replacing energy storage by nuclear plants is not a viable options, it can - as said above - only reduce the amount of needed storage. As soon as cheaper storage methods enter the market, they will totally outcompete nuclear plants, which makes investing now in nuclear plants a remarkable financial risk. (Additionally France had to shut down many reactors in 2021 and 2022 due to technical problems and to increase electricity imports mainly from Germany and Spain to replace the missing capacity, but that is an independent problem. The net export from Germany to France in 2022 was about 5.4 TWh (gross export 8.8 TWh); the years before France had mostly net exports to Germany in the winter months and net imports in the summer months, but in the winter 21/22 France was always importing more than exporting.)

[@Nill757]

“Half offline… struggling… to its knees” Strange, IAEA right now shows all online. Yes apparently many reactors were down for some maintenance months ago, and .. now they’re not. Still, with the adjectives, and “age counter”, how dramatic. Can we get one on every 30 year old road bridge building, also made of concrete and steel? All in all, very dramatic.

[@tictac2therevenge291]

Why did you rename the video

[@nekdo_kavc]

It is not only about French nuclear energy, it is about European nuclear energy. We Slovenians also have problem with Austria objecting against building new nuclear reactor.

[@amey_852]

The World Cup Curse is real 😂.

[@dookyee]

Im just going to bump

[@bonito34]

No water for cooling.

[@zelenka4365]

good video!

[@IntoEurope]

Thanks!

[@tareklule9249]

The big lie in all these discussions that of the cheap energy. Yes the electricity is sold cheap, but the price is dictated still today by the French state. And it is obviously so low, that it does not leave any margins to pay for all the repair, maintenance, let alone the humungous cost of building new reactors (22B$ and still counting). Last year the French state pumped 2.1Billion$ into EDF and not ending. If the selling price is so low that it puts EDF into deep red debt, then this "cheap nuclear energy" is an illusion, a dream that still most French still are dreaming, while the gap to reality gets bigger and bigger.

[@bobvroomans4415]

just an idea and maybe a bit of a dream. wat if the EU creates an "interstate" (nuclear)energy company . (the sneaky mentos comercial tho JK

[@ReyZar666]

it seem to me that the EU is starting to centralize the political power in order to stabilize the big hole the Russian left in the Energy industry. In my opinion i am glade they are going for more renewables energy since the Climate Change is getting worst and worst every year.

[@baronvonlimbourgh1716]

We need a single european wide utility. That can deploy resources all over europe where they make sense and it being one large network. It is the way forward.

[@VIT-ey8wo]

@@baronvonlimbourgh1716 sounds like communism

[@philoslother4602]

Hugo, tu étudies à Sciences PO ?

[@IntoEurope]

Non, j'ai fait mes études aux Pays-Bas!

[@seneca983]

Is Flamanville 3 going to be even more delayed than Olkiluoto 3?

[@AngelicaAtomic]

Almost certainly. Olkiluoto was going to be fully up and running by this winter before hitting another hiccup. Flamenville 3 is not even slated to fuel load until mid 2023.

[@seneca983]

@@AngelicaAtomic But Flamanville 3 began construction over 2 year later than Olkiluoto 3 and you need to account for that.

[@ateisme3752]

I mean its under maintance

[@oditeomnes]

It takes about 30 years from a point where money for the construction project are allocated, to the point where the nuclear power plant has paid for itself and starts earning money. No private investor will bother with such long term investment. Even young investors would be retired old men by then. That is why it is fine to have national single company monopoly over this sector where the state is the investor. Another factor is that the more you build, the faster you build it. Russia, China and South Korea are pretty damned fast at conmstruction project of an NPP, because they hgave experience. While American Westinghouse and French splinters of EDF have been sitting on their thumbs while making fuel rods and spare parts for the last decade.

[@matthewbarabas3052]

the government knows best in this instance, clearly.

[@dodovomitory3496]

Please please please make your animations smoother.

[@dastankuspaev9217]

should ve chosen bwr design

[@tobiwan001]

Although many are talking about a nuclear renaissance most countries that have large reactor fleets are building not enough to replace older ones. E.g. the US and most European countries. Even with rapid expansion the share of nuclear energy will decline for at least 2 decades. During that time renewables expand rapidly and storage technology and smart grids evolve. I am not sure nuclear reactors are economically viable in the future if they even are today.

[@robbebrecx2136]

In 2050 the energy demand will be three times that of today, we need to switch all our industry to electricity to replace fossil energy as primary source. This ensures that there will always be a base-load demand that will be coming from new industry's that produces green molecules to substitute current fossil bases chemicals. Nuclear is economically viable, if we build many costs and delays will be lower then today. They are economically viable and will produce new value adding industries what makes them the most economically viable ever.

[@fredbcf1255]

Renewables, bull. You mean wind & solar. They cost 6X traditional electricity sources Nuclear/Hydro/fossil in Europe. They are a complete failure. Not even close to practical except on a diesel grid.

[@tobiwan001]

@@fredbcf1255 Wind and solar are much cheaper in Europe than all the other energy sources with the exception of lignite. All 3 are below 10 cent per kWh while nuclear is at 11-13 cent. The high prices of electricity at the moment is due to coal and gas import prices being high.

[@fredbcf1255]

@@tobiwan001 No that's not true. Wind and solar cost 6x traditional energy sources fossil, nuclear, hydro. The BS quoted costs pretend 1kwh of solar = 1kwh of nuclear. That's just not the way the grid works. All the solar at must will do is replace some NG or coal fuel which worth 2 cents/kwh in the US. But it increases the inefficiency of the grid which nullifies even that savings. So in effect, the wind & solar is nearly worthless.

[@ivanbrezina7632]

Situation in Czech rep: Last year we produced 77TWh of electricity. If we were about to de-carbonize industry and use electric cars, we would need at least 135TWh of electricity. i.e. would would need to nearly DOUBLE the electricity production over short period of time (one or two decates). Or we could start importing electricity from abroad. But we are landlocked country, surrounded by electricity importers. Those GreenDeal plans are totally unrealistic and there is no way to fulfill them.

[@maximbollansee]

Thank god there is one country with a good set of brains. Energy is to big and important to privatise. Or at least not completely.

[@paulmarwood4325]

Britain's nuclear power industry was instantly destroyed the moment it was privatised, investment ended, new build ended, support and supply industries died, eg, Parsons gone, English Electric gone, Reyroll, GE gone in its previous form, pluse many more UK C&I supply industries.

[@stolz999]

"ИндаШтри"... эта Ш перед Т просто вымораживает...

[@brandonn.1275]

A pretty good alternative to privatization would have been democratization of the utilities with the United States establishing electrical cooperatives and its early expansion of electrical infrastructure in the western United States. Nowadays these electrical cooperatives have provided extraordinarily reliable electricity at low rates with many of the states with the highest electrical reliability scores having a large number of these cooperatives.

[@bobvanbutselaar]

Too big will always fail...

[@baronvonjo1929]

I will never understand anti-nuclear stuff. Not like many nations have a better option.

[@chazbertino6102]

There is solar. The sun is always shining lol

[@baronvonjo1929]

@@chazbertino6102 Europe is so far north. And it's so cloudy many parts of the year in many areas. And if you look at light intensity naps it doesn't have many areas either. I assume solar could get more efficient but you can't deny what the climate is.

[@chazbertino6102]

@@baronvonjo1929 I was being sarcastic lol

[@weirdmateus6075]

Nuclear energy is one of the best types of energy to produce right now we in Europe should all go Nuclear until renewable energy becomes better which will take a lot of time (atleast 40 years)

[@amitgupta25121993]

Invest in masterworks 3:30

[@Jokkkkke]

The ruler’s back and showing us why he’s still the best content creator on European affairs ❤️

[@SuHrskyy]

Thats why Poland didnt choose nuclear plant offer from France 💀

[@USABESTMBA.COM-NEWS]

Warning

[@erebosbs2210]

it is simply uneconomical to build new nuclear reactors now when reneables are 3 times cheaper

[@AngelicaAtomic]

unfortunately this does not take the cost of storing energy into account. We will need baseload so nuclear serves that need in the grid. Also, as we build more nuclear energy, we will be able to cost down.

[@stefanreiterer6152]

@@AngelicaAtomic Did actually anyone listen to the video? It was clearly stated that one of them main reasons nuclear fell behind was that they couldn't compete with renewables. We will need by far less nuclear power plants not more, especially if they are prone to shut downs because of lacking cooling water. The situation will not get better.