(Updated with details)
PARIS, December 17 (Reuters) – The Minister for the Ecological Transition, Barbara Pompili, on Friday asked EDF to take measures to strengthen the security of electricity supply in the short term and to carry out an audit on the availability of French nuclear power plants , announces his ministry in a press release.
Barbara Pompili received the CEO of EDF, Jean-Bernard Lévy, after the announcement of the shutdown of reactors this week.
The electrician, in which the State holds 83.7% of the capital, reported Wednesday of “faults” near cooling circuits of the Civaux nuclear power plant (Vienna), which will force him to extend the shutdown of the site to carry out work and interrupt production at the Chooz power plant (Ardennes), equipped with two reactors of the same power.
These announcements come “in a context where RTE (Electricity Transmission Network) recently indicated that security of supply remains under ‘particular vigilance’, in particular in January and February next in the event of a significant cold snap and unfavorable conditions. on the production park, “recalled the Ministry of Ecological Transition.
“Barbara Pompili asked Jean-Bernard Lévy to implement all the relevant means to increase the availability of EDF production means and also seek to promote the flexibility of its consumer customers,” he added.
The Minister also asked for an independent audit on the industrial control of reactor outages to identify avenues that would make it possible to optimize these outages and their planning. A progress report is expected before mid-March, the ministry said.
(Report Jean-Stéphane Brosse, edited by Matthieu Protard)
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