Emmanuelle Ducros 8:54 a.m., March 28, 2024

Every morning after the 8:30 a.m. news, Emmanuelle Ducros reveals to listeners her “Journey into absurdity”, from Monday to Thursday.

This is the home stretch for the start of the Flamanville EPR. We're almost there... But it's not without some surprises.

We cannot say that the project went off without a hitch. 12 years late. But the Nuclear Safety Authority is preparing to authorize the commissioning of the EPR. Loading of the reactor should take place during April. There's just. Connection to the network should take place mid-2024

But there is still a small last minute delay to be expected.

EDF had planned to load the fuel at the end of March, but it will ultimately be mid-April. For what ? Because the Nuclear Safety Authority must... Consult the public on its project to authorize the commissioning of the reactor. This authorization is necessary to proceed to the next step, loading the fuel.

Basically, the highest French authority on nuclear power must ask for their opinion from Ms. Michu, Mr. Pignon and more certainly from all the anti-nuclear people who are generally hyper-mobilized to play anti-game on its evaluation work.

But why do such a thing?

 It's obligatory, it falls under an article of the environmental code of January 2017, which we owe to the then Minister of the Environment, the always very inspired Ségolène Royal. It is part of the system of administrative stink balls put in place for years, quietly, by elected officials and anti-nuclear civil servants.

And we are asking the public's opinion on what points exactly?

Neither more nor less than on the recommendations transmitted by ASN to EDF. I went to consult the list of points submitted to the sagacity of Mr. and Mrs. Tartempion. If you have an opinion on the way in which ASN wants to supervise “the carrying out and monitoring of installation start-up tests after commissioning”, take your cues.

It's technical, though.

If you have any comments to make on the “schedule for replacing the exchangers between the intermediate refrigeration (RRI) and rescued raw water (SEC) circuits in order to ensure, over the entire lifespan of the installation, a sufficient level of performance”, the form awaits you. The same if you want to put your two cents in the “process of replacing the bodies of two protection valves of the main secondary circuits”, go ahead, you have until April 17.

Does it serve any purpose?

Absolutely nothing. We suspect that no one will go without hundreds of pages of technical documents, it's a release for anti-nuclear people. Yesterday, the Minister of Industry Roland Lescure explained "We've been waiting for twelve years. We're not even two weeks away." Then maybe. But engineers will still spend days reading literature inspired by people who have not the slightest skill in answering questions of incredible complexity. There are some particularly annoying ways to waste time.