Climate change is an often heard argument for the once called nuclear "renaissance". However, if one looks closer, there was something fishy about the industry using climate change protection as its most prominent feature... » Read more
More then thirty years of debate, and the controversy remains as polarised as ever. This website (to be fair - whose maintainer is anti-nuclear) collects news about nuclear power in Europe, sorted by nuclear power plant, type of power plant, country etc.
By presenting different (media) angles on current nuclear issues, we hope to be able to cut out some spin, either pro or against, and to allow the reader to make up his or her own mind about today's pro's and con's of nuclear power.
In the menu on the right you can select your country, the nuclear power plant in your neighbourhood, or your favourite company and read latest (most English) news about it.
Latest nuclear news
Will nuclear reactors Doel 3 and Tihange 2 ever get restarted?
Thursday, August 21, 2014It may well be possible that two of Belgium's nuclear reactors, Doel 3 and Tihange 2, will never be put online again. Small cracks in the nuclear vessels are turning out to be a bigger problem than initially thought. The two nuclear reactors have been offline for some time now, and this will remain the case at least until next spring. New tests dashed hopes of getting them started again during winter. And there is more. They may even never get started again, the VRT learned from several reliable sources. The latest news only adds to Belgium's imminent power supply problems for next winter.
EDF nuclear deal is a bad economic bet
Thursday, August 21, 2014Rising renewables output makes promise to buy Hinkley Point electricity at twice its current price a costly gamble
It has always been difficult to see what was attractive about the proposed deal with EDF to build a nuclear reactor at Hinkley Point in Somerset. To bring this off the government is offering to sell 35 years of index-linked tax receipts to the French government to buy electricity at twice its current price.
Belgian Doel 4 nuclear reactor closed till year-end
Thursday, August 14, 2014PARIS, Aug 14 (Reuters) - Belgian energy company Electrabel said its Doel 4 nuclear reactor would stay offline at least until the end of this year after major damage to its turbine, with the cause confirmed as sabotage.
On Tuesday, Electrabel had said the plant would remain offline until Sept. 15 as it carried out repairs and investigated an oil leak that forced its closure on Aug. 5. Its French parent company GDF Suez confirmed the closure was due to sabotage.
Areva's stock plunges on sales warning
Sunday, August 3, 2014PARIS, Aug 1 (Reuters) - Shares in French nuclear power group Areva closed 20 percent lower on Friday, the worst fall since the company was formed in 2001, as it posted a first-half loss, exited a thermal solar power business and cut sales targets.
The shares were down by as much as 23 percent earlier in the session with trading the busiest by volume since late February, when Areva posted a net loss of nearly half a billion euros.
Chief Executive Luc Oursel dropped a long-held target to sell 10 nuclear reactors by 2016, saying it would "take a few more years" and the firm warned that 2014 revenue would fall 10 percent, more than the 2-5 percent decline forecast in February.
Bulgaria signs nuclear deal with Westinghouse
Friday, August 1, 2014SOFIA, Aug 1 (Reuters) - Bulgaria, one of five EU states that depend totally on Russia for nuclear fuel, and Westinghouse Electric Company signed a shareholder agreement on Friday paving the way for construction of a new nuclear reactor estimated to cost $5 billion.
The deal, which still requires the approval of Bulgaria's next government, will help the Balkan country reduce its energy dependence on Russia at a time of increased tensions between Moscow and the European Union over Ukraine.
Cernavoda 3&4 construction back on after Candu Energy signs cooperation deal with Chinese state company
Monday, July 28, 2014SNC Lavalin subsidiary Candu Energy has signed a 'binding and exclusive' contract with China Nuclear Power Engineering Company, Ltd. (CNPEC) for the construction of CANDU Units 3 and 4 at the Cernavoda Nuclear Power Plant in Romania in Vancouver. The agreement was witnessed by senior representatives of China's National Energy Administration and Natural Resources Canada.
This agreement follows a letter of intent signed by CNPEC's parent company China General Nuclear Power Group (CGN) and Romanian utility Societatea Nationala Nuclearelectrica (SNN) in November 2013 for investment in and development of two additional nuclear units at the Cernavoda site.
The EU's nuclear links with Russia
Monday, July 28, 2014The EU has 18 Russian-designed nuclear power plants
Following the loss of the Malaysian airliner last week, European leaders are once again wrestling with the question of how to respond to Russia over its role in the Ukraine crisis.
They are reluctant to get tough, much more so than the United States.
The EU could easily end up doing itself a lot of economic harm, most obviously if Russia were to respond by turning down the gas.
Safety alert shuts down Torness nuclear reactor
Wednesday, July 2, 2014A nuclear reactor at Torness power plant has been shut down after a safety alert was triggered.
The incident at the plant, which is one of Scotland’s main power stations, happened just weeks after £30 million was spent on the same reactor to get it back online.
The shutdown means the power station is now only pumping out around a quarter of the energy it usually produces as the second reactor is currently working at a reduced capacity ahead of scheduled maintenance work.
Highly radioactive substance found in Swiss dump
Thursday, June 26, 2014GENEVA: A highly radioactive substance, emitting in some places radiation 100 times the permitted amount, has been discovered in Switzerland, local media reported on Sunday, adding that authorities had covered it up for 18 months.
Swiss weeklies Le Matin Dimanche and SonntagsZeitung reported that federal, regional and local officials decided not to reveal the fact that they had found radium deposits in an old dump in the town of Bienne so as not to scare the 50,000 local inhabitants.
UK nuclear clean-up bill rises by £6.6bn
Monday, June 23, 2014The bill faced by taxpayers for the clean-up of Sellafield and Britain’s other nuclear sites will be £6.6bn more than previously thought, in a sign of the challenges the country faces in dealing with its atomic legacy.
The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority said it had raised its best estimate for the undiscounted cost of the clean-up over the next 120 years to £110bn, a 7 per cent increase, with Sellafield alone accounting for £79.1bn of that. It also raised its total discounted estimate of the costs by 10 per cent to £64.9bn.