Penly Nuclear Power Plant

The Penly Nuclear power station (French: Centrale nucléaire de Penly) is found some 6 miles (9.7 km) northeast of Dieppe. It lies on the border of two French municipalities: Penly and Saint-Martin-en-Campagne in the département of Seine-Maritime, Normandy, on the English Channel coast. It employs France's only working funicular railway in industrial use.

Penly Nuclear Power Plant
Official nameCentrale Nucléaire de Penly
CountryFrance
LocationDieppe, Seine-Maritime
Coordinates49°58′36″N 01°12′43″E
StatusOperational
Construction began1982
Commission date4 May 1990 (1990-05-04)
Operator(s)EDF
Nuclear power station
Reactor typePWR
Reactor supplierFramatome
Cooling sourceEnglish Channel
Power generation
Units operational2 × 1382 MW
Make and modelAlstom
Units cancelled1 × 1650 MW
Nameplate capacity2764 MW
Capacity factor80.2%
Annual net output19,418 GW·h
External links
WebsiteSite c/o Betreibers
CommonsRelated media on Commons

Data

The plant employs about 670 people full-time and is owned and operated by the French company Électricité de France (EDF). Water from the English Channel is used for cooling.

The two PWR units are of the 1330 MWe class. The installed total output is 2764 MW, which means the plant is about average for French nuclear plants. It feeds on average about 18 billion kilowatt-hours per year into the public grid, corresponding to about 80% of the current annual consumption of Normandy. It is about ten kilometres from Dieppe.

Proposed third and fourth reactors

In January 2009, the French government announced that a third reactor, the second French EPR reactor, would be built in Penly. Construction was announced for 2012 with connection to the grid following in 2017. GDF Suez was to own a part of the plant, with the majority taken by EdF.[1] However in 2010 GDF Suez withdrew from the project.[2] In 2011, following the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, EdF postponed public consultations putting in doubt the 2012 construction start date.[3] In February 2013, the Minister of Industrial Renewal Arnaud Montebourg stated that the plans for a new EPR reactor at Penly had been canceled, citing the capacity for electricity production and massive investments in renewable energy along with his confidence in the EPR as a competitive project in foreign countries.[4][5]

In 2019, EDF is seeking a site for the construction of a pair of EPR reactors, and Penly is considered as one of the lead contenders.[6]

Accidents and incidents

9 June 2004 - Weakly radioactive water was leaked into the sea from the reserve tank of a reactor's secondary circuit.[7]

11 October 2011 - A subcontractor employee had localised contamination on his face.[8]

5 April 2012 - 10 Fire engines attended a small fire within a reactor building. The operating company later reported two small oil fires inside the reactor building from a leaking oil pipe were extinguished with nobody hurt and no environmental impact. The detection of smoke caused the reactor to be automatically shut down.[9][10]

6 April 2012 - As a consequence of the incident of 5 April 2012 a joint had leaked radioactive water into collection tanks inside the reactor building.[11] The incident was classified as 1 (lowest) on the 7 point International Nuclear Event Scale.[12]

References
  1. New French nuclear to include oil interest
  2. Peggy Hollinger (23 September 2010). "GDF Suez pulls out of key reactor project". Financial Times. Retrieved 30 September 2011.
  3. "France says Penly reactor on course despite delays". Reuters. 4 October 2011. Retrieved 5 October 2011.
  4. "Pas d'EPR à la centrale de Penly" [No EPR at the Penly power plant]. BFM TV (in French). 25 April 2013. Retrieved 9 March 2017.
  5. "Montebourg enterre l'EPR de Penly" [Montebourg buries the Penly EPR]. normandie.canalblog.com (in French). 3 March 2013. Retrieved 9 March 2017.
  6. La Normandie prête à accueillir un nouveau réacteur EPR
  7. "Rejets faiblement radioactifs en mer". ASN (in French). 31 August 2004. Retrieved 18 December 2020.
  8. "Contamination externe au visage d'un agent lors d'une intervention dans le batiment du réacteur n° 1". ASN (in French). 24 October 2011. Retrieved 18 December 2020.
  9. "Fire at nuclear reactor in France". BBC. 5 April 2012. Retrieved 5 April 2012.
  10. "EDF: Nuclear Reactor In France Halted Automatically After Fire". Dow Jones Newswires. 5 April 2012. Retrieved 5 April 2012.
  11. "Radioactive leak at France's Penly plant after fires break out". rfi. 6 April 2012.
  12. "L'ASN fait le point sur les investigations menées à la suite de l'incident survenu le 5 avril 2012 sur le réacteur n°2 de la centrale nucléaire de Penly". ASN. 25 April 2012.
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