Summary
France’s Flamanville 3 nuclear reactor, its most powerful at 1,600 MW, was connected to the grid on December 21 after 17 years of construction plagued by delays and budget overruns.
The European Pressurized Reactor (EPR), designed to boost nuclear energy post-Chernobyl, is 12 years behind schedule and cost €13.2 billion, quadruple initial estimates.
President Macron hailed the launch as a key step for low-carbon energy and energy security.
Nuclear power, which supplies 60% of France’s electricity, is central to Macron’s plan for a “nuclear renaissance.”
If you exclude the early phases of nuclear development, and later accidents that happened due to bad management, how dangerous is well run nuclear energy? Maybe it’s not the form of energy generation that’s the problem.
Maybe if the difference between “just an expensive technology” and “deadly disaster impacting the lifes of millions of people” is some bad management and poor regulatory oversight, it is not a technology fit for the use of current humanity.
Personally, drag is pick-your-battles-nuclear. That is to say, scientifically it’s a good technology, but fighting a political battle to get nuclear cheap enough to compete with wind and solar is pointless. Advocating wind and solar is much more efficient in terms of political effort spent.