Political and engineering incompentence screwing nuclear power

[Thanas]

Guardian

Vincent de Rivaz, chief executive of EDF Energy, once boasted that British customers would be cooking their Christmas turkeys in 2017 with electricity from the proposed new Hinkley Point nuclear power station his firm is contracted to build. That was a time of optimism, and a grandiose claim in keeping with the £18bn grandiosity of the project itself; equivalent in cost to Heathrow Terminal 5 and the Olympics combined.

De Rivaz was wrong about that deadline and optimism is now in short supply. Business situations are often described as zero-sum, or win-win. Hinkley Point, already the site of a power station in Somerset, is a rare case where the project could be damaging to both customers and investors. It would saddle British taxpayers with highly expensive power, and risk bankrupting a major French company, whose finances are already shaky. The government should cancel the deal.

In theory it could do that, but in practice it cannot – not without damaging its reputation for consistent policymaking, and scaring off the other nuclear consortia it will need to build future plants; and they are needed, in order to meet Britain’s climate change obligations.

o this is the dilemma: Britain needs the project cancelled, but that cancellation must come from France. We are relying on the French and EDF, which has already spent £2bn on the project, to do the right thing. But will they?

Hinkley was to be the first new nuclear reactor in the UK for 20 years, providing 7% of the nation’s electricity. But it has been undermined. The first is that the European pressurised water reactor (EPR) planned for Hinkley has turned out to be an engineering disaster. The first to be built was at Olkiluoto, in Finland. Originally scheduled to start operating in 2009, the station is now tentatively to be finished by 2018. Costs have trebled and are the subject of a multibillion-euro lawsuit that has pretty much bankrupted the EPR’s French developer, Areva.

The second station, built by EDF itself at Flamanville in Normandy, is also in deep trouble. Intended for completion in 2012, it now looks unlikely to start before 2018 and is also running at about three times the original cost. On top of that, the French nuclear regulator is investigating potentially fatal problems in the fabric of the station that could lead to it being abandoned or rebuilt at even greater cost.

Two EPRs being built in China are also behind schedule, despite China’s expertise in nuclear construction. As the evidence grew that the EPR for Hinkley would be far more costly than expected, the talk of allowing private investment was replaced by promises of government support. The UK government will guarantee at least £2bn of debt. And it has promised that we, the electricity customers, will buy the power produced by Hinkley for 35 years at a price of £92.50 per megawatt-hour (MWh) in 2012 prices. The price would now be about £99/MWh (and will increase further with inflation). Contrast that with the current wholesale price of power in the UK, about £35/MWh.

No one knows what the price of competing power sources will be in 2025 (when Hinkley is supposed to start generating). But it would take a dramatic rise in oil and gas prices to match the Hinkley contract price. And offshore wind, the main source of renewable energy in the UK, is already coming in below £90/MWh, with a good chance that it will fall further.

So the contract was flawed. But consider too the state of EDF. The firm has seen its market value cut to under £20bn. This is little to do with the Hinkley project: it reflects falling power prices in France, its home market. Utilities are normally financially strong companies, with steady cash generation and relatively low risk. But EDF now has a level of debt greater than its market value. It has had to borrow to pay its dividend for the past four years, something healthy companies do not do.

Belatedly EDF’s domestic constituency seem to have woken up to the enormous risk it would be taking with Hinkley. The UK deal promises a high fixed price of electricity but leaves the construction risk with EDF and its Chinese partner, CGN, which has a one-third share of the project.

Given the dreadful construction record of the previous EPRs, one would need to be wildly optimistic to assume Hinkley would go smoothly. The estimated cost has steadily risen from £8bn (in today’s money) to £16bn (plus £2bn that has already been spent). But the stakes are higher than that. In its 2014 state aid report, the European commission required EDF and other investors to make available up to £24.5bn as extra “contingent equity” – to reduce the risk to the UK government, which would be guaranteeing some of the project debt.

EDF’s stock market value is about £18bn. For it to contemplate a single investment that could cost £16bn (its two-thirds share of £24bn) is astonishing. No normal company would consider such a risk, even if it hoped to make a high and predictable return in the future.

But EDF is not a normal company. Although privatised and listed on the Paris and London stock exchanges, it remains 85% owned by the French state, and has a major trade union (CFE-CGC) represented on its board.

The latter is significant, for it was the union that first realised the risk of Hinkley. In January, it forced the EDF board to postpone a decision on committing fully to the project, fearing the cost and risk would jeopardise French jobs. Last week Thomas Piquemal, the firm’s chief financial officer, resigned, reportedly in protest against the refusal of the board to delay the project by at least three years, until the French reactor is finished and a proper cost audit can be done.

EDF’s board is, of course, answerable to its shareholders. But there is a major conflict of interest between the private shareholders and the main one, the French government, for it would be embarrassing for the French state to have to delay or cancel the Hinkley project. And doing so could end the prospects of its EPR reactor being sold anywhere else in the world.

Jean-Bernard Lévy, chief executive of EDF (EDF Energy’s parent company), is in a difficult position. It was revealed this weekend that he told staff he wants further financial support from the French government before proceeding with Hinkley. In effect, he is asking his major shareholder to protect him against future lawsuits from the minor shareholders.

So there is a mess on both sides of the Channel. In Britain the 2008 Climate Change Act makes future cuts in UK greenhouse gas emissions legally binding. In theory, if the government fails to hit the carbon budgets the energy secretary (currently Amber Rudd) is in breach of the law. The budget for 2023-27 depends on Hinkley going ahead, as well as a full contribution from offshore wind. And after this, Britain will need at least three other new nuclear stations to replace old ones that will have closed.

The British government must also consider its “golden” relationship with China. For, once it became clear that EDF couldn’t fund Hinkley on its own, the UK turned to its longstanding Chinese partners – an arrangement reaffirmed during president Xi Jinping’s state visit to the UK last October. How embarrassing would it be for David Cameron to have to explain to the Chinese that we were now cancelling the project? Too embarrassing, perhaps. He needs the French to pull the plug. We all do.

[Flagg]

This is why I, personally am wary about nuclear power except in areas where wind/solar/tidal are just not options. Nuclear power itself is not inherently unsafe, but people, especially when in different agencies with deadlines, money, and ego's in play are astoundingly stupid and lead to shit like Yucca Mountain NIMBY's and Fukishima backup generators on ground level as opposed to in a place where water won't flood them.

It's like you can have the safest, most well designed plant or plants, but all it takes is one thing to fuck it all up. I mean I don't think transporting nuclear waste in practically indestructable containers is more of a safety risk than a growing number of pools filled with spent rods at each plant.

I'm not going to mention Chernobyl as a worry of mine, since it was FUBAR from conception.

[Patroklos]

I realize the technology is different as well as the scale, but I find it odd that naval nuclear technology in the west can be so successful and safe but civilian projects seem to wallow in these problems.

Nuclear power is still extremely safe relative to fossil fuels. The externalities between the are not even close even with the Chernobyls and Fukishimas. Just imagine a world where continued nuclear plant building past the 70s. Where associated projects like Yucca Mountain were not sabotaged.

[Purple]

I realize the technology is different as well as the scale, but I find it odd that naval nuclear technology in the west can be so successful and safe but civilian projects seem to wallow in these problems.

It's almost as if when an organization does its own work, start to finish they do it for the purpose of creating the best product where as when you allow a for profit company to do the same job they do it for the purposes of maximum profit...

[Lord Revan]

I realize the technology is different as well as the scale, but I find it odd that naval nuclear technology in the west can be so successful and safe but civilian projects seem to wallow in these problems.

It's almost as if when an organization does its own work, start to finish they do it for the purpose of creating the best product where as when you allow a for profit company to do the same job they do it for the purposes of maximum profit...

I dunno about the rest but Olkiluoto was a disaster when it came to organization with the french not doing their research as to the standards used here so delays were caused when the buildings for the reactor were not up to code (or so my brother told me), oh and it's seen as an embrassing fiasko here not "business as usual".

[Patroklos]

I realize the technology is different as well as the scale, but I find it odd that naval nuclear technology in the west can be so successful and safe but civilian projects seem to wallow in these problems.

It's almost as if when an organization does its own work, start to finish they do it for the purpose of creating the best product where as when you allow a for profit company to do the same job they do it for the purposes of maximum profit...

For profit companies (Electric Boat and Northrup Gruman) do the majority of he design and all the construction of our nuclear navy. The only major nuclear work he government does itself is refueling and that again is with lots of contractors from said firms.

It's not who is doing the work in my opinion, it's something else.

[Thanas]

I think it is due to the fact that civilian projects of this size have a lot more factors to consider and a lot more interests in play than naval forces.

[madd0ct0r]

There's a rule of thumb which states a single major nuclear accident every decade or so. All reactors in use or being built them get reviewed for that accident, people make changes and cost increases.

[aerius]

You know your design has issues when the Chinese can't build it on schedule.
Here in Canada, we've never built a CANDU plant on budget yet the Chinese were able to do it under budget and ahead of schedule.

[Edi]

Yes, the Olkiluoto reactor has been a colossal fuckup in terms of execution, and most of that is directly at Areva's feet. It was supposed to have been completed in 2009 and it's still not ready and the price tag is something like double what it was projected.

[Flagg]

There are a couple of military nuclear incidents that happen here and there as far as radiation leaks, but they are minor and tend to be classified, but I've only seen stuff on TV and can't find any articles of incidents, but unless a ship melts down in port I doubt we'd hear about it. So since I've got no evidence, take it or leave it for what it is.

Though I have the USS Nimitz parked maybe +/- 10 miles as the crow flies from my house about 6 months out of the year and any number of nuclear submarines parked father away across the sound and they don't keep me up at night. But the military tends to get what it wants or they close bases, so they have more say in how shit gets done and a tiny bit more say of when, but like has been said, it's all contracted work.

I think it's just too many cooks in the kitchen. The more hands shit passes through, the greater a chance there is for error, especially if there isn't really strong, firm oversight. It's like a game of "telephone". A good example would be that Mars probe that got destroyed because the contractor doing the programming used functional idiot imperial measurement while NASA uses real measurements like almost every other country on the fucking face of the goddamned planet the metric system and no one checked to make sure it had been converted.

[Lord Revan]

Yes, the Olkiluoto reactor has been a colossal fuckup in terms of execution, and most of that is directly at Areva's feet. It was supposed to have been completed in 2009 and it's still not ready and the price tag is something like double what it was projected.

From what I've heard from my brother "colossal fuckup" is an understatement, we're talking millions of euros worth of "oops!" in part of Areva.

[Elheru Aran]

I think it is due to the fact that civilian projects of this size have a lot more factors to consider and a lot more interests in play than naval forces.

Relevant thoughts:

--Naval reactors only have to power a single vessel. There may have been incidents where they were hooked up to temporarily power shore facilities or other ships, but that's pure hypothesis as I imagine such a function is theoretically possible. I think I vaguely recall reading about concepts for 'power ships' which would have been like small freighters carrying a nuclear reactor specifically for such situations, but I cannot stand upon that. In normal operations, they are confined to single vessels, and as such, they tend to be small, which lends a certain security to thinking about them, versus thinking about reactors that power an entire city or whatever.

--Furthermore, being aboard ships, they tend to be more easily isolated and away from civilization in general (port visits notwithstanding, see Flagg's example), which again lends more security to public perception.

--Since operating parameters can be easily defined and limited due to the small area of operation (one vessel), design parameters are far more easily adhered to during construction and operation. There's no concern that the reactor might go over capacity because they had to connect another town down the river or whatever.

--Lastly: It's the military. In the US, about all they have to do is hold out their hands to Congress and make Bambi eyes. They can get pretty much whatever they want in broad strokes, especially back during the Cold War... and it bears noting that many, if not almost all, of their nuke ships have distinct Cold War roots; the Nimitz carriers definitely do, as do the SSN's and SSBN's for the most part. How many naval vessels have been designed and built from the ground (er, water?) up since the 1990s? 2000's? that use nuclear reactors as their primary source of power?

[Patroklos]

--Naval reactors only have to power a single vessel. There may have been incidents where they were hooked up to temporarily power shore facilities or other ships, but that's pure hypothesis as I imagine such a function is theoretically possible. I think I vaguely recall reading about concepts for 'power ships' which would have been like small freighters carrying a nuclear reactor specifically for such situations, but I cannot stand upon that. In normal operations, they are confined to single vessels, and as such, they tend to be small, which lends a certain security to thinking about them, versus thinking about reactors that power an entire city or whatever.

Does anyone have an info on how a reactor scales regarding supporting infrastructure versus power produced? I am sure on a militarized vessel its not favorable but what if its on a towed barge instead of an attack submarine? I am sure it exists I just can't look at the moment.

--Furthermore, being aboard ships, they tend to be more easily isolated and away from civilization in general (port visits notwithstanding, see Flagg's example), which again lends more security to public perception.

Until recently I lived within five miles of sometimes five CVNs and a dozen SSNs. They were not always all in port at the same time, but most of them usually were. These ships spend most of their time in port so if they were accident prone those accidents would probably happen in port.

I think there is merit in being mobile though. Hurricane is coming? Disconnect and move out of the way, come back a day later and reconnect. As long as you are in a tsunami protected harbor which most naval bases are, you are immune to earthquakes for the most part too. No the electric grid might still be screwed up, but the power plant won't be and that's one less problem.

--Since operating parameters can be easily defined and limited due to the small area of operation (one vessel), design parameters are far more easily adhered to during construction and operation. There's no concern that the reactor might go over capacity because they had to connect another town down the river or whatever.

Power plants shed load when they get to capacity anyway. And I think you are expressing the opposite of reality regarding design. A military reactor might be purpose built but its purpose built to all sorts of military needs and special circumstances. A civilian reactor is built to do one thing and one thing only and generally under the most benign circumstances possible. A civilian reactor isn't routinely tilted 30 degrees off level for instance, or has to be encapsulated in a fully closed environment to the same extent.

--Lastly: It's the military. In the US, about all they have to do is hold out their hands to Congress and make Bambi eyes. They can get pretty much whatever they want in broad strokes, especially back during the Cold War... and it bears noting that many, if not almost all, of their nuke ships have distinct Cold War roots; the Nimitz carriers definitely do, as do the SSN's and SSBN's for the most part. How many naval vessels have been designed and built from the ground (er, water?) up since the 1990s? 2000's? that use nuclear reactors as their primary source of power?

[/quote]

The Virginias and the Ford are all well post Cold War designs and use new reactor designs that are also post Cold War. The SSBX is in the works now, so no its not a Cold War thing though that obviously greased the wheels regarding the first generation research hurdles.

I tend to agree with Thanas. Its artificial obstruction. National security is a good way of swatting off hangers on and troublesome nay sayers. Now that's not always good, you need some of that to keep everyone honest, but given the stellar safety record of the nuclear USN and most other nuclear navies (with the notable exception of Russia to a degree) I don't think that applies here. Somehow government and industry has partnered to create a very safe and stable nuclear technology base and I don't see why that can't be replicated for civilian uses.

[Starglider]

Relevant thoughts

None of what you just said made sense.

In normal operations, they are confined to single vessels, and as such, they tend to be small, which lends a certain security to thinking about them, versus thinking about reactors that power an entire city or whatever.

Shipboard nuclear reactors have much less shielding and are vulnerable to all the usual things that can sink ships/submarines as well as the usual range of possible reactor emergencies. Naval reactors are designed to challenging volume and weight requirements which make safety a lot harder than shore based systems which can just brute force the emergency cooling, redundant shielding etc.

Furthermore, being aboard ships, they tend to be more easily isolated and away from civilization in general (port visits notwithstanding, see Flagg's example), which again lends more security to public perception.

Perception aside, naval reactors are exposed to a corrosive environment, constant vibration at many different changing frequencies and potentially shock damage. They are harder to get at to maintain and refuel.

Since operating parameters can be easily defined and limited due to the small area of operation (one vessel), design parameters are far more easily adhered to during construction and operation. There's no concern that the reactor might go over capacity because they had to connect another town down the river or whatever.

For naval reactors operating parameters vary radically and frequently from no load to flank speed plus running steam catapults, with the need to ramp power up and down. Civillian power reactors do not have any concerns about 'over capacity' because that only applies to the genset (and not even that really, just the grid), not the reactor system, which has a fixed known capacity which is occasionally ramped slowly up and down.

How many naval vessels have been designed and built from the ground (er, water?) up since the 1990s? 2000's? that use nuclear reactors as their primary source of power?

The A1B and S9G are post-cold-war designs.

In short, yes naval reactor designers are more competent than the contractors who build contemporary nuclear plants. It was a prestigous field attracting brilliant engineers in the 1960s, 1970s, even 1980s, but no longer it seems.

[Patroklos]

That talent drain is a symptom of the problem though right? Why wants to be attached to projects that allow little innovation and drag on for multiple decades for what are often non technical reasons?

[madd0ct0r]

That talent drain is a symptom of the problem though right? Why wants to be attached to projects that allow little innovation and drag on for multiple decades for what are often non technical reasons?

gee, that would be totally unlike all other civil major civil engineering projects.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Cost over-runs are to be expected. These are new designs, being constructed in countries that have different regulatory requirements than say, France. So there are the teething problems of a new reactor (and the EPR is an expensive option anyway) and regulatory fuckups to contend with.

Canceling the projects wont make things any better, all it will do is make the building of new nuclear plants (with better designs) less likely.

[Edi]

Cost over-runs are to be expected. These are new designs, being constructed in countries that have different regulatory requirements than say, France. So there are the teething problems of a new reactor (and the EPR is an expensive option anyway) and regulatory fuckups to contend with.

Canceling the projects wont make things any better, all it will do is make the building of new nuclear plants (with better designs) less likely.

Since we're talking about different regulatory requirements, it could and should be said that any company building a reactor that doesn't do due diligence and as a result incurs massive cost overruns should automatically be in breach of contract.

Of course there will be some issues, but if you take a look at the history of Olkiluoto 3, it has been an Areva fuckup from start to finish. It's incompetence, carelessness, willful disregard and complete contempt for quality.

No use trying to explain it away with some mealy-mouthed bullshit about regulatory issues and new reactors. Those factors just merit even more care than an ordinary project for precisely those reasons.

[Zeropoint]

A military reactor might be purpose built but its purpose built to all sorts of military needs and special circumstances.

From my experience as a Nuke ET on board the Carl Vinson, I'd say the main design influence is the knowledge that a) the ship has "get shot at" in its job description, and b) people can't just throw up their hands and walk away if something goes wrong. In other words, the plant, and the procedures for operating it, are designed to be robust and safe. For example, one of the problems with the Fukushima plant was that even after "shutting it down", the core was still running at about 3% power, if I recall correctly. US Navy reactors are designed so that when you want them shut down, they shut the hell down--even if the primary shutdown mechanism goes a little wrong. If it goes a LOT wrong, there's a secondary shutdown system, completely separate and operating on a different principle.

Shipboard nuclear reactors have much less shielding

Maybe true, but they have plenty. We got less radiation exposure working down in the Reactor Auxiliaries Room than the guys working the flight deck did.

and are vulnerable to all the usual things that can sink ships/submarines as well as the usual range of possible reactor emergencies.

Which is why a healthy helping of "defensive design" is in play.

Naval reactors are designed to challenging volume and weight requirements which make safety a lot harder than shore based systems which can just brute force the emergency cooling, redundant shielding etc.

And they're still safer than civilian plants.

Perception aside, naval reactors are exposed to a corrosive environment

This is a genuine concern, and why there is much care and attention given to the chemical environment of the reactor.

In short, naval nuclear reactors face a much more challenging and dangerous environment than land-based civilian reactors do . . . and yet, they have an excellent, perhaps perfect safety record.

I can only conclude that civilian plants have these problems because people just can't be bothered to build them to be safe.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Cost over-runs are to be expected. These are new designs, being constructed in countries that have different regulatory requirements than say, France. So there are the teething problems of a new reactor (and the EPR is an expensive option anyway) and regulatory fuckups to contend with.

Canceling the projects wont make things any better, all it will do is make the building of new nuclear plants (with better designs) less likely.

Since we're talking about different regulatory requirements, it could and should be said that any company building a reactor that doesn't do due diligence and as a result incurs massive cost overruns should automatically be in breach of contract.

Of course there will be some issues, but if you take a look at the history of Olkiluoto 3, it has been an Areva fuckup from start to finish. It's incompetence, carelessness, willful disregard and complete contempt for quality.

No use trying to explain it away with some mealy-mouthed bullshit about regulatory issues and new reactors. Those factors just merit even more care than an ordinary project for precisely those reasons.

Cost over-runs, not in breach, I would say. They project a cost on paper, but the actual construction, even under the best conditions, will be more difficult and more costly than that. It is not until they have institutional experience building that particular design that the costs will go go down.

Actual fuckups (which seemed to have happened in the case of Olkiluoto 3) yeah, probably. There is shit you dont foresee with a new design that have to be fixed. On the other hand, if the buildings are not up to basic building codes...jesus christ.

[Ziggy Stardust]

Since we're talking about different regulatory requirements, it could and should be said that any company building a reactor that doesn't do due diligence and as a result incurs massive cost overruns should automatically be in breach of contract.

Classifying cost overruns as a breach of contract would only stall this construction longer and make it more expensive through all the various legal fees. That doesn't seem at all like a helpful path to take at this point.

[Sea Skimmer]

I'd point out a couple factors strongly favor the safety of naval nuclear power. Its much smaller scale, the platforms are very expensively built for other reasons, and not required to last as long. The US goal is 50 years max for a nuclear carrier, and about 30 years for submarines. 50 years lifespan is about the minimal anyone wants to design a large scale nuclear plant for. Nuclear power plants also need maximum up time, while naval ships fully expect long periods of idle time, even if the nuclear plant is not always shutdown during them. The total power duty cycle is less, though it can be more violent.

The use of HEU fuel in most western naval reactors also helps reliability in certain ways, and such reactors are simply safer. But use of HEU is only affordable as its leveraged off vastly expensive nuclear weapons production equipment. Once we had enough HEU for bombs it all kept being made as sub fuel at slightly lower enrichment levels. All civilian reactors and French, Russian and Chinese submarines use LEU fuel. All of those nations subs are less reliable then US-British ones in no small part because they get cut open so often for refueling and must be designed to 'easily' allow this.


Modern civilian reactors are just paper pushing nightmares, and any level of delay vastly inflates costs because of how much goes into maintaining certifications of literally every last single nut and bolt allowed to be used on the projects. Naval nuclear power is also like that, but this cost is spread over multiple hulls through constant production. The restart of civilian reactors was always going to involve huge proportional costs, and ones which would only go down given steady launches of new projects.

Classifying cost overruns as a breach of contract would only stall this construction longer and make it more expensive through all the various legal fees. That doesn't seem at all like a helpful path to take at this point.

What it would probably do is stall construction long enough to turn into the builder going bankrupt. That can already easily happen multiple ways. This is why few companies will even partially invest in nuclear power without full government backing of the loans. The risk of implosion is pretty damn real with how many different ways a project can be paused, let alone redesigned or aborted.

...worth recalling how many damn railroads went bankrupt everywhere that allowed private companies to build them. Problem is you can't just pickup a nuclear reactor site, grab some labor and get it finished under a totally different name.

[Edi]

Since we're talking about different regulatory requirements, it could and should be said that any company building a reactor that doesn't do due diligence and as a result incurs massive cost overruns should automatically be in breach of contract.

Classifying cost overruns as a breach of contract would only stall this construction longer and make it more expensive through all the various legal fees. That doesn't seem at all like a helpful path to take at this point.

Cost overruns incurred as a result of neglecting due diligence. There is a difference. You can still do everything right and get cost overruns, but if you neglect something as basic as finding out what the regulations are and don't build up to spec, then yes, there is no reason to not have the builder eat the cost.

[Lord Revan]

There's a reason why I said "collosal fuckup" was an understatement, my brother used to work in the nuclear department of Fortum (he has since moved to different part of the Company) and while not directly involved with Olkiluoto he had heard things about it.

What I gathered from the things he told me was that Areva had been "surely we don't have to check what the local standards are, those Finns won't care as long as we build it", when we the goverment organizations responsible for inspecting told them that they'll have to build the reactor to finnish standards Areva threw a fit and dragged their feet about it making the project cost even more and be even more behind the estimate completion date (which was 7 years ago give or take few months).