On Monday, a French company submitted the very first authorization request in France for a mini nuclear reactor.
This equipment is intended to be less polluting and emits less CO2.
If the file is approved, the mini-reactor could be connected to the Cristanol industrial site, where alcohol and bioethanol are produced.
This is the very first project to be the subject of a “creation authorization request file” for a mini nuclear reactor. The French company Jimmy Energy announced, in a press release published Monday April 29, that it had submitted an authorization request to the Ministry of Ecological Transition to develop a mini-nuclear reactor.
This first step opens an examination process by the Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN), which will examine the proposal. If the file is validated, the small modular reactor (PRM, or SMR in English), with a power of 10 megawatts according to the start-up, should be directly connected to the industrial complex of the Cristanol sugar group, in Bazancourt (Marne) .
The goal ? “Providing carbon-free heat”
Concretely, this type of reactor is similar to a kind of nuclear fuel boiler whose objective is to “providing carbon-free heat” to industry, “by replacing the gas burners”, since the latter release greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, underlines the company in a press release. On the contrary, “Jimmy’s generators do not emit CO2 and connect directly to existing industrial installations”assures the start-up.
“The generators designed by Jimmy, with a lifespan of 20 years, are part of a complementary energy mix large and medium power nuclear reactors and renewable energy sources, sometimes unsuitable for demanding industrial processes.”, continues the company. Smaller, less powerful than their big brothers in the historic nuclear fleet, the SMRs must be able to produce electricity, but also provide heat to heavy industries – glass, chemicals, steel – which are still very dependent today on electricity. ‘fossil fuels.
The instruction phase can last at least three years
From now on, “the Safety Authority is awaiting referral to the ministry”, an ASN spokesperson told AFP. Then, the instruction phase can take at least three years. “This will allow, in particular, all stakeholders to comment on the project, as well as the opening of an environmental study and a public inquiry”explains Jimmy in his press release.
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Also, ASN promises to be “much more demanding” with regard to these new objects, intended to be mass-produced and deployed in numbers to be profitable. In total, more than 80 mini-nuclear reactor projects have been identified around the world, at various maturity levels. So far, only two countries have announced that they have put them into service: Russia and China, according to the 2023 report on the state of the nuclear industry, produced by independent experts.
