20180902wnisr2018-hr

THE WORLD
NUCLEAR
INDUSTRY
STATUS REPORT 2018
A Mycle Schneider Consulting Project
Paris, London, September 2018

World Nuclear Industry Status Report | 2018 | 2
Mycle Schneider
Independent Consultant, Paris, France
Project Coordinator and Lead Author
Julie Hazemann
Director of EnerWebWatch, Paris, France
Documentary Research, Modelling and Datavisualization
Tadahiro Katsuta
Professor, School of Law, Meiji University, Tokyo,
Japan
Contributing Author
Andy Stirling
Professor, Science Policy Research Unit, University
of Sussex, U.K.
Contributing Author
Ben Wealer
Research Associate, Workgroup for Economic
and Infrastructure Policy, Berlin University of
Technology (TU Berlin), Germany
Contributing Author
The World Nuclear Industry
Status Report 2018
Antony Froggatt
Independent Consultant, London, U.K.
Lead Author
Phil Johnstone
Research Fellow, Science Policy Research Unit,
University of Sussex, U.K.
Contributing Author
M.V. Ramana
Simons Chair in Disarmament, Global and Human
Security with the Liu Institute for Global Issues
at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver,
Canada
Contributing Author
Christian von Hirschhausen
Professor, Workgroup for Economic and
Infrastructure Policy, Berlin University of
Technology (TU) and Research Director, German
Institute for Economic Research (DIW), Berlin,
Germany
Contributing Author
Agnès Stienne
Artist, Graphic Designer, Cartographer, Le Mans,
France
Graphic Design & Layout
By
With
Paris, London, September 2018 © A Mycle Schneider Consulting Project
Forewords by
The cover is based on a photograph of the Saint-Alban nuclear power plant by © Sébastien Sassoulas. Photomontage and design by Agnès Stienne.
HAN Wenke and ZHOU Jie
International Forum for Clean Energy (IFCE)
China
Anton Eberhard
University of Cape Town
South Africa

World Nuclear Industry Status Report | 2018 | 3
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The project coordinator wishes to thank AntonyFroggatt for his ideas, his iron-clad reliability and his friendship
over so many years.
At the core of the WNISR is its database, designed and maintained by data manager and information engineer
JulieHazema nn, who also develops most of the roughs for the graphical illustrations. In other words, no WNISR
without her. Thanks so much.
It has been several years now that the WNISR project can count on the professional and insightful input by contri-
buting authors M.V.Ramana and TadahiroKatsuta. A big thank you for that.
The WNISR2018 team includes several new contributors. We are very grateful for the excellent work delivered by
Christian vonHirschhausen and BenWealer, as well as their ability to adapt their input to the WNISR framework.
The thought-provoking and original research by Andy Stirling and Phil Johnstone is a great new contribution to the
WNISR. Thank you all very much.
Our special gratitude goes to the authors of the two brilliant and generous Forewords, HANWenke, ZHOUJie
andAnton Eberhard that provide two different but very complementary views from two different parts of the pla-
net. A big thank you goes to Jade Huang and Wangshu (Annie) Pan for their effective assistance with communica-
tion and translation.
Many other people have contributed pieces of work to make this project possible and to bring it to the current
standard. In particular ShaunBurnie, whose multiple contributions have been invaluable and highly appreciated.
Thank you also to CarolinePeachey, Nuclear Engineering International, for providing the load factor figures quoted
throughout the report.
The cooperation with artist and graphic designer AgnèsStienne, who created the redesigned layout in 2017 and
shed a creative new light on our graphic illustrations, which was so successful that we are happy to have her on
board again. Thank you. We are fortunate that NinaSchneider put her excellent proof-reading and production skills
to work again. Thank you. Thanks to EDF for making available the cover photography.
This work has greatly benefitted from further proofreading by Walt Patterson, partial proof-reading, editing sug-
gestions or comments by ShaunBurnie, IanFairlie, JanHaverkamp, IrynaHolovko, DaulJang, TomasKåberger,
KANGJunjie, LutzMez, OlexiPasyuk, SteveThomas and others. Thank you all.
The authors wish to thank in particular Rebecca Harms, Amory B.Lovins, Matthew McKinzie, TanjaGaudian,
Rainer Griesshammer, AndreaDroste, NilsEpprecht and MichaelSailer for their durable and enthusiastic support
of this project.
And everybody involved is grateful to the MacArthur Foundation, Natural Resources Defense Council, HeinrichBöll
Foundation France, the Greens-EFA Group in the European Parliament, Elektrizitätswerke Schönau, Foundation
Zukunftserbe and the Swiss Energy Foundation for their generous support.
A big thank-you to Philippe Rivière for his continuous, reliable work on the website over the past six years. He is
moving on to other responsibilities. We wish him good luck. Thank you to ArnaudMartin for picking up the chal-
lenge to continue the work on the website.
NOTE
This report contains a very large amount of factual and numerical data. While we do our utmost to verify and
double-check, nobody is perfect. The authors are always grateful for corrections and suggested improvements.
LEAD AUTHORS’ CONTACT INFORMATION
Mycle Schneider Antony Froggatt
45, Allée des deux cèdres 53a Neville Road
91210 Draveil (Paris) London N16 8SW
France United Kingdom
Ph: [phone] Ph: [phone]
E: [e-mail] E: [e-mail]

World Nuclear Industry Status Report | 2018 | 4
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
FOREWORD 1 A VIEW FROM CHINA 11
FOREWORD 2 A VIEW FROM SOUTH AFRICA 13
KEY INSIGHTS 15
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS 16
Reactor Startups and Shutdowns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Operation and Construction Data. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17
Construction Starts & New-Build Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Focus Countries - Overall Shrinking Role of Nuclear . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Fukushima Status Report . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19
Decommissioning Status Report. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21
Interdependencies Between Civil and Military Nuclear Infrastructures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Nuclear Power vs. Renewable Energy Deployment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
INTRODUCTION 23
GENERAL OVERVIEW WORLDWIDE 27
THE ROLE OF NUCLEAR POWER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
OPERATION, POWER GENERATION, AGE DISTRIBUTION. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
OVERVIEW OF CURRENT NEW-BUILD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
CONSTRUCTION TIMES 36
CONSTRUCTION TIMES OF REACTORS CURRENTLY UNDER CONSTRUCTION. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .36
CONSTRUCTION TIMES OF PAST AND CURRENTLY OPERATING REACTORS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .36
CONSTRUCTION STARTS AND CANCELLATIONS 38
OPERATING AGE 41
LIFETIME PROJECTIONS 44
FOCUS COUNTRIES 47
CHINA FOCUS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
FRANCE FOCUS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
French Nuclear Power and Electricity Mix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Safety and Security in Question . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
The Ongoing Flamanville-3 EPR Saga . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

World Nuclear Industry Status Report | 2018 | 5
Fallout from the Creusot Forge Affair . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .63
Industry Restructuring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .64
GERMANY FOCUS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
JAPAN FOCUS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Reactor Restarts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .70
Permanent Closures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .72
Restart Prospects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .76
Energy Policy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .79
New-Build Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .82
SOUTH KOREA FOCUS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Public Panel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
New Energy Policy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .86
Construction Restart Delays and Cancelled Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .87
Containment Liner Plate Corrosion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .89
UNITED KINGDOM FOCUS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
UNITED STATES FOCUS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
Securing Financing to Prevent Shutdowns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .102
Innovations for Nuclear Rescue Subsidies—An Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
18 Early Retirement Announcements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
New Reactor Construction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
FUKUSHIMA STATUS REPORT 124
INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .124
ON-SITE CHALLENGES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
Current Status of Each Reactor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
Contaminated Water Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
Worker Exposure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
OFF-SITE CHALLENGES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
Current Status of Evacuation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
Radiation Exposure and Health Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Food Contamination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
Decontamination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
COSTS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .133
CHAPTER CONCLUSION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133