UK Nuclear Fleet

[dan_b]

Noticed on Grid Energy Numbers that UK Nuke has quietly crept back up to over 5GW (5.3GW today to be precise).

So had a quick look on the EDF Nuclear Power Plant Status and it seems like all but one nuclear generator sites is up and running - Hartlepool A is the only unit not generating and that's expected to be back online on 10th December. Just in time for the cold snap! Useful.

https://www.edfenergy.com/energy/power- ... y-statuses

[Swwils]

Not getting any younger though are they!

[dan_b]

Indeed not, and their replacements keep getting more delayed and more expensive!

[nowty]

I think the government has asked whether the remaining plants can be kept open for longer.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... 0in%202035.

EDF said on Wednesday that it would review whether there was a case to keep open the Hartlepool nuclear power plant in County Durham and Heysham 1 on the north-west coast of England near Lancaster. Both plants had been scheduled to close in March 2024.

[dan_b]

I guess it depends on how much longer it'll take to get Hinkley C and then Sizewell C up and generating. The answer to which is "blinkin' ages yet".

[Moxi]

I wonder what EDF are leveraging against the government for consideration of keeping the two plants running longer?

That said ultimately the decision isnt EDF's or Governments but H M Nuclear Inspectorate, the two stations are sister sites so they share the same designs and components and their moderators are quite fissured these days according to what I am told, the main issue for them though is the fact that their pod boilers had to be welded in many years ago due to crevice corrosion and the pod boilers are leaking more and more and are too complex in form to fix internally via remote methods being helical spiral in nature rather than more traditional formats.

https://www.onr.org.uk/documents/licenc ... ndbook.pdf

The link takes you to the ONR pages and the licensing requirements for all sites, the issue of convincing the regulator that the facility remains compliant really starts around section 26 for an aging station and the subsequent sections get harder and therefore more expensive to prove. Statutory outages normally take the reactor offline for 9 to 18months so any extension will only come after a period off the bars anyway.

I have worked on a number of outages for Magnox units where we worked for many months before being told of the decision to retire the unit as costs were pushing them to a loss.

Feels like the government doing what it does best - grasping at straws and displaying its ignorance.

Moxi

[Moxi]

More bad news for France, us and Europe in general as EDF have again pushed back restart dates for some of their aging fleet.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/ed ... 6c302b0710

Lets hope the wind keeps blowing favourably and we can export to Europe to help.

Moxi

[dan_b]

Its not all bad news, there's this last sentence

"However, the restart of the 1.3 GW Cattenom 1 reactor was moved forward by two weeks to Feb. 12."

[dan_b]

Which unfortunately also then coincides with a statutory outage at Sizewell B!

[Moxi]

Dan, having worked in the industry for many a year I would not count of the "two weeks early" statement until it actually happens

But fingers crossed eh........


Moxi