Doctor specializing in nuclear physics and author of The urgency of sustainable nuclear power (De Boeck Superior), Claire Kerboul is one of the best specialists in fast neutron reactors. A very promising technology that France could have developed, but which it ruled in 2018, by putting an end to the Astrid project. For L’Express, the researcher returns to this major fault, the country of which risks paying the high price during the decades to come.
L’Express: closure of Fessenheim in 2020, abandonment of the Astrid project two years earlier. Do you see similarities between these two events qualified by experts from historic errors?
Claire Kerboul: These two decisions are unfortunately the sign of a political power which for a long time does not understand that he has not understood, neither the climate challenge nor the energy challenge. A shock on the uranium supply is looming around the middle of the century. All indicators show it. The logic would have wanted the revival of nuclear to be based on the technology of fast neutrons (RNR), that is to say reactors which allow us to do without uranium mines. There was an opportunity for the government to do its mea culpa saying: “We have mistaken. We must now start on new bases by betting on the quick sector that we should not have abandoned.” But that didn’t happen in this way. The current recovery is essentially based on the deployment of new EPRs. When the uranium shock will occur around 2050, we will not be ready.
To justify the judgment of the Astrid project, the executive invoked cost issues, an abundance of uranium but also risks linked to the use of sodium in the machine. Do these arguments hold the road?
I don’t think so. Compare a RNR to a classic reactor is like a racing car and a 2 CV. The technology of a fast neutron reactor such as Astrid makes it possible to obtain a greater thermodynamic efficiency. Above all, it allows you to do without uranium mines since the reactors would work using the hundreds of thousands of tonnes already extracted from this element, of which we used only tiny part (less than 1 %) to manufacture current fuels . Admittedly, in an RNR cooled with liquid sodium, the water and sodium circuits must not meet. To avoid incidents, an additional piping loop is therefore carried out which generates an additional cost. But when we look closely at the many advantages of RNRs, the balance clearly leans in their favor, both from the angle of the economy of the resource and the minimization of waste, as well as better radiation protection. Developing a rapid neutron sector in France is ensuring our energy sovereignty for several thousand years at the very low words, given uranium stocks already available!
Was the maturity of the Astrid project sufficiently advanced at the time of its abandonment?
First of all. The role of research is to tackle questions that we do not even know if they have an answer. It is the highest level of questioning at the service of knowledge. It is therefore vital for industrial development, but also for the influence of the country internationally. This dimension was completely forgotten in the decision to stop a project such as Astrid. Regarding the project itself, we spent nearly 700 million euros to carry it out and mobilized nearly 600 engineers and researchers. In 2010, he was the subject of an investment plan for the future. The State and the CEA signed a objectives and funding agreement, the stages of which were validated and accomplished properly, until the day of the final ax. We destroyed something that was much more than a draft. Astrid was the detailed, successful preliminary draft of a prototype that only asked to be built.
The Japanese recently allied in Framatome to relaunch research on RNRs. Is a similar turnaround possible in France?
The Japanese show pragmatism. They always blame us for having left them in the open campaign in 2018 because they were our research partners on the Astrid project. However, they understood, like China or Russia, that RNRs are among the irreplaceable solutions that we will need in the future. In France, speeches do not compensate for the lack of vision and the lack of strategic decisions. Political instability does not promote the courage that would be necessary. One thing is certain: the technology of the Power RNR and the R&D it requires cannot be worn in France by a few start-ups that are struggling to be financed. It is up to the State to assume its role and define a roadmap for the development of a high power RNR sector. Urgently, because it goes from our future.
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