What I don't understand is France: they have a controlled energy price but their nuclear provider has a lot of debt.
And they need to start rebuilding new.ones.
So was it smart in France? Besides the obvious advantage regarding CO2
And they need to start rebuilding new.ones.
So was it smart in France? Besides the obvious advantage regarding CO2
The whole history of nuclear in Europe is incredibly sad, we stopped developing and investing after some early success, and with almost no serious consideration of future problems. And all of this has been known and discussed openly for decades.
EDF got loans from banks and money on the market, based on the fact that investors thinks it is a good investment. That is economics 101 and holds true for all publicly traded companies. The numbers are freely available on the internet, as prescribed by the law for all companies listed.
The debt also went down in 2023. It is worth to remember that EDF is forced by the French government to sell cheap energy, below market price, to protect consumers from rising energy prices (caused by the high reliance of other countries on natural gas from Russia - like Germany that phased-out nuclear in the meanwhile).
Nuclear is also treated differently from renewables when it comes down to low-emission investments by the various EU investment funds, and cannot compete in bidding rounds together with renewables (which drives the prices up, as there is way more demand than offer, so it makes no sense to compete). If the EU commission decides that there should be technological neutrality on low-emission power plants, EDF would be in a quite good position.
If you are so sure that EDF will not be able to finance its debt or build new reactors, you can bet against it by short it and, if your analysis is correct, make quite some money.
It does not mean that a nuclear path would have always led where France is, the same way a renewable path is not always leading to where Germany is.