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And we all know how it's going to work from a financial point of view in Emmanuel Macon's world: The projects will be funded with public debt (either directly

And we all know how it's going to work from a financial point of view in Emmanuel Macon's world: The projects will be funded with public debt (either directly or by providing state-backed loans that not be paid back for the most part), the profits will be private, and if a company fails, we will save their arse with public money again. Decommissioning and the long terms effects will also be left to the imagination of the reader, I mean, for taxpayers to pay. Don't get me wrong here, this is not a rant against nuclear power, which is the least bad source of energy we have at the moment, this is a rant about France's neo-liberal tunnel vision that even the USA has been steering away from in the past decade.

sofixa 5y ago
What? EDF, the company that operates the nuclear power plants and sells the electricity, is majority state owned. Full cleanup and decomissioning costs are always included upfront in new nuclear projects, and are a part of the electricity price calculated for the plant.
- bigbaguette 5y ago
  It's been a few years the government wanted to decouple the debt laden infrastructure and the retail parts (Hercule plan). Keep the former state-owned so that it can front the upcoming heavy investments and sell the retail activities to the private sector.
- fguerraz 5y ago
  Ever heard of project Hercules? It basically consist of chopping off EDF in bite-size pieces to satisfy the appetites of the European commission on competition and the free market. To some extent that has already been done, with the "old" fully state-owned EDF having been chopped into Enedis and EDF, and this will continue. Stating that "Full clean-up and decommissioning costs are always included upfront in new nuclear projects" is problematic considering that it has never been done, and the cost of storing by-products is made extraordinarily opaque with a combination of private actors (Orano for example) that are ridden with corruption issues. Also, it is just completely wrong that the cost of electricity takes all this into account. Let's say that there is a lot of debate around the issue :)
- cycomanic 5y ago
  Regarding the full cleanup and decommissioning costs essentially they are significantly underfunding the costs https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-europe-nuclear-idUKKCN0VP2KN https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-europe-nuclear-idUKKCN0VP...

sofixa 5y ago

What? EDF, the company that operates the nuclear power plants and sells the electricity, is majority state owned. Full cleanup and decomissioning costs are always included upfront in new nuclear projects, and are a part of the electricity price calculated for the plant.

bigbaguette 5y ago
It's been a few years the government wanted to decouple the debt laden infrastructure and the retail parts (Hercule plan). Keep the former state-owned so that it can front the upcoming heavy investments and sell the retail activities to the private sector.
fguerraz 5y ago
Ever heard of project Hercules? It basically consist of chopping off EDF in bite-size pieces to satisfy the appetites of the European commission on competition and the free market. To some extent that has already been done, with the "old" fully state-owned EDF having been chopped into Enedis and EDF, and this will continue. Stating that "Full clean-up and decommissioning costs are always included upfront in new nuclear projects" is problematic considering that it has never been done, and the cost of storing by-products is made extraordinarily opaque with a combination of private actors (Orano for example) that are ridden with corruption issues. Also, it is just completely wrong that the cost of electricity takes all this into account. Let's say that there is a lot of debate around the issue :)
cycomanic 5y ago
Regarding the full cleanup and decommissioning costs essentially they are significantly underfunding the costs https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-europe-nuclear-idUKKCN0VP2KN https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-europe-nuclear-idUKKCN0VP...