France's newest PWR reactors, using the EPR design, are being built in France and Finland. They're both grotesquely late and over-budget. If Flamanville 3 could switch on today and incur no further construction costs, the electricity from it would still cost more to generate than German electricity costs to generate.
What will happen to the EPR in Europe after Flamanville 3 and Olkiluoto 3 are finally complete?
The faithful would say "build more EPRs. Future ones will be cheaper due to lessons learned on these original projects." And they might well be correct. Unfortunately, the Flamanville 3 and Olkiluoto 3 projects were also touted as affordable and predictable to build back when they were originally started. How do you convince buyers that the lies and/or irrational exuberance that lead to bad predictions in 2005 have been tamed, and that the next reactor project will be the real affordable, predictable reactor project?
The reason why new plants are more expensive is that they're often not part of serial production runs. When France put big investment in nuclear and built 170 reactors mostly of 6 specific designs, the per unit cost was much lower. Newer reactors are usually unique or part of only a single digit production run.
The EPR was supposed to be the next standardized French design, produced in significant numbers and at low cost. The costs and delays have been so bad with the first few of them that I don't know if it will ever really take off.
So we're back to the question: do you keep pushing forward with more EPRs? How do you keep pushing forward with EPRs if there is a credibility gap on cost and schedule predictions? Or if you choose to standardize on a different reactor than the EPR, how do you estimate its cost and construction schedule?
What will happen to the EPR in Europe after Flamanville 3 and Olkiluoto 3 are finally complete?
The faithful would say "build more EPRs. Future ones will be cheaper due to lessons learned on these original projects." And they might well be correct. Unfortunately, the Flamanville 3 and Olkiluoto 3 projects were also touted as affordable and predictable to build back when they were originally started. How do you convince buyers that the lies and/or irrational exuberance that lead to bad predictions in 2005 have been tamed, and that the next reactor project will be the real affordable, predictable reactor project?