20 December 2023

Montel

EDF reactor outages rise 47% in “disastrous” 2022 – study

French utility EDF shut down its nuclear reactors for a total of 8,515 days in 2022, an increase of 46.5% from 2021, in a “disastrous year” marked by the corrosion crisis, a report showed on Wednesday.

Source : Montel: EDF reactor outages rise 47% in “disastrous” 2022 – study https://www.montelnews.com/news/1532606/edf-reactor-outages-rise-47-in-disastrous-2022--study

by Muriel Boselli • 6 December 2023

All 56 French reactors were subject to outages lasting between four and 365 days amid corrosion probes and repairs, said the World Nuclear Industry Status Report (WNISR), an annual study of the status of reactors worldwide.

Five reactors – Chooz 1 and 2, Civaux 1 and 2 and Penly 1 – were offline from 16-22 months between August 2021-July 2023. The firm kept 11 other reactors out of service for more than 200 days. At least 20 reactors were stopped simultaneously during the equivalent of 273 days. In terms of outages, 2022 turned out to be “disastrous” and “much worse than 2020”, when the Covid crisis severely disrupted EDF’s reactor maintenance schedules, the report said.

However, it was impossible to calculate the number of days of outage extensions in 2022 due to the huge number of changes made amid the corrosion crisis, said Mycle Schneider, WNISR lead author, nuclear industry critic and independent energy analyst.

In 2022, French nuclear output plummeted 22.6% (81.7 TWh) from 2021 to 279 TWh – its lowest level in 30 years.

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