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That is the first next generation EPR reactor, the second one of its kind in Europe and first in France. This is just reinforcing my point the first one is hard to predict the cost and timeline for.

France built 20 P4/P'4 reactors, most were built on time and at reasonable costs.

The last gen N4 had only 4 units, even then the second batch at CIVAUX costed only $4B.1[2] i.e. $1,349/ kWe overnight costs

Vogtle(GA) 3/4 is expected to cost ~ $8,000 /kWe [3] [4] and the EPR is at Flamanville 3(France) is expected to come in at $6,500 kWe [5].

France projects to achieve 40% cost reduction and faster commisioning for EPR designs over next few being built to achieve $ 3800 /kWe overnight costs [5]. The report details on how they this is achieved and gains already seen at Taishan(China) ( partly owned by EDF)

OECD Nuclear Energy Agency reports in the modern era the overnight costs to be between $2,157 kWe [South Korea] to $6,900 kWe [Slovakia] [6]

Reduction in time and cost is normal to expect in any repeated project development. The first one is path finder, next few should benefit from them, however if we do just built only a few then costs or timeline shouldn't be an objective to compare.

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[2] https://www.power-technology.com/projects/civaux/?cf-view

[3] https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/AP1000-remains-attra....

[4] https://ifp.org/nuclear-power-plant-construction-costs/

[5] https://www.sfen.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/EN-The-cost-...

[6] https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/economic-aspec...



Moving goal posts? Your assertion was "France and India regularly build cheap reactors quickly".

With nuclear power is always "is expected...", "projections are...", "it's hard...", "the next one would be...". You know what is delivering in time and costs right now? Solar and wind.


I made two consecutive comments in the thread . My point was split between the two comments and i replied was in combination of both. Comments and timestamp are available for you to see

I realize that from this thread point of view it seems I am changing the argument, that’s on me . It is not always the commenter is trying to the move the goal post sometimes things to do happen .

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To the actual point, It is not about whether nuclear is best option, I never compared it with any other option. It was not defense of nuclear , it was of project and costs management .

Nuclear’s costs cannot be baselined by costs at GA , every developed country is doing it half the costs or less.

With respect to “projected” gains are already realized in Taishan, yes it is china but that does not make EDF components being built in Europe faster or, state subsidies can make projects cheaper not faster .

France and other countries have proven track record of building plants . Citing one outlier with brand new tech plant whose costs and time have ballooned is not valid argument .

Reject or dislike nuclear for any number of reasons ideological, economic or environmental, but building a single plant after 40 years and saying it is too costly and slow is a dishonest argument .




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