CONSULTING

levels. It now looks plausible that EDF will attempt to extend lifetimes of some units, while others
might be closed prior to reaching the 40-year age limit. But there is still no plan.
If the French Government and state controlled utility Électricité de France (EDF) in 2005 opted to
proceed with the construction of a new unit, EDF would be motivated not by lack of generating
capacity but by the industry’s serious problem of maintaining nuclear competence. In December
2007, EDF started construction of Flamanville-3 (FL3). The FL3 site has encountered qualitycontrol
problems including basic concrete and welding similar to those at the OL3 project in
Finland, which started two-and-a-half years earlier.
The Flamanville-3 project is now at least six years late—one year more since WNISR2015—and
now expected to “load fuel and start up” until the fourth trimester 2018. 734
In April 2015 the French Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN) revealed that the bottom piece and the
lid of the FL3 pressure vessel had “very serious” defects. 735 Chemical and mechanical tests
“revealed the presence of a zone in which there was a high carbon concentration, leading to lower
than expected mechanical toughness values”. 736 Both pieces were fabricated and assembled by
AREVA in France, while the center piece was forged by Japan Steel Works (JSW) in Japan. ASN
stated then that the same fabrication procedure by AREVA's Creusot Forge was applied to “certain
calottes” (also called bottom heads and closure heads) of the two pressure vessels made for the
two EPRs under construction at Taishan in China, while the EPR under construction in Finland
was entirely manufactured in Japan. It is unclear, which of the four bottoms and lids have been
manufactured by Creusot Forge, but likely at least the ones for Taishan-1, while, according to
AREVA 737 and media reports 738 , the pressure vessel for Taishan-2 has been manufactured by
Chinese company Dongfang Electric Corporation (DEC). However, no specific mention is made of
the vessel bottoms and lids.
AREVA's challenge is now to prove that, although clearly below technical specifications, the EPR
pressure vessels could withstand any major transient and submitted a proposal for a major test
program to ASN in late 2015. In December 2015, ASN approved the program, considering that the
“test program proposed on two scale-one replica domes should be able to assess the scale and
depth of the segregated zone as well as its influence on the mechanical properties”. In other words,
AREVA will sacrifice two vessel heads that had already been manufactured for a never-built
reactor project in the U.S. (Calvert Cliffs) and a maybe-built EPR at Hinkley Point in the U.K.
ASN added:
I would however remind you that rejection of the RPV closure head and bottom head further to the
investigation cannot be ruled out. This is why I consider it necessary for you to study all alternative
734 EDF, “Rapport Annuel 2015”, February 2016.
735 Usine Nouvelle, “Le cri d'alarme de l'ASN sur le nucléaire français”, 20 January 2016, see
http://www.usinenouvelle.com/article/le-cri-d-alarme-de-l-asn-sur-le-nucleaire-francais.N374729, accessed
11 June 2016.
736 ASN, “Flamanville EPR reactor vessel manufacturing anomalies”, Press Release, 7 April 2015, see
http://www.french-nuclear-safety.fr/Information/News-releases/Flamanville-EPR-reactor-vesselmanufacturing-anomalies,
accessed 11 June 2016.
737 AREVA, “Taishan 1&2 - China—AREVA Supply Chain”, undated, see
http://www.areva.com/EN/operations-2404/china-taishan-12.html#tab=tab5, accessed 2 July 2016.
738 Factwire, “Made in China: critical component of Taishan nuclear plant manufactured in Guangzhou”,
27 May 2016, see https://www.factwire.news/en/Taishan-nuclear-tech.html, accessed 2 July 2016.
Mycle Schneider, Antony Froggatt et al. 180 World Nuclear Industry Status Report 2016