AtkinsRéalis, EDF pursue tighter partnership as they seek to build new nuclear plants
Montreal-based engineering company AtkinsRéalis Group Inc. ATRL-T and Électricité de France, the French nuclear giant, have agreed to pursue a deeper partnership, the companies declared Monday.
The two nuclear companies are preparing for what they hope will be a global surge in reactor construction. Their new collaboration agreement could lead to supplying power-plant equipment, such as turbines, and providing engineering support.
Joe St. Julian, president of AtkinsRéalis's nuclear operations, has predicted that as many as 1,000 new reactors will be built by mid-century; he said his company is responding to concerns from customers and government about whether it has sufficient capacity to capture a sizable chunk of that demand.
'We don't know if we're going to need them or their capacity in engineering,' he said of EDF. 'But if we do, we want to have them as a readily available partner.'
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The two companies have worked together before; EDF is AtkinsRéalis's second-largest customer, behind Ontario Power Generation.
Owned entirely by the French government, EDF operates the largest reactor fleet of any single company worldwide: 57 in France, and nine in Britain. It's also lead contractor on two large plants under construction in Britain: Hinkley Point C and Sizewell C.
AtkinsRéalis is the architect and engineer on both projects. Mr. St. Julian said negotiations began six months ago on the collaboration agreement, which is non-binding and can be terminated by either party at will. Both companies agree they'll continue competing with each other to sell their own respective reactor models.
AtkinsRéalis holds an exclusive licence for Canada's Candu reactor; it's marketing the 740-megawatt Enhanced Candu 6 along with a proposed 1,000-megawatt model called the Monark.
The company has been searching for a turbine generator set to pair with the Monark. (Candus have traditionally been paired with American-built turbines from General Electric.) The company has shortlisted turbines from Arabelle Solutions, which became an EDF subsidiary a year ago and has roots in France dating from the 1950s.
'We really like the EDF turbine generator,' Mr. St. Julian said. 'And as we started that discussion, we recognized there's opportunities for us to take this already robust industrial partnership and expand it, where we help you guys in Europe, maybe, and you guys can help us in Canada, maybe.'
The European Pressurized Reactor (EPR) – which EDF is building at Hinkley Point and Sizewell – is much larger than the Monark, at 1,600 megawatts. In 2023, Ontario Power Generation and EDF said they were jointly exploring the feasibility of building EPRs in Canada.
Nuclear-power generation is tightly concentrated in a handful of countries, and France is among them. It once boasted the world's second-largest operating fleet but has been eclipsed by China, which stands nearly alone in aggressively adding new nuclear capacity.
Despite recent optimism about a nuclear 'renaissance,' other technologies (including renewables and fossil fuels) continue to attract far more investment, the International Energy Agency said in a report published last week.
Capital flows directed to nuclear power have grown by half over the past five years, the IEA noted, but Chinese investment accounted for most of that increase.
Although the French government continues to express enthusiasm for building new nuclear plants, EDF's reactor fleet is aging. France's only new plant so far this century, the 1.65-gigawatt Flamanville Unit 3, was connected to the grid in December. Its construction began as long ago as 2007 but was plagued by immense cost and schedule overruns. EDF carries a heavy debt load, which is widely expected to present a major obstacle for future projects.
According to Paris-based Mycle Schneider Consulting's latest report on the nuclear industry, EDF also faces 'technical and manpower challenges with their existing ageing nuclear fleets and ongoing construction projects.' The Korea Electric Power Corp. is also highly indebted, while major Chinese and Russian builders have been subject to international sanctions and blacklists.
'Who is supposed to build hundreds of nuclear power reactors around the world over the coming two and a half decades?' the consultancy asked.
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