[HN Gopher] France prepares for possibility of electricity black... ___________________________________________________________________ France prepares for possibility of electricity blackouts during winter months Author : geox Score : 78 points Date : 2022-12-03 19:58 UTC (3 hours ago) (HTM) web link (www.rfi.fr) (TXT) w3m dump (www.rfi.fr) | cm2187 wrote: | I don't understand the advice of switching off appliances and | lights at night. Surely if France has an energy production | shortfall, it must be at peak period which is during the day from | 9am until about 7pm [1], not in the middle of the night. | Particularly given the vast majority of its production costs the | same whether you use it or not (nuclear, wind). And even for gas, | the problem isn't the quantity of gas available, it is the output | of the gas power plants available. So saving gas during the night | doesn't help peak production. | | [1] https://www.rte-france.com/eco2mix/la-production- | delectricit... | hinata08 wrote: | On top of the peak production issue, there is also a fuel | reserve issue | | As half of the the nuclear power plants are down, they have to | rely on gas. And gas has become difficult to import. | | France feels both the liberalisation of the electricity | production : Private operators promised to produce cheaper and | cleaner power back in the 2000s. But they didn't. Virtually all | of them used a scheme (the Arenh system) to get public | electricity in bulk, sold to them at a loss and at a fixed | price, so that they could compete with the public company on | retail prices. Then the government was still in their | privatization bubble, lobbies told them everything was fine, | and they began to stop to maintain and to phase out public | nuclear power plants. | | And now we no longer have electricity. | | The backup would be electricity made with natural gas. But you | need to save that natural gas now. Russia froze the export of | natural gas. And other companies know that gas is in short | supply, so prices skyrocket. | | So yeah, we have to turn everything off at night. | Normille wrote: | >Russia froze the export of natural gas... | | France [and the rest of the EU] announced they were going to | stop buying Russian oil and gas, blocked Russia's access to | the world banking system so Russia couldn't receive payment | for their gas in $$$ or EUREUREUR, then refused to pay for it | in Roubles instead. Consequently, Russia froze the export of | natural gas... because they weren't going to give it away for | free. | | 'FTFY'... as the kids say. | | Amazing how the narrative has changed to "Russia froze gas | exports". You'd maybe expect the historical timeline to get a | bit vague after a few decades. But we're talking events which | occurred only this year. We can all remember what actually | happened and in what order. Why are so many people, --who | must remember as well as I do, the actual sequence of | events-- willing to go along with this doublethink version of | history, just because Russia are the 'bad guys' in this | conflict? | hinata08 wrote: | Whatever, there is no Russian gas anymore | | I disagree with your russian narrative (payments for gas | would have been processed despite the swift ban). But the | objective part of this story is that EU has no gas anymore. | And debates about Russia won't fuel power plants | gattilorenz wrote: | > France [and the rest of the EU] announced they were going | to stop buying Russian oil and gas, blocked Russia's access | to the world banking system so Russia couldn't receive | payment for their gas in $$$ or EUREUREUR, then refused to | pay for it in Roubles instead. | | As far as I remember, it was still possible (in terms of | banking systems/santions) to pay the gas in Euros as usual; | Russia decided, unilaterally, that they would require the | payment to be in Rubles (to try and limit its plummeting | value). For ther rest, you're correct. | alwayseasy wrote: | Your recollection is correct. He is falling for the same | thing he accused op of. | f6v wrote: | Why would Russia want to be payed in EUR when their | foreign assets were frozen? Russia relied on foreign | financial infrastructure which has proven to be | unreliable for them. | analognoise wrote: | It's a funny twist of logic to say the Russians found the | foreign financial infrastructure to be unreliable for | them... When they were booted out for attacking a | neighboring country, isn't it? | | It's so unreliable! All they have to avoid is invading | their neighbors, but they couldn't manage that. Russia is | the unreliable party. | cm2187 wrote: | I am sure France isn't contemplating blackouts to save on the | gas supply. | hinata08 wrote: | No | | i'm just saying there are 2 issues nowadays : | | peak production issue | | and how to keep producing electricity in the next year, as | gas is difficult to source, and the tank might eventually | run out. | | The government is just making a single campaign to simplify | the PR ! In the same ads, they ask citizens to both reduce | energy consumption (eg lower heating to 18degC), and to | delay intensive usage out of peak hours (eg use you washing | machine or the space heater during the day and not in the | evening) | Loic wrote: | In France, a lot of heating is done during the night (Water, | buildings with so cold "accumulator electrical heating"). | | You also need to think that France is not alone. If they can | save during the night, this is extra power which can be | exported to Germany where the base production relies on coal | and gas. This way, Germany uses less gas during the night and | can export more during the day to help France. | | We are fully interconnected, we need to look beyond "just our | country". | cm2187 wrote: | But that assumes the blackouts are the result of gas power | plants not running at full capacity at peak period because of | a lack of gas. I don't believe that is the case, at least not | this winter. | hinata08 wrote: | they run at full capacity, but the capacity of natural gas | power plant is very limited | | Nuclear power plants used to make up for the steady base | consumption. Natural gas power plants used to be the last | ones to be solicited. They were just used to adjust to the | marginal needs, not to produce most of the power. | masklinn wrote: | FWIW https://energygraph.info/d/cM9gMNZ4k/availability- | timeline?o... has a timeline of the various french reactors, and | shows that some (tricastin 3, 4, cruas 3, budget 4, belleville 2) | were restarted during november. | | I assume the part of the bars which is after the green ("update") | dashed line is previsional. | | It shows that more reactors should be restarting in the next few | days although several (most notably all 4 N4 still) will remain | offline over winter. And Cattenom 1 and 3 are apparently not | planned to restart before late feb / early march. | | There's also an overview dashboard which is just... sad: | https://energygraph.info/d/q7IpAJHVz/overview?orgId=1&refres... | daVe23hu wrote: | oezi wrote: | lizardactivist wrote: | You cannot be serious. Why would Russia blow up their own | pipeline instead of just saying "no"? | | Did you even listen to the US in the weeks leading up to the | invasion of Ukraine? They were agitating more about Nord | Stream and their own Energy Dominance agenda than actually | talking about Ukraine, and to top it off Biden literally said | right in front of the cameras that we want to stop the EU | from buying Russian gas, and in fact we have a way of doing | that. | oezi wrote: | Because it is part of Russia's strategy to drive European | energy prices higher and by forcing a hard winter to bully | their way to negotiations in Ukraine. | | Europe already made it clear it won't go back to Russian | energy so the pipelines aren't needed anymore. This also | explains why nobody started with any repairs. | | For your insinuation that the US did it, there doesn't seem | to be any evidence or motive. And if anybody wanted to | really disrupt any Gas flow they would have needed to blow | up all 4 pipes. Yet only 3 were destroyed. | | Also it would have been much too dangerous for any NATO | member to engage with a military action against Russian | property. | | It is most likely that Russia had already installed bombs | during construction and just had to pull a trigger. | [deleted] | kazen44 wrote: | > You cannot be serious. Why would Russia blow up their own | pipeline instead of just saying "no"? | | because it denies the non hardline faction inside the | russian political sphere the option of negotiating with the | west. This further solidifies putin's position. | | Blowing up the pipeline made sure the war in ukraine had to | continue, because stoppping the war will not result in the | resumption of gas trade with the west. | lm28469 wrote: | Only 5% of french electricity comes from gas and of these 5% | only 20% come from Russia | brainchild-adam wrote: | France is not alone in this. In a way it seems Europe in general | is headed for a challenging winter when it comes to energy | supply. | | I wonder where this will lead. | | I assume that once larger parts of the population start feeling | the effects of these energy shortages, some dynamics might | change. | | At the moment, most do not seem to take much notice or care, not | that I blame them. Life can be stressful enough as it is. | kazen44 wrote: | at the same time, gas supplies are at an all time high. | | The main issue seems to be absolutely atrocious timing of | nuclear reactor maintenance. (which is just bad luck). | | > I assume that once larger parts of the population start | feeling the effects of these energy shortages, some dynamics | might change. | | I sure as hell hope that the dynamic will increase in providing | ukraine with the weapons required to end of the war far more | quickly. From a geopolitical standpoint, making sure russia | does not win this war or end it in a stalemate is absolutely | vital for European stability. | | Also, it could lead to further defence integration in europe. | (this has already been fast tracked once the war started). | lzooz wrote: | In what way will Ukraine winning (whatever that means) help | us in terms of energy? | iudqnolq wrote: | Russia is already going broke. They could be forced to | resume gas sales by financial need. | Raed667 wrote: | And yet we allow extravagant malls all over France to light and | heat 24/7 with open doors and no accountability. All streets are | filled with large high-definition ad screens & computers that | cool and heat all day long. Restaurants and bars can just heat | the outside terrace air, etc... | | And the liberal take has been: This is fine as long as they're | paying their bills. | 323 wrote: | If malls waste it like that it means that the electricity is | too cheap and still plenty. | | I bet that a lot of it it's subsidized in good old French | tradition. | f6v wrote: | Same in Denmark. A shitload of storefronts lit up at night. | WastingMyTime89 wrote: | I have no idea of what you are talking about. | | Blackouts are a solution to consumption surges. We are not | seeing surges right now so there is no reason to restrict | anyone. We can't store electricity after all. In case of a | surge, the commercial sector is the first being hit, long | before houses. Plus the issue is mostly heating, lights consume | next to nothing. | | France electricity is mostly clean by the way. | | > Restaurants and bars can just heat the outside terrace air. | etc... | | That's been illegal for more than a year. | zelphirkalt wrote: | France's energy production is not as clean as one may think. | There is considerable damage to the environment in countries | in Africa, where Uranium is mined/extracted. Probably still | better than lots of CO2 output, but not actually clean. | kergonath wrote: | Any source at all? | | (Good luck finding one that supports your position). | | FWIW: yes, mining is bad. But uranium is unbelievably | energy-dense and the amounts are ridiculously small | compared to any other source of energy. All things | considered, nuclear causes fewer emissions per MWh than | most solar panels (which are not radioactive but still need | heaps of metals and semiconductors). Also, there is no | contest with coal, oil, and gas, which is the thing that is | actually used when you don't have nuclear energy available. | yodsanklai wrote: | No energy production is clean. Actually, I'd be curious to | compare the damage to the environment caused by uranium | extraction vs producing batteries and solar panels. | kergonath wrote: | Nuclear and solar panels are about the same. Better than | wind and hydro. But all of these are very similar, and | are miles better than fossil fuels. It's difficult to | have accurate projections for batteries because the | technology that can be used at these scales is not clear | (though he vast majority of them need cobalt, which is a | huge issue on several levels). | guggle wrote: | Indeed, there is no clean energy, it's all relative. I'd | like more people to realize this. | pitaj wrote: | > There is considerable damage to the environment in | countries in Africa, where Uranium is mined/extracted. | | That's equally of not more true of renewables like solar | and batteries that require large amounts of rare metals. | zelphirkalt wrote: | Doesn't change the fact, that it is not actually clean, | does it? | loeg wrote: | Most uranium comes from Kazakhstan. Australia and Canada | are also major producers. Namibia produces some, but far | from the majority. This isn't exactly a "western countries | dumping environmental problems in Africa" story. | zelphirkalt wrote: | So is the Uranium extraction story better in those | countries? I think that would then be the next question. | tomatotomato37 wrote: | In Australia at least most of it comes from a copper mine | that happens to intersect a uranium vein, so as long as | the demand for copper exists its extraction is | essentially environmentally free | loeg wrote: | I don't think it's particularly bad per GWh of energy | produced. You just don't need that much uranium. Compare | coal (still being actively mined and burned for energy!), | natural gas, exotics for batteries/solar. | Raed667 wrote: | > the commercial sector is the first being it | | That's not what they announced, the day before an area code | will be revealed, and all electricity will be cut (including | schools, public utility and telephone towers) | | > That's been illegal for more than a year | | There is an exception if terrace area is "covered". Guess | what everyone installed in the past year? | WastingMyTime89 wrote: | What they announced is in addition to what's always done. | The commercial sector has always been the first to be cut. | Some companies actually have special contracts which mean | they can be cut with barely any notice. | | If they do large scale blackouts it's that they can't | manage the load without cutting normal customers so | obviously it's going to hit everyone. | zelphirkalt wrote: | Same stuff in Germany. We ask households to save energy, but at | the same time store windows and malls and whatnot are lit up | all night long. Maybe it needs a separate higher energy price | for businesses to change that behavior. | oezi wrote: | I can talk only about Berlin but many furniture stores have | started to switch all lights off at night. Even the Ikea sign | isn't lit anymore. | zelphirkalt wrote: | I guess the take on that is, that there is no good | regulation for it. If it can be one way in one city, for | some of the shops, and different for other cities or other | shops, then the measures/policies are not really reaching | the target. Apparently one cannot rely on people doing the | right thing, especially not, when they are in some kind of | loosely associated group like a business, where no one | feels responsible at the end. It might be a topic which | needs intervention by the state to get the desired effect. | bushbaba wrote: | In the US industrial & large electric consumers often pay a | cheaper $/Kwh price. But they also have additional peak | demand surcharges. | morelisp wrote: | While I'm sure there's a ton of possible places for | commercial use to optimize that aren't being done yet, stores | leaving signs on all night was banned by the EnSikuMaV back | in August. | zelphirkalt wrote: | They should come to my city then and start fining | businesses for violating that. | septune wrote: | After Fukushima nuclear accident, France green party shot on | French nuclear plants, it was the new cool thing to push for | sustainable only energy and bring down our nuclear industry. | Newly elected socialist president stared at the green party so he | also pushed against. 10 years later we have no plumbers, no | welders, old plans, no gas. And more to come : because of Ukraine | war and increasing EV, electrical power consumption is | anticipated to reach peaks and cause outages. Thats what you get | when politicians only consider their popularity, ignoring what | experts used to warn. | WastingMyTime89 wrote: | No one takes the Green Party seriously in France. They won a | few cities because the socialists are a mess and people wanted | to punish Macron but generally speaking they are only useful as | the butt of jokes. It's not a serious political party in any | way. | the_mitsuhiko wrote: | What's the reason that nuclear is so unreliable recently in | France? | lm28469 wrote: | A bit of everything, 5 have been stopped due to cracks: | https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stress_corrosion_cracking | | A few are having their once in a decade maintenance check | | Some are waiting for maintenance which were delayed due to | covid | | We didn't train enough maintenance workers because everyone was | talking about shifting out of nuclear in favor of renewable | (we're using American contractors now afaik) | | So mostly bad decisions and poor management, it's a political | issue more than anything else, it worked fine since the 70s to | more or less a decade ago | gobip wrote: | You forget to mention a key point: these maintenance workers | were on strike and they were also part of the problem. | kkfx wrote: | Nothing is "unreliable recently", the mess is decade old, | simply when EDF was private, after have acquired public made | energy systems, they reduce investments to the minimum creating | the present mess. Once the damage was so big they can't mask it | again they left, leaving the mess to the public. | | The public, who is abetter, have managed to push some excuses | to avoid finger point any private friend and so reveal the mess | all at once. | [deleted] | yodsanklai wrote: | Short answer: Lack of investment caused by incompetent | politicians, supported by public opinion. Lot of French are | anti-nuclear. | tuatoru wrote: | Wikipedia says the plants are managed by EDF, a private | company. Ordinary asset management would have prevented known | problems, so there must be a few things that went wrong at | the same time. | ohgodplsno wrote: | EDF being a public company owned by the state means that it | gets hurt by two things: | | * It has to make money, instead of being a utility that the | state provides, so decisions have to be taken in accord | with all shareholders. | | * When it does make these decision, well, politicians have | been selling off EDF piece by piece on the right, and | sacrificing it to get votes from the green party on the | left. | | All in all, incompetent fucks with a 5 year foresight | running it like a pawn on a chessboard, happily sacrificing | it to get a meager advantage. | detaro wrote: | A "private company", owned to 85% by the French state, | taking price policy orders from the French state, getting | regular cash injections from the French state to not go | bankrupt. | ttymck wrote: | Investment in _what_? The plant is still running, no? Do they | need _more_ plants, _repairs_ to existing, or _upgrades_ to | existing? How do I dig further? | guggle wrote: | > Do they need more plants, repairs to existing, or | upgrades to existing? | | All of these... but no political will because "nuclear bad, | renewables good". | Gwypaas wrote: | Well, what is there to say given the state of Flamanville | 3? Currently sitting at ~ EUR13 B compared to the initial | estimate of EUR3.3 B. With a tentative start date for end | of 2023. | | All the while EDF is being nationalized. Should more | money have been spent in even deeper pits? | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flamanville_Nuclear_Power_P | lan... | yodsanklai wrote: | > Should more money have been spent in even deeper pits? | | If we want electricity in a world without less fossil | fuels, I'd say yes. | | EDIT: renewable can't be the only solution. They are | cheap only because they are built on top of existing | nuclear/fossil solutions. | Gwypaas wrote: | Renewables already fill that gap at vastly lower costs. | Unless you specify that you're one of the about a million | people living north of the arctic circle, then sure, do | whatever you need. | martin_a wrote: | In the summer they had lots of cooling issues due to low water, | if I remember the news correctly. | | The article speaks of "ongoing or delayed maintenance, or | corrosion problems" as the next reason for the problems. | martin_a wrote: | > At the moment, half of the country's reactors are offline | because of ongoing or delayed maintenance, or corrosion problems. | The new generation of power stations has yet to be built. | | Meanwhile, in Germany, pushing renewable energies is frowned upon | and people are saying "look to France, they're doing nuclear, | THAT would save us, too". | | (Even more) Strange times ahead. | lm28469 wrote: | lm28469 wrote: | From absolute gold standard electric production/infrastructure in | the 70s to barely able to light school rooms in 2022 | | I miss politicians who had a vision that didn't stop at the end | of their term. | | We even had to restart a coal power plant last week... | kkfx wrote: | The issue is simple: privatizations. | | The public in the past have invested for the public interests. | After the private have do not profiting from old State made | investments leaving anything else falling apart. When they | reach a certain level of mess they going out, leaving the State | arrange the mess and handle the rage, waiting to came back once | a new wave of investments will repair the mess. | | Unfortunately people seems to ignore that, allowing such model | to prosper. | cm2187 wrote: | Not sure what privatisations have to do with the problem. My | understanding is that it is a combination of a technical | problem (corrosion happening at an unexpected pace) and the | impact of covid lockdowns which deferred critical | maintenance. | ohgodplsno wrote: | Privatization has everything to do with the problem. Let's | take EDF and our nuclear plants. Why is EDF struggling | financially today ? Because, through the magic of _opening | up to the market_, they have been forced to sell up to | 100TWh are prices as low as EUR40/MWh. The new private | operators that came in simply resold that. And right now ? | They're even kicking out clients, just so they could sell | on the market at EUR1000/MWh. What does EDF struggling | financially mean ? Among others, fully depending on the | state to give them the money they need to exist, not being | able to keep training and maintain specialists to repair | such corrosion (we needed to import people because there | were simply not enough qualified engineers for that), not | being able to build more plants and therefore losing our | edge in nuclear power. | | Why are most of our public services struggling ? Because | over time, they've been handed out to private companies. | Unemployment office ? Partly privatized. Tax collection | from employers ? Privatized. Healthcare ? Partly | privatized, and the beast is being starved so they can | privatize it more. | | There has not been a single, memorable outcome of a public | service being privatized in France and it getting better. | skellington wrote: | Incomplete and biased analysis. What you describe as | 'privatization' is nothing like a free market which is | what most people think you're describing. | | Privatization in your case is crony capitalism combined | with state power to manipulate markets in favor of | certain actors. The key enabler in this scheme is | government power corrupted by money. | | The commonality in all the different areas that are | failing -- power, healthcare, homelessness, etc.. --- are | the regulatory systems that are grossly distorted by | corrupted government interventions. | | The main problem with governments and their services | today is that there is no real feedback loop and systems | without feedback are doomed to fail. You can vote liberal | or conservative and nothing changes because they are two | wings of the same bird. | analognoise wrote: | Maybe there's no "good" capitalism? What we used to think | of as "good" capitalism was really heavy government | investment leading to a "virtuous feedback loop", for | which the Government got no credit? | | I think that's more accurate then the "not TRUE | capitalism"/no true Scotsman interpretation. | alwayseasy wrote: | > Among others, fully depending on the state to give them | the money they need to exist, not being able to keep | training and maintain specialists to repair such | corrosion (we needed to import people because there were | simply not enough qualified engineers for that), not | being able to build more plants and therefore losing our | edge in nuclear power. | | EDF is struggling because the state kept intervening and | asking them to shut down future nuclear plants. You can't | have specialists if they are retiring and the state | destroyed any career prospects due to planning they would | shut down plants... | Gwypaas wrote: | Have a look at Flamanville 3 and then try to sell another | 20 of those to the public. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flamanville_Nuclear_Power_P | lan... | Gwypaas wrote: | > they have been forced to sell up to 100TWh are prices | as low as EUR40/MWh. | | Should be plenty. The Swedish paid off nuclear plants | operate around EUR25/MWh. Lazard similarly puts the range | for paid-off nuclear plants at $24-$33/MWh. | | It's simply mismanagement of a golden goose. | | https://www.lazard.com/perspective/levelized-cost-of- | energy-... | forty wrote: | It's easy to underpay nuclear power then realize heavy | investments are needed after a while to either keep the | plants alive with modern safety norms or to dismantle | them (we have done that a lot here, electricity used to | be cheap). | | Also EDF has been trying to build the EPR in England, | Finland and France, and it costed much more to build than | budgeted. And someone has to pay the difference. And it | seems that this someone is us :) (French tax payers and | consumers) | Gwypaas wrote: | > Also EDF has been trying to build the EPR in England, | Finland and France, and it costed much more to build than | budgeted. And someone has to pay the difference. And it | seems that this someone is us :) (French tax payers and | consumers) | | My view is that it is a subsidy for the naval nuclear | reactors and weapons programs in UK and France that they | choose to pay from a national security perspective. The | French and UK public simply gets to eat the costs with | barely any say in the matter. | akiselev wrote: | It's "simply mismanagement" is a trivial tautology that | can be applied to any situation. | | Team didn't deliver? Mismanaged the team. Team failed to | deliver because they didn't do any work? Mismanaged the | hiring process. Massive wild fire? Mismanaged forests. | Asteroid wipes out all life on Earth? Mismanaged the | planetary defense systems. Andor escapes from Narkina 5? | Mismanaged imperial prison complex. | Gwypaas wrote: | Given that nuclear power plants are known entities and | the list of "unknown unknowns" should be non-existent | given their safety critical nature it simply is | mismanagement. | | If your nuclear plant costs more than $33/MWh to operate | then you are doing something wrong and stop trying to | blame "the green movement", "privatization" or whatever. | katbyte wrote: | so costs to build operate and maintain something never | changes and is the exact same everywhere and in every | country and if it's different then what you think it's | "mismanagement"? | | Because I'm pretty sure it's going to be different from | France to America to poland | Gwypaas wrote: | > The LCOE figures for existing Generation II nuclear | power plants integrating post-Fukushima stress tests | safety upgrades following refurbishment for extended | operation (10-20 years on average): (in 2012 euros) | EUR23/MWh to EUR26/MWh (5% and 10% discount rate). | | There, from a source extremely positively biased towards | nuclear. | | https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/economic- | aspec... | | Putting the 2012 EUR23/MWh to EUR26/MW in an inflation | calculator gives EUR26/MWh to EUR29/MWh. | gobip wrote: | Your own argument is busted by.. your own argument. EDF has | been nationalized again and here we are. The issue isn't | "privatizations". | ohgodplsno wrote: | Lol no it hasn't. As of last year, the state owned 83% of | EDF, along with everything that being a publicly traded | company entails. The renationalization process has been | started, then immediately halted by shareholders that sued | to block it. Additionally, things don't get magically fixed | because it belongs to the state again. The current state of | things is the result of 20 years of selling off EDF, piece | by piece to vultures. | kevingadd wrote: | This is like watching a new administration take over | government and then blaming them a month later for problems | caused by the previous administrators. It takes time to fix | years of neglect and malicious incompetence. | mhh__ wrote: | The issue with "privatisation" (they're not all the same) IMO | is that it's usually done by politicians trying to get | something for nothing. | | Lets say the benefits of privatisation are 10% cheaper | widgets or power stations, a politician will aim for 30%. | Goodbye future. | guggle wrote: | Private or public, nuclear does not like short-term | management. And there has been too much of it lately, | mostly because politics. | ttymck wrote: | Sorry, I don't mean to be rude, but I can't quite follow what | you're saying. I know it's anti-privatization, but I can | really make out the rest. | | What does this mean > "After the private have do not | profiting from old State made investments leaving anything | else falling apart. When they reach a certain level of mess | they going out, leaving the State arrange the mess and handle | the rage" | oezi wrote: | He means that a publically built monopoly rarely benefits | from privatization. Because the efficiency gains will | largely be extracted by the private owners. | Raed667 wrote: | there was also an (ideology motivated) sabotage, where | EDF is forced to sell at a loss to private competitors | who produce nothing, who then will turn around and sell | to customers at a cheaper price than EDF. So they can | claim that private is obviously better. | [deleted] | kergonath wrote: | It's all a house of cards anyway, as the "alternative | providers" who were supposed to provide all that magical | agile goodness through the wonders of competition fold | one after the other and are actively pushing their | customers to EDF. | | That's cargo cult economics: someone said competition was | good so we're going to have all the appearances of it | without giving up on our large publicly-funded | infrastructure. Because at the end of the day we need | electricity and all these rent seekers are only good at | extracting value from existing installations. Utterly | disgusting. | lairv wrote: | Sure, obviously this has nothing to do with a 40-year anti- | nuclear policy. | sangnoir wrote: | > Sure, obviously this has nothing to do with a 40-year | anti-nuclear policy. | | Ah, the good ol' French anti-nuclear policy: I remember | when French intelligence blew up a ship belonging to a pro- | nuclear lobby group. Wait, that was the _Rainbow Warrior_ | [0], which belonged to Greenpeace, en route to | demonstrations against French nuclear tests | | 0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_the_Rainbow_War | rior | lairv wrote: | We're talking about nuclear power here, not weapons, I | thought that was implicit, and no the two are not | necessarily related | hinata08 wrote: | the anti-nuclear policy was in Germany | | France was proud of the nuclear energy. It had plenty of | cheap and carbon-free electricity (it was once exported to | all the neighbouring countries) It was a way to be | independent energy wise, as more countries can export | nuclear fuel than oil. It was building power plants, and | processing nuclear waste from other countries | | And it made plenty of engineers busy ! France used to be a | country led by engineers. | kergonath wrote: | The Superphenix closure was entirely political. The | turning point was when the socialists had to ally with | the environmentalists because they were getting short on | votes. That would be the "gauche plurielle" circa 1997. | In parallel the Gaullist old guard, who were all about | sovereignty were overtaken on the right by neo-liberals | looking to get a quick buck, for whom the Russian | oligarchs were role models, also in the mid-1990s. But | even at that point it was uneasy. I think most informed | people would have been pro-nuclear, but that was a | politically risky thing to say out loud. | | The environmentalists (well, most of them anyway; there | always were some who saw that the alternative to nuclear | was coal and oil, not sunshine and rainbows) were always | against because they were mostly hippies doubtful of any | state-run project and somehow nuclear bombs. | | > France used to be a country led by engineers. | | And teachers and doctors. But we've got the politicians | we vote for. | lairv wrote: | Anti-nuclear policy sure was more significant in Germany | as it has led to the complete stop of its use, but in | France it has also slowed down the development of the | industry. | | Although it has evolved positively over the last three | years, nuclear energy remains controversial in public | opinion [0,1], and many ecologist and left-wing movements | have militated against nuclear power for the last 30 | years. Whether or not it had an impact on the country | policy toward nuclear power would require a more in-depth | and complete archive work, but just remember that | Emmanuel Macron was advocating toward reducing the share | of nuclear power when he was elected for the first time | in 2017 [2] (he has now changed) | | [0] https://www.ifop.com/publication/lopinion-des- | francais-sur-l... | | [1] https://www.lesechos.fr/politique- | societe/societe/sondage-ex... | | [2] https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x87skbx | [deleted] | cdot2 wrote: | So the issue is that many of their nuclear plants require long | maintenance downtime simultaneously? That seems like something | that could have been foreseen. | seszett wrote: | Maintenance had been postponed during the corona crisis. What | had not been foreseen was the Russian invasion of Ukraine and | the associated general energy crisis in Europe. | lm28469 wrote: | Can't forsee covid though, nor the war in Ukraine | | Without these two things we most likely wouldn't have blackouts | Normille wrote: | >What had not been foreseen was the Russian invasion of | Ukraine and the associated general energy crisis in Europe... | >Can't forsee covid though, nor the war in Ukraine... | | Yes. Who could possibly have foreseen that announcing you're | stopping imports of gas from Europe's biggest supplier, in | the run up to winter, might lead to... er... a shortage of | gas supplies. | | No-one in the corridors of power in the EU or UK, apparently. | lm28469 wrote: | If you plan for these events you'll quickly stop all | imports and exports because you'd have to be self | sufficient 24/7 | f6v wrote: | > No-one in the corridors of power in the EU or UK, | apparently. | | The whole conflict is just the other party calling bluff. | But both the West and Russia have invested so much neither | is going to settle. So they up the stakes and get dragged | downwards. The only thing left is to complain that "it's | unfair the the US is profiting". | sgt wrote: | And those pesky Norwegians. | oezi wrote: | If anything can be learnt here it is | | A.) that many things cannot be easily foreseen which includes | record draughts and the Ukraine conflict. | | B.) It makes sense to have a diversified energy mix where no | single source is used predominantly. | masklinn wrote: | Yes and no. The 10 years maintenance was foreseeable, but | during that they discovered a stress corrosion issue, initially | on the (somewhat beleaguered) N4 plants but which turned out to | be a lot more widespread than that. | | It's also chicken-decisions coming home to roost: maintenance | delays due to covid, poor maintenance conditions leading to | strikes, and training of new maintenance staff had apparently | been slashed because an expected shift to renewables means you | apparently don't need to train staff to maintain 50+ nuclear | plants expected to run for decades more. | coulditbenow wrote: | I wonder how this will affect people's circadian rhythms and | subsequent health benefits, prime time for a study. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-12-03 23:00 UTC)