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The postponement of a final investment decision on the Hinkley Point C nuclear plant is "still under discussion", according to the French economy minister Ségolène Royal.
She reportedly made the remarks on a French radio station, saying: “This project must offer further proof that it is well-founded and offer a guarantee that the investment in this project will not dry up investments that must be made in renewable energies.”
“There’s an agreement between France and Britain, so things should go ahead. But the trade unions are right to ask for the stakes to be re-examined,” she added.
A group of 100 nuclear engineers and managers from EDF have published a letter in the French newspaper Le Monde pushing for the project to go ahead.
“We are convinced that EDF is able to build and deliver the two Hinkley Point reactors on time,” they wrote. “Hinkley Point is politically, economically and industrially, one of the most significant projects of our time.”
There have been severe delays and cost overruns at the other plants being built with the European Pressurized Reactor technology which will be used at Hinkley – Flamanville 3 in France, Olkiluoto 3 in Finland and Taishan 1 and 2 in China.
The engineers said lessons had been learnt from these projects which would benefit Hinkley: “Like all projects of that magnitude, there are uncertainties, but it is our job to manage these. We are confident in our ability to succeed.”
In March EDF director of employees Christian Taxil, who represents the French union CFE-CGC on the company’s board, reportedly said he would vote against the project. “Conditions are not right for me to give a positive opinion if such a project were presented to me,” he said. Earlier in the month EDF’s chief financial officer quit the firm, because of concerns over Hinkley.
At a recent meeting of the Energy and Climate Change Committee the chief executive of EDF Energy Vincent de Rivaz said “categorically” that the £18 billion project would go ahead. He said he expected a final investment decision to be made in mid-May, once the French government had made its own decision on funding.
EDF chief exectuive Jean-Bernard Lévy had previously stated that Hinkley would not be built without financial support from the French state.
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