In order to ensure the “security of the power grid”, the nuclear power plants in Playa, Saint Alban-San Maurice, Gullvich, Boge and Trecasten will be able to discharge their wastewater into the yards until September 11. of water, despite the heat wave already raising its temperature. This is despite the potential negative effects on the environment.
Live electrical network. Five nuclear power plants have been granted a temporary exemption from environmental rules to remain in operation despite heat waves that follow each other in France.
A decree was issued on Saturday in the Official Gazette outlining the “new thermal discharge limits applicable to the reactors of the Baugey, Blayet, Saint-Alban-Saint-Maurice, Golfec and Trecasten nuclear power plants.”
Each plant has its own regulatory discharge temperature limits that must not be exceeded, in order not to heat the surrounding waterways and to protect animals and plants. Power plants already pump water to cool reactors before it is rejected.
Combined with improved monitoring software
These exceptions are justified by the fact that “in the absence of any temporary adjustment to the current thermal discharge limits, the operator will have to decommission or reduce production of these nuclear power plants in order to reduce downstream heating. Maurice and Bougie, Garonne for the Golfech power plant and the Donzère-Mondragon Canal for the Tricastin nuclear power plant, although maintaining a minimum level of electricity production from the reactors of the nuclear power plant (…) constitutes, as regards the security of the power grid, a general necessity ” .
It has been determined that the implementation of these actions will be “linked to an enhanced environmental monitoring programme”.
In terms of correlation, this new exception is going poorly. “The nuclear power plant in Bugey has just been authorized to discharge water that is warmer than usual. This will not help improve the biodiversity of the Rhone, which suffers from summer heat waves, like all French rivers,” the NGO France Nature responded on Twitter. Environnement (FNE).
The nuclear power plant in Bugey has just been authorized to discharge water that is warmer than usual. This will not help improve the biodiversity of the Rhone, which suffers from summer heat waves, like all French rivers.
– France Nature Environment Ain (FNEAin) August 3, 2022
Moreover, this exemption, which began in 2006 following the 2003 heat wave, has so far been implemented only once in France, in 2018, for a period of 36 hours. This is the second time that the state has issued such a ruling since the summer.
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