Jellyfish have caused 3.2 GW of nuclear power plant capacity to be taken offline in France
A massive jellyfish bloom forced the French company Électricité de France SA to shut down three power units at the Gravelines nuclear power plant on France’s northern coast and reduce the output of another. In total, this took about 3.2 GW of generating capacity offline, Fortune reports, citing Bloomberg.
The outages began on Monday. According to regulatory reports, two reactors were scheduled to be brought back online by Wednesday evening. Two other units, with a combined capacity of 1.8 GW, may remain shut down until the end of the week.
The reduction in production occurred during a heat wave: temperatures of up to 40 °C were forecast for certain regions of France in the coming days. Unusually high temperatures off the French coast could contribute to a sharp increase in the jellyfish population.
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Coastal nuclear power plants, including the Gravelines plant, draw seawater for cooling through pumping stations, which can expose them to marine organisms. Last year, the Gravelines nuclear power plant already faced a similar problem when jellyfish clogged the filter drums.
EDF is also significantly restricting operations at other nuclear facilities located on rivers. Due to the heat, river water cannot cool the reactors effectively enough without harming the environment.
