Funny to look back at the heated arguments 2 years ago – all that stuff about subsidising the French taxpayer etc.

And now the CFO, Thomas Piquemal (who must know the numbers) reckons that this “give away” (sic) could jeopardise EDF’s financial position. How come, when it was SUCH a good deal for nos amis and such a shocker for us? 😀

building that kind of Nuclear power station is very expensive, more than the company (EDF) is worth, so it’s a bit risky.

They’d need to pay out more money than they’re worth, many years before they’d start earning any income from their investment.

(This is where the Chinese backers got involved)

They’ve been promised a handsome return, but would you put your company’s future in the hands of someone else? They’d be relying on our government to keep paying over the odds, for decades.

(yes, there are contracts, but, contracts get broken every day)

I’m not sure what your question is, are you asking why it might jeapardise EDF? If so yes as above I think the project is so ridiculously expensive already that the cost is more than the company is worth, I think I read they’re not entirely sure if they can actually succesfully build it yet either so costs will probably spiral.

I think EDF are largely state owned so with the massive cost of electricity from this reactor we are basically subsidising the French taxpayer. I imagine as usual the british taxpayer will have to pay the billions in decom costs too rather than the company itself. There used to be a good list of the costs of decommissioning our reactors on the NDA website but they’ve taken it down now.

It’s almost as if nuclear power is a really, really expensive option and we should be looking at cheaper alternatives.

I imagine as usual the british taxpayer will have to pay the billions in decom costs too rather than the company itself.

There are some hard and stark choices to be made in the next few years. Energy isn’t something the private sector can necessarily provide on its own. Also nuclear costs from the past are irrelevant to modern reactors.

It’s almost as if nuclear power is a really, really expensive option and we should be looking at cheaper alternatives.

Please provide some costed Base load alternatives and their environmental impact, bear in mind these techs need to be built today as there is an energy shortage coming.

BJ – just smiling at the vitriole of 2 years ago, when the argument that this was not a good deal for EDF did not go down too well 😉

Definitions of “handsome” seem to spark some controversy too!!

from the bbc:

The company (EDF) has debt of more than €37bn (£28bn), its share price has more than halved in the past 12 months and the new nuclear power plants it is building in Finland and Flamanville, northwestern France are running late and are significantly over-budget.

I’d be a little uneasy about going into another scheme off the back of those numbers.!.

When (if?) it’s fully up and running then the £/KWh which zee French will receive will be a complete steal for the UK taxpayer if oil prices are at about $450 / barrel.

🙂

scotroutes – Member

It’s almost as if nuclear power is a really, really expensive option and we should be looking at cheaper alternatives.

Small Modular Reactors.

rather than designing / making / decomissioning each power station as a one off (like now) each stage is productionised – economies of scale, etc.

SMR’s seem to be the way the wind is blowing…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_the_Wind_Blows_(1986_film)

😆

It’s almost as if nuclear power is a really, really expensive option and we should be looking at cheaper alternatives.

But Gideon’s donators and chums won’t get rich then.

Perish the thought people try and reduce their energy consumption instead…

Yep reduce but that still only touches on the fact there has been **** all serious investment in UK power gen for decades. The but where not making a decision was an option is over and the problems are coming in.

Perish the thought people try and reduce their energy consumption instead…

How?

Go on then, turn your laptop off and go live in a cave by candle light.

And don’t even think about those eco friendly electric cars, or anything made from aluminium for that matter.

Perish the thought people try and reduce their energy consumption instead…

Or use any water for that matter, I think Scottish Water are the largest energy user north of the border. Reduction and micro-generation go some way, but peak load and industrial usage will need high capacity for some time.

How?

Go on then, turn your laptop off and go live in a cave by candle light.

Seriously? I don’t spend enough time in this dark side of the forum to know if I’m being trolled by a big hitter or not

Here is a starter anyway http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/domestic/

Many more resources online.

As has been said already, the pay off if it all goes well is good, however to get there EDF risk potentially overextending themselves which causes cashflow problems and could lead to them becoming insolvent.

As the other 2 plants are delayed it means that they arent in the position at this point in time they would have expected to be during negotiations. It’s not a good situation for anyone.

Estimated cost… £18 Biiiiilllion. 😯

And 😯

… For another £3 billion you can get your own fusion reactor – ITER project 2014 prices. (If it ever works).

scotroutes
It’s almost as if nuclear power is a really, really expensive option and we should be looking at cheaper alternatives.

There are no cheaper alternatives.

Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution in the later 1700’s, we have been living off energy that was conveniently and cheaply (free!) stored away in a cheap and easily accessible form (coal, oil and gas) by Nature. You literally just had to dig a hole and out it popped.

i.e. Nature, over millions of years converted the energy in sun light into hydrocarbon fuels.

Now we know that burning vast quantities of these easily accessible fuels causes climate issues, the pressure is on to move away to a more renewable and low carbon alternative. But those alternatives ALL require us to carry out the energy conversion and storage phase, that was previously done from free by Nature herself.

As a result ALL future energy is going to be more expensive, at a minimum twice as expensive and more like 4 or 5 times as expensive because “best practice” is now a lot more involved and complex.

So the actual options really are:

1) Cheap energy, but not much of it

OR

2) Lots of expensive energy

Unfortunately right now we need both – people could instantly reduce their consumption by a significant amount and we’d still have a crisis. Don’t think I’m against the suggestion – IMHO we should be investing lots of money in that, as the payback is far better than building power stations, but right now we have to build new power stations anyway.

It is the extent of project that is his issue, he supported a 33% participation. From this one can assume that he is comfortable with the upside downside ratio but not the size of the downside in the context of their balance sheet.

Thing is though EDF are owned primarily by the French government and they want this deal to go ahead. This is supposed to demonstrate EDF’s capabilities outside France and let them go win business elsewhere. And in reality does it really ruin EDF’s balance sheet, when the French government could just inject more money if required, albeit at a cost to the French tax payer.

If every building in the uk had a solar panel how much electricity would it supply versus 1 nuclear power station?

At 7:30pm in winter when everybody switches on their kettles after Corrie finishes?

Is storage of renewable energy such a problem that the billions of pounds that are needed for Hinkley wouldn’t be able to sort it out?

Seriously? I don’t spend enough time in this dark side of the forum to know if I’m being trolled by a big hitter or not

Go read the Cynic-Al spoon thread.

Here is a starter anyway http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/domestic/

Many more resources online.

LED bulbs, TV’s, and whatever else runs on electric in your house aren’t going to makeup the shortfall though are they? They’re important, but not the solution.

Then there’s the dwindling supplies of gas, so more homes are going to need to be heated by electricity in the next 50 years.

Likewise combustion engined cars are going to disappear, which is going to put electricity consumption through the roof, in the same way broadband had a shaky start with providers simply not having the server capacity to back up the speeds they were selling to customers.

It’s an inevitability that energy usage will go up, even if you somehow cut it per person, what do you do when the population increases?

Is storage of renewable energy such a problem that the billions of pounds that are needed for Hinkley wouldn’t be able to sort it out?

Simply put, yes.

How do you propose storing up all that solar energy from the summer to see us through heating homes all winter?

Yes you could spend that on £1000 for each home in insulation etc, that’s great, but it still doesn’t power the kettle let alone the car.

At 7:30pm in winter when everybody switches on their kettles after Corrie finishes?

Isn’t this supplied by Ben Cruachan and other hydros as they spin up in about 60 seconds?

Perish the thought people try and reduce their energy consumption instead…

Problem is the ‘rebound’ effect shows it often doesn’t really work, as the savings in one area often lead to increases in another area e.g. turning up the heating in a newly insulated house or driving more often in a new fuel efficient car.

The future of energy is the same as it always was, mixed sources, and nuclear can and should be a key player IMO.

Cruachan expansion plans:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ca3f4fe6-dbd9-11e5-a72f-1e7744c66818.html#axzz42JpIqoZO

UK regulators have said pumped storage can help increase the power network’s efficiency, but have struggled to balance a desire to encourage expansion with reluctance to introduce subsidies.
SSE, one of the UK’s biggest power groups, has dropped two of three pumped storage schemes it had been considering and said in November that “current policy and market signals?.?.?.?do not favour investment” in such plants.

Isn’t this supplied by Ben Cruachan and other hydros as they spin up in about 60 seconds?

Yep, or Dinorwic if you’re further South. But the base load argument still exists. Solar panels won’t fix that.

The total amount of wave and tidal stream energy in UK and Irish waters is estimated at 935 TWh/year. Of this, some 98 TWh/year of marine energy resource has been assessed as being economically recoverable with today’s technologies.

UK’s marine energy reserves are too promising to be ignored

Places like Dinorwig Power Station do provide the necessary ‘kick’ at peak times, but overall is a net user of energy.

NB: Gas plants are good at enabling a managing of demand.

If marine is so great why is no one rushing to develop it?

If marine is so great why is no one rushing to develop it?

I can’t prove it but I’m assuming our leaders care more about their business chums than our country.
No doubt if we did do marine , Cameron would flog the waves to the Chinese who could then sell them back to us at 1000% profit.

At 7:30pm in winter when everybody switches on their kettles after Corrie finishes?

maybe they could arrange to broadcast it at staggered intervals across the country?

I’m assuming our leaders care more about their business chums than our country.

Really, you’d think if there was money to be made in marine than people would be there, government support or not.

maybe they could arrange to broadcast it at staggered intervals across the country?

Interestingly catch up does mean things like Corrie are no longer as important as before. However, sports like the World Cup or 100m final will still be watched in real time and that isn’t going to change.

They’re important, but not the solution.

I don’t think anyone’s claimed it’s any kind of solution, but part of the big picture.

How do you propose storing up all that solar energy from the summer to see us through heating homes all winter?

There are many potential ways of storing renewable energy, from simple pump storage, which we basically do already, to things like liquid metal batteries. I think the future is quite likely to involve a supergrid type scenario where generation can be distributed easily across great distances. I’ve worked on a couple of international HVDC projects that will export/import energy as required, eg one from Norway to Scotland that will supply from Norway to here in summer when they have an excess of hydro, and in winter from here to there when we have an excess of wind/hydro and their hydro is frozen. Existing HVDC interconnectors have been very succesful.

If marine is so great why is no one rushing to develop it?

There is development going on, but because it is a relatively unproven emerging technology that is poorly supported by government it is hard for developers to attract good investment to move it forwards. The UK were pretty much leading the field until the last two years when funding was cut and we’ve lost many of our leading companies who had been developing the technology for many years. Personally tidal energy is a no-brainer, we can predict exactly when and how much power is available for a very long time in the future, and tide times vary greatly around the country.

One of the more advanced pioneering projects is Meygen http://www.meygen.com/ , and a unique interesting one is http://minesto.com/deep-green/ . You can keep abreast about the rest of the industry here http://renews.biz/tag/wave-tidal+europe

I don’t think anyone’s claimed it’s any kind of solution, but part of the big picture.

Indeed, but it still a big picture, coloring’s it in with a fineliner isn’t going to help.

I think the future is quite likely to involve a supergrid type scenario where generation can be distributed easily across great distances.

You still need something at the end of the grid doing the generating, however efficient it is there are still days when the sun doesn’t shine, the lakes are frozen and there’s no wind. But I still want a cup of tea.

And we need it now, not after a gazillion planing disputes over wind farms, another study into a tidal barrage at Bristol and Scotland proclaiming “we’re all right jack, you can’t build power stations here”.

If we’re talking about storing renewable energy, we need something that can supply nationally significant amounts (gigawatts), for hours if not days.

Our pumped-storage stations don’t even touch the sides. Yes we could build more, but millions of people would object passionately if we started flooding large valleys – which tend to be in places like the Lake District…

do the calc’s yourself if you get bored:

use: power = pressure x flowrate

and: pressure = density x g x height

Q1) how much water, dropping through a 200m high ‘penstock’, do you need to provide 1GW for 1hour.

Q2) how big a lake is that?

Q3) where in the uk can you find a valley big enough, and high enough?

(the ‘qualitative’ answers are:

Q1) = chuffing loads

Q2) = chuffing massive

Q3) = Good Luck.

Factor in the new reactors are being built by a foreign owned comapny using money borrowed from another country, using untried technology to produce if it all works at huge cost power to keep your tv on for Hollyoaks, thats without the huge costs and delays if stuff doesnt work and even higher costs if it all goes boom.

whats needed is energy conservation, switch off all motorway lighting, all no essential floodlighting, ban coronation street, etc