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- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Wissenschaft und neue Technologien
- Sprache: Englisch
This book presents the factual, precise, complete and accessible economic elements of nuclear energy in order to contribute to an informed and dispassionate debate. It begins with an in-depth analysis of the strategic policies relating to nuclear energy in France and around the world. The methodological aspects are presented exhaustively and illustrated with detailed examples and case studies. This book provides a relevant economic study of the fuel component of nuclear energy. In this context, aspects of the uranium market are presented, before describing in detail the technical and economic components upstream of the nuclear cycle.
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Seitenzahl: 413
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023
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Table of Contents
Cover
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Preface
1 The Evolution of Nuclear Energy in the World and in France
1.1. Introduction
1.2. Nuclear power in the world
1.3. The trajectory of the French nuclear ecosystem, between continuity and rupture
1.4. Conclusion
1.5. References
2 Nuclear Costs: Methodological Aspects
2.1. Introduction
2.2. The different notions of costs
2.3. The discounted cost of nuclear electricity
2.4. Determining the discount rate
2.5. Case study: a new nuclear reactor
2.6. Conclusion
2.7. References
3 The Production Costs of Nuclear Electricity
3.1. Introduction
3.2. Nuclear costs of existing reactors (Generation II)
3.3. Costs of nuclear electricity at the power station terminal
3.4. Overview of production costs of other nuclear technologies: SMR and FNR
3.5. Electrical system costs and nuclear competitiveness
3.6. Conclusion
3.7. References
4 The Costs of Nuclear Fuel
4.1. The cost of fuel expressed in the LCOE
4.2. Uranium: availability and markets
4.3. From conversion to fuel fabrication
4.4. References
Appendix: Ore Deposits and Mining Projects
List of Authors
Index
Summary of Volume 2
End User License Agreement
List of Tables
Chapter 2
Table 2.1. Summary of the costs used for the reference calculation
Table 2.2. Summary of the sensitivity study and the effects on the LCOE in rel...
Chapter 3
Table 3.1. Operating costs (excluding fuel) of French reactors over the period...
Table 3.2. Global census of Generation III reactors connected or under constru...
Table 3.3. Overnight costs of future reactors as calculated by the Nuclear Ene...
Table 3.4. Operating, maintenance and fuel costs for new reactors (NEA 2020; O...
Table 3.5. Summary of orders of magnitude (in €/MWh) of nuclear, wind and sola...
Chapter 4
Table 4.1. Cost tranches considered by the IAEA-NEA
Table 4.2. Proportional breakdown of the world’s production by mining company ...
Table 4.3. Characteristics of the uranium market quotes
Table 4.4. Increase in operational and investment costs in the mining industry
Table 4.5. UF
6
production capacities in 2019
Table 4.6. Evolution and forecasting of the enriched UF
6
production capacity
Table 4.7. Changes in the demand for first-core fuels, expressed in tons of he...
List of Illustrations
Chapter 1
Figure 1.1. Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) Chairman Glenn Seaborg and NASA Adm...
Figure 1.2. Evolution of China’s electricity production between 1990 and 2018...
Figure 1.3. Illustration of European collaboration in the development of nucle...
Figure 1.4. Illustration of the assembly of fuel rods in the tubes configuring...
Figure 1.5. The development of first-generation reactors.
Chapter 2
Figure 2.1. The various scopes of cost analysis according to OECD/NEA (2015).
Figure 2.2. Historic of expenses (negative monetary unit) and revenues (positi...
Figure 2.3. Evolution of the discount factor as a function of time over a time...
Figure 2.4. Profile of construction costs and interim interest calculated for ...
Figure 2.5. Time profile of nominal annual electricity production (blue) with ...
Figure 2.6. Disbursement for a new EPR-type nuclear reference project. (a) a z...
Figure 2.7. Breakdown of LCOE for a 4% discount rate (a). Breakdown of capital...
Figure 2.8. Breakdown of LCOE for a 7 % discount rate (a). Breakdown of capita...
Figure 2.9. Representation of the LCOE depending on the discount rate assumed ...
Chapter 3
Figure 3.1. History of the construction and connection of nuclear reactors (le...
Figure 3.2. Evolution of historical reactor construction costs in the United S...
Figure 3.3. Succession of French reactor models
Figure 3.4. Construction duration of “historic” reactors in six countries...
Figure 3.5. Comparison of the construction costs of Generation III reactors, d...
Figure 3.6. Learning curve of reactor costs for a new concept
Figure 3.7. Sensitivity of the guaranteed price according to the investor’s ra...
Figure 3.8. Sensitivity of the discounted cost according to the capacity facto...
Figure 3.9. Qualitative presentation of expected cost reduction factors for SM...
Figure 3.10. Order of magnitude of production costs, nuclear and renewable ene...
Figure 3.11. Stylized succession of nuclear generations and profiles of their...
Figure 3.12. Order of magnitude of the costs of a French-type electrical syste...
Chapter 4
Figure 4.1. Schematic view of the nuclear fuel cycle with a focus on three dis...
Figure 4.2. Illustration of the fuel cost calculation methodology.
Figure 4.3. Breakdown of operating costs for coal, gas and nuclear power (Worl...
Figure 4.4. World demand for uranium in 2018 (59,200 tU)
Figure 4.5. Prospects for the development of the world’s nuclear power plants ...
Figure 4.6. Prospects for the evolution of world uranium demand until 2040
Figure 4.7. Evolution of resources identified by cost tranche
Figure 4.8. Evolution of reasonably assured resources by country
Figure 4.9. Resources identified by country in 2020
Figure 4.10. World uranium production 1853–1944 (Orano estimate).
Figure 4.11. Production by country. Only countries with a cumulative productio...
Figure 4.12. Breakdown of world uranium production 2019: 53,718 tU
Figure 4.13. Production history of Kazakhstan
Figure 4.14. Average uranium spot price.
Figure 4.15. Stages of a mining project
Figure 4.16. Mining development schedule for the Athabasca ore deposits
Figure 4.17. Amount of funds raised for uranium exploration
Figure 4.18. Evolution of the conversion price from 2017 to 2021
Figure 4.19. Conversion demand scenarios until 2040. AGR stands for annual gro...
Figure 4.20. Production forecast by stakeholder for the period 2019–2023...
Figure 4.21. Location of UF6 production and demand from enrichers in 2019.
Figure 4.22. Evolution of the enrichment price from 2017 to 2021
Figure 4.23. Enrichment demand scenarios until 2040. AGR stands for annual gro...
Figure 4.24. PWR fuel assembly.
Figure 4.25. AGR fuel assembly.
Figure 4.26. Fuel reload demand scenarios until 2040. In this case, AGR stands...
Figure 4.27. First-core fuel demand scenarios until 2037. In this case, AGR st...
Figure 4.28. Limits to combustion rates and fuel enrichment (Nuclear Energy In...
Guide
Cover
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Preface
Begin Reading
Appendix: Ore Deposits and Mining Projects
List of Authors
Index
Summary of Volume 2
End User License Agreement
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SCIENCES
Energy, Field Directors – Alain Dollet and Pascal Brault
Nuclear Energy, Subject Head – Sylvain David
Nuclear Economy 1
Nuclear Fuel Cycle Economic Analysis
Coordinated by
Jacques Percebois
Nicolas Thiollière
First published 2023 in Great Britain and the United States by ISTE Ltd and John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms and licenses issued by the CLA. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside these terms should be sent to the publishers at the undermentioned address:
ISTE Ltd27-37 St George’s RoadLondon SW19 4EUUKwww.iste.co.uk
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.111 River StreetHoboken, NJ 07030USAwww.wiley.com
© ISTE Ltd 2023The rights of Jacques Percebois and Nicolas Thiollière to be identified as the authors of this work have been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s), contributor(s) or editor(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of ISTE Group.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2023931851
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication DataA CIP record for this book is available from the British LibraryISBN 978-1-78945-094-1
ERC code:PE2 Fundamental Constituents of Matter PE2_3 Nuclear physicsPE8 Products and Processes Engineering PE8_6 Energy processes engineeringSH1 Individuals, Markets and Organisations SH1_12 Agricultural economics; energy economics; environmental economics
Preface
Sylvain DAVID1, Jacques PERCEBOIS2 and Nicolas THIOLLIÈRE3
1 IJCLab Orsay, CNRS, IN2P3, France
2 CREDEN, CNRS ART-Dev, Université de Montpellier, France
3 Subatech, IMT Atlantique, Nantes, France
Nuclear energy initiates passionate debates that are often characterized by radical positions. Nevertheless, this subject benefits from robust core knowledge drawing on many disciplines in the human and social sciences, the technological sciences and even life sciences.
However, the dynamism of this field of research cannot obscure the fact that nuclear energy is a controversial source of energy. Research works having addressed nuclear safety, nuclear waste management and decommissioning issues, as well as those discussing the economic aspects of nuclear energy, have not resulted in a consensual vision, shared by all the actors involved.
The economic aspects of nuclear energy are relatively complex, which is evidenced by the size of this work. The authors wish to explore this issue in an academic and detailed way, describing its complexity while making it accessible.
Future strategies involving the use of nuclear energy are highly heterogeneous around the world. Since the characteristics of the energy and electricity mixes fall within the domain of national sovereignty, each country is likely to develop a specific strategy. Many determinants come into play, historical, socioeconomic or even political.
One of the specificities of nuclear energy is that it engages expenses and revenues over prolonged periods of time: around a decade for the construction of sites, half a century for the operation of a plant and a century or more for waste management. This has led to the development of cost calculation methodologies capable of taking those time frames into account. Even assuming that all costs and benefits are accurately known beforehand, there is no predefined law for comparing costs over such long periods, which is why different methods are available. Due to the uncertainty of the future technical and scientific context, the advancement of knowledge, the social model at work and even geopolitics, it is impossible to predict the effect of a financial flow over 50 years. It is necessary to develop sensitivity analyses capable of inspiring decision-makers and guiding the choices to be made.
At present, the implementation of nuclear energy is mainly destined to the production of electricity. Nuclear power plants, as well as all the other sources of electricity, are connected to an electricity network that must ensure the balance between supply and demand at all times. The increasing popularity of intermittent renewable energies in the context of the energy transition is provoking disturbances in the normal flow of electricity markets, which require a thorough understanding so as to better anticipate energetic needs.
This book addresses all of these questions, with a detailed focus on the specificities and calculation methods associated with activities upstream and downstream of the electronuclear energy cycle. Cost estimation is analyzed, with an emphasis on the management of mining waste. We also study the way in which nuclear energy fits into a larger mix and responds to the rules of the energy market in an ever-evolving socioeconomic context.
For practical reasons, this book is divided into two volumes.
The first volume includes the following four chapters and appendix:
Chapter 1
: The Evolution of Nuclear Energy in the World and in France;
Chapter 2
: Nuclear Costs: Methodological Aspects;
Chapter 3
: The Production Costs of Nuclear Electricity;
Chapter 4
: The Costs of Nuclear Fuel;
Appendix
: Ore Deposits and Mining Projects.
The second volume includes the following five chapters and appendix:
Chapter 1: Management of Spent Fuels;
Chapter 2: Nuclear Power in the European Electricity Market;
Chapter 3: The Industrial Challenges of Nuclear Power;
Chapter 4: The Economic Costs of a Nuclear Accident;
Chapter 5: Prospective Scenarios from the Present to 2050;
Appendix: The Dismantling of Nuclear Facilities.
Each chapter can be read independently, because the chapters are built around a central topic. The chapters share an overall coherence and there is a logical progression in the presentation of the themes: the methodological aspects of economic calculation are discussed in the first chapters, while the world perspectives of nuclear energy are analyzed in the last chapter of the book.
This book is intended for a wide audience with a minimum scientific knowledge and wishing to understand the details of the calculations of the various costs of nuclear energy, or to enrich their understanding of this problem: students, researchers, professionals in the energy sector (companies, ministries, communities, etc.) will find a large amount of information and be able to form an opinion regarding the economic aspects of nuclear energy.
The intention behind this work is to keep it as academic as possible, methodically describing the hypotheses and uncertainties that relate to knowledge or theories of the future, as well as to technical or political choices. The profile of the authors is heterogeneous, striving to summon a wide spectrum of specialists, from university teachers to pilots of major industrial projects.
Readers will undoubtedly appreciate the nuances in the approach to given topics, and while some “opinions” may permeate certain introductory sections, the entire work constitutes an unprecedented scientific resource. This book aims to provide factual, accurate, comprehensive and accessible elements, and contribute to an informed and dispassionate debate meeting current energy and climate challenges.
April 2023
1The Evolution of Nuclear Energy in the World and in France
Daniel IRACANE1, Stéphanie TILLEMENT2 and Frédéric GARCIAS3,4
1 CEA, Saclay, France
2 LEMNA, IMT Atlantique, Nantes, France
3 IAE Lille, France
4 Université de Lille, France
1.1. Introduction
Nuclear energy has the advantage of being extremely concentrated, which makes it an attractive source of energy. However, it also requires harnessing the risks associated with such concentration.
For several decades, the equilibrium between the advantages and disadvantages of this technology has been the subject of bitter controversies in many countries. Safety, waste management and decommissioning are major issues whose long-term uncertainties fuel debates. These topics are at the heart of a know-how consolidated over the decades and reinforced by intense international exchanges, dictating the state-of-the-art in the field. This international state-of-the-art receives various nuances depending on the country and is translated by national legislation and regulations. Despite their critical importance, these topics fall under the broader question of the “nuclear know-how” and will not be addressed in this first chapter.
The intention here is to evaluate the position of nuclear energy in the energetic-industrial policy of a certain number of countries, both in terms of motivation and management.
The consumption of considerable amounts of energy is the essential basis of our way of life and shows a perfect correlation with the world’s GDP. The debates on energy policies are lively and choices even more difficult in a world which has to cope with climatic emergencies and which exceeded the conventional oil production peak in 2006. The tensions, not to mention the antagonism, between availability constraints, a low-carbon economy, strategic security and socially acceptable costs have never been so palpable. New energy technologies are tools which are all contributing to the evolution of electricity mixes.
But will nuclear energy remain a significant asset in the solutions toolbox deployed by our advanced societies in order to meet both the massive citizen demand for affordable energy and climate commitments?
International agencies (OECD, IAEA) advise on the need to use all the technologies at hand – including nuclear energy – since energy-related issues today seem almost insurmountable and terribly urgent. Despite this, many societal actors believe just as legitimately that our world should work because of new energy technologies and innovation, and dispense with controllable (fossil, nuclear) sources.
While innovation is the key to an unknown future, it is impossible to peremptorily demonstrate that a world based on renewable energies cannot meet the needs of our societies.
However, the deployment of the technologies required for collecting wind power and solar energy, whose nature is diffuse and intermittent, raises new challenges when such deployments take place on a very large scale. A country like France consumes an average electrical power in the range of 50–60 GW. Estimates agree to show that a 100% renewable system, based on the production of hydrogen to compensate for intermittency, would require the deployment of around 300 GW of technological objects (wind turbines, solar panels, electrolyzers and fuel cells), namely, five to six times the energy needed. While wind power and solar energy are renewable, the technology to extract and concentrate them is not. This poses a major challenge and systemic uncertainties, for example, in terms of the materials needed. It is therefore just as premature to guarantee that we can do without a carbon-free, concentrated and controllable energy such as nuclear power.
Confronted with a societal debate of primary importance, it is crucial to examine the trajectory of a few emblematic countries in their willingness and their ability to include nuclear energy in their technological and energy policies.
This first chapter will describe the evolution of nuclear energy, first at a global scale, before focusing on the French case.
1.2. Nuclear power in the world
In its pioneering phase, nuclear science and technology shared a parallel development within a few countries. At first, it was necessary to overcome the scientific challenges resulting from the discovery of the neutron in 1932, and fission in 1938. In these countries, the Second World War marked the starting point of an often dual technological adventure, which materialized in the 1960s through the proliferation of national programs widely exploring the different solutions for producing electricity. The 1974 oil crisis led to a new paradigm shift associated with the supply security challenges, leading both to the choice of the best technologies and their rapid deployment. All of the countries having followed this path share the same development model built around a State determination and framework, concomitantly encouraging the emergence of industries and national regulatory systems. The last two decades of the 20th century were marked by the stabilization of the world’s nuclear fleet after a period of strong growth, and above all, by the liberalization of the electricity markets (Deffrennes and Iracane 2020).
Following the homogeneous heritage described in section 1.1, the trajectories of the different countries equipped with nuclear energy reactors has diverged since the 2000s. This is not only related to the public perception of nuclear energy and the economic and legislative framework given to the electricity market, but also due to varying geostrategic visions associated with the key domain of energy. More recently, climate issues, the breakthrough of shale gas, as well as the sustained growth of intermittent solar energy and wind power, have further increased the complexity of the energy subject in all countries.
It is therefore interesting to examine the different management and development modes of nuclear technologies around the world. The perception of these different dynamics offers a salutary perspective on a subject often caught in frozen debates.
The following paragraphs will provide examples of various management and development modes – to a certain extent each embodied by a particular country – which will then be considered as an illustrative basis. The illustration by country in no way suggests that the country in question favors a monolithic approach to nuclear power. On the contrary, to varying degrees and more or less explicitly, all the management methods illustrated below affect each country, which invites apprehending the nuclear subject from a natural multiplicity of viewpoints.
1.2.1. Creating long-term visibility seducing the market to invest: the case of the United Kingdom
Nuclear technology is capital-intensive and its associated investments are only possible within the framework of a stable long-term vision. The major historic nuclear programs, as well as the more recent one in China, were the result of a State readiness embodying this long-term vision instead of focusing on a market dynamic. In contrast, the United Kingdom implements an emblematic approach according to which the State’s role lies in establishing the relevant conditions so that the market can operate until a new generation of nuclear reactors is deployed.
The United Kingdom’s nuclear trajectory is characterized by large-scale transitions between a pioneering period in the field marked by British leadership, a second phase of brutal abandonment, and finally, the current juncture signaling a voluntarist and politically assumed reconstruction.
With the depletion of its hydrocarbon reserves in the North Sea and the aging of its energy infrastructure, the United Kingdom turned to low-carbon, nuclear and renewable energies, the fruit of a cross-party consensus. In 30 years, the electricity mix massively shifted from carbon to gas supplemented by wind power and solar energy, the nuclear component remaining globally stable. Although in 1999 the United Kingdom surpassed its gas production record, in 2002 its production began to fall.
After a long period of hesitation, striving to find an energy solution primarily based on renewable energies, successive governments built a political project integrating the renewable component and the nuclear component into the same “green economy”, motivated by three simultaneous commitments: reducing CO2 emissions by 2050, supply security and cost reduction for the consumer. In September 2016, the signing of the Contract for Difference for the Hinkley Point C project involving the construction of EPRs was the concrete kick-off signal for British nuclear renaissance.
The compatibility between the deregulation of the electricity sector and electronuclear technology continues to be a key issue in the use of this technology. The United Kingdom is a textbook case in this respect. The first announcements regarding the privatization of the nuclear sector date from 1988. In 1995, the “Review of the future prospects for nuclear energy” report in the United Kingdom (Danby 1996) definitively concluded on the interest of a transfer to the private sector for the industry, the consumer and the taxpayer. This was followed by the creation of British Energy in 1995 and its privatization in 1998, operating eight nuclear energy plants. Later, British Energy was destabilized by the priority given to shareholder compensation over investment and the company’s international adventures. The new market structure (New Electricity Trading Arrangements [NETA]), launched by the government in 2001 with the intention of promoting competition, caused wholesale electricity prices to fall and sent British Energy into the red as early as 2002. Following unsuccessful rescue operations, the government withdrew from the company in 2006, which was bought by EDF Energy in 2008. In 2020, with eight nuclear energy plants, 35 wind farms including two off-shore facilities, one gas-fired and two carbon power stations, EDF Energy became Great Britain’s leading electricity supplier, meeting 20% of the country’s needs.
Box 1.1.Technical history of nuclear energy development in the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom was a pioneer country in nuclear energy with two experimental piles commissioned in 1947 and 1948, and a first Advanced Gas-cooled Reactor (AGR) coupled to the network in 1963. As in other countries, including France, the debate for the choice of future power reactors between national technology and American technologies was fierce. In 1965, the British government chose the national AGR sector. But in 1979, the Thatcher administration endorsed a policy shift, authorizing the construction of a pressurized water reactor at Sizewell, using American technology. This was the last reactor built in the United Kingdom until the official start of construction work on two EPRs (European Pressurized Reactors) by EDF Energy and the Chinese enterprise CGN at Hinkley Point C, in September 2016.
In 2006, Tony Blair’s administration announced its intention to launch a program for building new reactors in the United Kingdom, aimed at replacing the existing stations and increasing the share of nuclear energy in the electricity mix, in order to reduce British greenhouse gas emissions. Several projects were proposed, planning for the construction of different types of reactors: the French EPR, the Japanese-American AP1000 and ABWR, and the Chinese Hualong. The paths followed by France and the United Kingdom in terms of nuclear energy share many similarities. The choice of the technological sector for a massive deployment in the 1970s reveals a key bifurcation; the choice of the British for their national low-power density reactor technology largely accounts for the setbacks the industry experienced during its privatization.
Together with France, the United Kingdom is one of the few Western countries to have deployed industrial leadership in the field of the fuel cycle. British Nuclear Fuels Ltd1 (BNFL), the flagship of the English nuclear industry, exploited the benefits of national public investment and became a world leader, then quickly lost momentum, until its complete dissolution. Following its transformation into a public limited liability company in 1984, BNFL became one of the largest nuclear companies worldwide, providing its services at all levels of the fuel cycle, acquiring Westinghouse Electric Company in 1998, and then the nuclear portion of ABB (ASEA Brown Boveri, a Swiss-Swedish company). As from 2005, BNFL became gradually weakened by its dismemberment into several national organizations and by the sale of its assets (sale of Westinghouse in 2006 to Toshiba), until being completely dissolved in 2010.
One may observe that after a first-rate pioneering phase, the privatization of an industrial sector seeking to access a classical market was a flagrant failure.
The “Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy” ministry created in 2016 signified a remarkable turning point, with a renewed desire to develop an industrial strategy. In the nuclear field, this desire materialized in 2018 via the Nuclear Sector Deal (HM Government 2018), opening up prospects in the field of human resources and skills management, infrastructure deployment and innovation.
In view of meeting the challenge of the massive renewal of its nuclear fleet between 2020 and 2030 and honoring its commitment to reduce greenhouse gases (carbon neutrality by 2050), the British government is supporting the relaunching of a program for the construction of nuclear energy plants and striving to create favorable conditions for this program.
In the field of safety, in order to accommodate a broad technological offer, the government instructed the regulators – the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) and the Environment Agency – to create a Generic Design Assessment worksheet, in view of facilitating the regulatory visibility of emerging commercial proposals. The role of the safety authorities is fundamental to enable the emergence and penetration of new technologies. Given their independence, a clear political framework is necessary for the safety authorities to set up a transparent process when working with technology suppliers upstream of deployment decisions. Equivalent approaches motivated by the desire to promote national innovation or to accept innovative foreign technologies are observable in the United States, as in Canada.
In terms of financial protection, the British government created conditions for long-term visibility, enabling investors to secure their business plan. With the Contract for Difference, in 2013 the government introduced a strike price of £92.5/MWh (indexed to inflation) over a period of 35 years from the start of operations. For another EPR construction project (Sizewell), a new financial architecture (the Regulated Asset Base or RAB) is being studied, whose aim is to reduce the price per kWh. This mechanism, quite innovative for nuclear energy, enables an independent regulator to periodically review the situation and set prices.
The Hinkley Point C project marked a second emblematic change. In 2016, the Chinese CGN electricity supplier acquired a 33.5% stake in the project, alongside EDF, thus marking the first significant Chinese step into the Western nuclear field. This paved the way for another project by CGN with the support of EDF involving the certification and construction of a 100% Chinese design reactor (HPR 1000 or Hualong) on Bradwell B site.
Great Britain’s rise to power in the nuclear field is being catapulted by its plans to build Generation III nuclear reactors, while relying on a market with a facilitative public framework. This framework also implies a proactive long-term support policy for the sector, with priority given to human resources management and actions in favor of open innovation. A continuous production of initiatives can be observed at government level. Their goal is to rebuild a global nuclear system: the creation of a support structure for the definition of government policies, such as the diligent Nuclear Innovation Research Office (NIRO), the production of a “Nuclear Innovation Program”, the launch of the “Industrial Strategy Nuclear Sector Deal” in 2018, the call for projects for the development of advanced modular reactors (AMR).
After the disengagement of the 1980s and 1990s, the starting point for this reconstruction is undoubtedly low, and it will take long for this policy to materialize a new British leadership in the field. Government documents, such as the Energy White Paper (HM Government 2020a) and the Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution (HM Government 2020b), released at the end of 2020, clearly state the British goals in terms of decarbonization and consistently classify nuclear power alongside offshore wind turbines as clean energy. This contrasts with many other countries, in Europe and elsewhere, whose technical capacities have remained at a high level in terms of means, but whose dynamism is losing momentum in the context of hesitant national policies on nuclear energy, lagging behind in terms of innovation and maintaining competencies.
1.2.2. Nuclear activities at the heart of State integration and at the service of economic diplomacy: the case of Russia
Unlike the British case, Russia embodies the historic nuclear paradigm fully integrating all the functions within the State corporation, Rosatom: not only research, engineering, manufacturing, production and management of nuclear materials from mine to fuel, electricity supply, but also institutional prerogatives at a quasi-ministerial level. After being a competitor among others by the end of the first decade of the century, 10 years later Russia became the undisputed leader in the field, confirming the performance of an integrated state-owned enterprise (SOE) for an activity such as nuclear power.
The State corporation, Rosatom, created in 2007, brings together more than 300 companies and employs 25,0000 people. Rosatom’s general management has direct control over the entire nuclear industrial sector, both within the national economy and on export markets.
This is a powerful State monopoly which benefits from a voluntarist commitment on the part of the government, not only motivated by financial resources for export, but also by the availability of a tool strengthening its economic and geopolitical diplomacy in the energy field.
It is interesting to call into question this organizational structure based both on the merger of technical functions as well as on such a high level of politicotechnical integration. At first glance, this scheme may seem reminiscent of a bygone era and only few similar examples can be found in other fields and other countries.
The observation cannot be contested though. In barely a few years, Rosatom has become the undisputed world leader in the field, while its main competitors have withered away.
Yet, during the 2000–2010 decade, the games were far from over. That era corresponded to the so-called “nuclear renaissance”, characterized by significant growth prospects in the nuclear fleet around the world, not only in large countries such as China and India, but also in many emerging countries, increasingly aware that the availability of an efficient source of energy could enable them to climb the steps of development.
In 2001, France merged several companies into the Areva group which could boast an enviable order book by the end of 2008, 71,000 employees (55% of whom were abroad), and planned to recruit 2,500 executives in 2009 alone.
Other Japanese and American powerful players, such as Toshiba/Westinghouse, were starting to enter onto the international market. With the support of the United States, the South Korean KEPCO (Korea Electric Power Company) made a sensational entry into the international market. Its major achievement was signing the sales contract for four reactors to the United Arab Emirates at the end of 2009.
Which could be the underlying reasons for the disappearance of the Areva group in 2018, and the loss of the domineering positions by major American, Japanese and Korean players?
The size and monopolistic character of Rosatom do not seem to be a decisive reason because all the industrialists in the field naturally create consortia providing all the resources and competencies required for major nuclear projects. While it is true that the technical products of competitors are different, they all belong to the same technological generation. The setbacks of the American and French construction projects appear more as iconic scenarios rather than causal factors. An array of factual elements led to the weakening of Rosatom’s competitors. Suffice to mention, for example, the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident, which marked a political turning point, and the Basel III agreements, which reformed the banking sector after the 2008 financial crisis and made it more difficult to finance major nuclear projects in the Western world.
Beyond these factual elements, a root cause of the divergence of trajectory between Russia and its competitors in the nuclear field probably lies in the intertwining between the technical and political spheres, which is clearly more powerful in the Russian model:
The value of nuclear projects is long-term, offering great stability to the electricity mix, but also requiring stability in political and financial conditions. In the United States, the power plants which close down due to economic reasons are set in deregulated market areas, revealing that the market alone is insufficient when it comes to supporting a field of activity such as nuclear energy. The long-term vision of States and the transpartisan stability of this initiative are structuring elements for a viable nuclear industry.
When this vision is promising, the States undertake national programs, making visible and deterministic prospects and domestic investments in the nuclear field. The existence of a long-term perspective on the domestic market is a cornerstone for the industry, because of which the entire supply chain can invest in skills and innovation. This has direct consequences on the performance of national construction sites and export credibility.
The financial aspects are determinant for such a capital-intensive industry. The reinforced regulation of the financial field is in itself a source of complexity, as it involves the capping of public loans and the coverage of these loans by State guarantees. Regardless of any technical differences between countries as to the implementation of the international regulatory framework, this is a clear indicator of the greater or lesser determination of States to engage in nuclear export. This State’s readiness makes all the difference in the negotiations and the risks involved in decision-making.
The above-mentioned elements prove that, given its tropism, the nuclear business sector will have to fiercely struggle to achieve the performances required for its survival, unless it is backed up by a long-term vision and a promising State policy. This explains why the United States and Europe have not been able to maintain their leadership.
In contrast to its competitor countries, Russia has maintained a stable, strong and long-term vision for its nuclear activity, encouraging its industry to thrive in a clear strategic context. This includes the definition of a national market structured by the replacement of 10 of the 37 existing light water reactors, providing great visibility to the entire Russian industrial supply chain.
Russia has also engaged in the development of small modular reactors (SMRs), already used for the icebreaker fleet and which can also be installed on land or on a barge (55 MWe RITM-200 and 120 MWe RITM-400 reactors).
At the same time, Russia maintains its closed cycle strategy and has become an undisputed leader on the subject of fast neutron reactors, whose know-how is attested by the BN-600 operating reactors, the BREST-300 units under construction and the planned BN-1200 reactors. Furthermore, France and Japan, which shared this leadership, no longer have facilities in the area and have stopped their construction projects. The United States is relaunching a project to build a test reactor with the aim of redeveloping competencies in the field, without however having defined a strategic vision on the use of this technology; only the future will show whether a project of such magnitude can materialize without an encompassing vision.
On the other hand, relying on the strength of its national dynamic, Rosatom exhibits credibility and dynamism in exports, which are evidenced by an order book of 36 reactors for export in 12 countries and a value of $133 billion in exports scheduled for the upcoming 10 years. Rosatom’s export projects imply economic and geopolitical challenges because they establish long-term relational bridges with partner countries, thus completing the Russian geopolitical portfolio in the energy sector. In this perspective, Rosatom benefits from strong diplomatic and financial support at the highest level of the State to materialize its export offer. At the same time, Russia can grant loans covering the greater portion of operational costs or even engage in direct investment (e.g. projects managed under the Build-Own-Operate modality by Hanhikivi in Finland and Akkuyu in Turkey). In the same spirit, since 2014 the State has mandated and allocated resources to the safety authority Rostekhnadzor to provide assistance to countries acquiring Russian nuclear technologies, which is a key factor in attracting the interest of countries wishing to access nuclear energy.
Russia’s inevitable challenger is of course China. The Russian trajectory in China is parallel to that of France and other Western technology providers. Russia has deployed several reactors in China (4 VVER-1000 in Tianwan) and signed the delivery of four others in 2018. Rosatom’s role is gradually being shadowed by the rise in competence of the Chinese ecosystems and by technology sinicization, which will make the sales of other reactors highly unlikely. This will be followed by the rise of China in the export of national technologies, probably on the basis of head-on competition with Russia, as the two countries offer similar arguments: mastery of technology thanks to benchmarking, the ability to advance funding, State support, etc. However, it is difficult to anticipate the balance of this future stage because the competition between the two countries will be part of a framework outstretching beyond the field of nuclear technologies.
1.2.3. The concrete implications of political change: the case of South Korea
After Russia, South Korea provides a mirror illustration of the structural link between nuclear energy and public policies in countries developing or using this technology.
As a matter of fact, South Korea made a sharp political shift in 2017 with the coming to power of the Liberal Democratic Party and the election of President Moon. Since this political change, the Korean State has carried out both a policy of gradual exit from nuclear energy in its electricity mix and a supporting policy for the export of its nuclear industry. It will be interesting to study this country over time to factually measure the impact of this duality on the nuclear industrial sector.
This duality is already limiting Korean export credibility by raising natural questions from potential customers who are looking for long-term reliability from their suppliers. The Emirati electricity supplier ENEC, operator of the Barakah reactors built by South Korea, publicly expressed this questioning. This might have influenced its decision not to award the exclusive long-term maintenance contract for the Barakah reactors to South Korean manufacturers, even though for Korean industry this contract represented a key element regarding the project’s profitability. In this context, and despite the undeniable success of the Barakah project (four reactors with a 1,400 MW potency, among which the first became operational in mid-2020), as well as the technical and political support of the United States, South Korea has not won any export contracts since 2009, although its goal was to export six reactors before 2025.
Even if future options remain open, like other Western countries, the case of South Korea may illustrate that the absence of a national market and a coherent policy limits the viability of a nuclear industry capable of exporting major construction projects. Since 2017, almost half of the main companies in the field have announced a reduction in their workforce. The recruitment rate of new engineers has decreased accordingly. In a country where the access cost to university is very high, the number of students in the 18 universities with a nuclear engineering department decreased from 893 in 2018 to 457 in 2019.
The gradual abandonment of nuclear energy in South Korea is defined by the non-renovation of operating licenses (40 years), which will result in the closure of 12 reactors by 2030. As South Korea struggles to define and implement a management policy for its spent fuel, the closure of certain power stations could even be faster.
As in several countries in Western Europe, South Korea displays a dual energy agenda involving the abandonment of nuclear energy and carbon. Again, the Korean case will be interesting to follow. With a highly concentrated population in large metropolises (the urban area of Seoul has a population of 25 million inhabitants, that is, 40% of the country’s population), a poorly favorable geography for the deployment of renewable energies, a quasi-island network and a powerful production industry, South Korea’s energy equation is difficult. At the end of 2020, South Korea announced its carbon neutrality goal by 2050 and its ninth electricity program plan (covering the period until 2034). This plan clearly shows a massive transition to liquid natural gas (+50% with the replacement of 24 of the 30 carbon power stations shut down), having a significant impact on the cost of electricity and energy independence.
South Korea’s economic boom was accompanied by cheap subsidized electricity for consumers. The population is little mobilized on energy savings and, more generally, on the subject of energy. The economic tension is high for the operator Kepco, tugged between a massive increase in production costs (transition to natural gas and renewable energy) and politically imposed low tariffs.
Regardless of how it is conducted, the transition to a more realistic pricing policy is raising greater societal and political awareness about the energy issue, which is the foundation for countries to build lucid and robust strategies.
1.2.4. A new innovation paradigm at the service of reconquering the market: the case of the United States
Western cradle of electronuclear technologies, the United States have long lost their technological leadership in the field. But, in the context of a growing technological cold war with China, it is difficult to imagine the United States accepting the Russian leadership in the field or the irrepressible Chinese dynamics, without a counter-reaction. The United States is then confronted with the question of the strategic path that will enable them to regain leadership in the international nuclear market.
Most of the 300 pressurized water reactors (PWRs), that is to say, two-thirds of the 443 reactors in operation worldwide in 2019, have been designed based on the concept developed by Westinghouse2. The end of the period as a national territory supplier led to a severe decline in American industry. This was illustrated by the sale of Westinghouse’s nuclear assets in 1998 to the British company BNFL, resold to Toshiba in 2007, then in 2018 to a Canadian asset management company (Brookfield Asset Management Inc.).
In the recent period, nuclear energy has been confirmed by the American administration as a sovereignty technology, which has motivated an investment revival in nuclear technology. Now thrust into a challenging role, the United States relies on innovation to regain leadership in the field.
The global electronuclear industry has reached a high degree of maturity, with a cumulative experience over five decades equivalent to 18,000 reactors/year. The trajectory was marked by three major accidents3, each signaling a major stage towards improving safety, both in technological and organizational terms. But this industrial and regulatory maturity disguises, or perhaps even induces, a major structural weakness in the field: the drastic slowdown in innovation and the renewal of technological generations.
Although the term “innovation” was not used, the pioneering decades of the 1960s and 1970s gave the United States the possibility of experimenting with a variety of electronuclear technology solutions. The cycle between the ideas and the manufacture of prototypical models at a large scale only lasted a few years. The transfer from research to large-scale industrial deployment took less than 10 years.
Development programs were implemented by large State agencies. The two personalities shown in Figure 1.1 were the leaders of NASA and the Atomic Energy Commission. These two agencies succeeded in creating a first-class industrial reality in the nuclear field in less than two decades.
Figure 1.1.Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) Chairman Glenn Seaborg and NASA Administrator James Webb in July 1961
Innovation is again of the utmost importance to optimize electricity production costs with permanent (or better) reliability, in order to provide solutions to technological obsolescence, promote a sustainable fuel cycle, accomplish waste management solutions, and, globally, ensure that nuclear technology meets societal needs.
The global deceleration in nuclear innovation is due to several concurrent reasons:
As happens with all industries where risk control is a top priority, the entry ticket for any new technology is very costly because it involves raising the confidence level of old technologies. Technological innovation, as well as its accompanying regulatory framework, must be built coherently, which implies harmonizing a large ecosystem of stakeholders. While academic and industrial laboratories continuously deliver their share of ideas and solutions, penetration into an industrial system is lengthy and subject to extensive technology qualification periods (a decade or over).
During the pioneering phase of nuclear power, the alignment between national priorities and the integration of scientific, industrial and political worlds was the pillar of efficiency, with consistent and swift decision-making processes. At present, however, the political hesitations specific to nuclear energy in many countries are weighing on market prospects and constraining the industry’s ability to project itself into ambitious and long-term developments, limiting investments in research and development.
In countries where innovation processes are losing their vitality, deceleration phenomena in technological development are reinforced by the erosion of research infrastructures and associated skills.
As a response, the United States increased public investment to revitalize the nuclear ecosystem:
In the 1980s, the weakness of educational activities led to a reduction of over a factor of 2, both in public funding, in the number of nuclear engineering departments and in the number of students. Since the end of the 1990s, the US Congress have decided on a significant increase in funding for universities, resulting in a tripling of the number of students in nuclear science and technology in 10 years (OECD/NEA 2012).
More recently, sustained investments have been granted to national research centers for the construction of infrastructures specifically open to university programs, subsidized up to €50 million and over, per research center annually.
This public investment in research and education was supplemented by a massive support for industrial investment in innovation. The Department of Energy (DOE), echoing its GAIN (Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear) program, extensively supports the industry via the calls for projects in the field of innovative reactors or accident-resistant fuels. It is then up to the industry to choose disruptive paths, either by the major conventional nuclear manufacturers, by the
