Yesterday there was more bad news regarding the two 1GW power stations already shut down in Belgium. They are probably shut down for good.

Predictably, the Energy Minister has come on air to try to allay the public’s fears. He appears to have a “cunning plan”, as Baldrick would say. Here is a quick translation I made from today’s De Standaard newspaper:

“There is an extra power station, but the cable is missing”

The walls of the nuclear reactors at Doel 3 and Tihange 2 are much weakened as a result of thousands of cracks. That would appear from the interim test results. There is a significant chance that the reactors will remain shut down all winter, and perhaps will never operate again. According to Energy Minister Johan Vande Lanotte, speaking on ‘The Morning’ show on Radio 1, there are solutions to prevent a black out.

According to Johan Vande Lanotte it is now necessary to "prevent panic". According to Vande Lanotte the last time was that we had a very high energy demand was on 17 January 2013. "On such a cold winter day we consume about 14,000MW. From this we get the idea that current production is 1000MW too short" said the minister.

Emergency
The Minister proposes a number of the emergency measures: import more electricity from abroad, restart Doel 4, adjust supply-side demand from companies, and use the capacity of emergency generators in our country. According to Vande Lanotte this emergency generation capacity in our country is rarely utilised.

Also, it is little known by the public that there is overcapacity in generating networks in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany. "For example in Maasbracht, 3 kilometers from the Netherlands-Belgian border, there is a new 1,300 MW power station completely idle." The gas fired plant in Maasbracht was indeed shut down on July 1 because it could not be run profitably due to low electricity prices. Much to the frustration of the minister this power station cannot yet be connected to the Belgian grid. The only thing missing is a cable of 15 km, it seems.

Nuclear Exit
The Minister does not believe that the government’s [nuclear phase-out] policy is guilty of causing the current problem. "It's the nuclear power plants that fail. If there is now a problem, due to the cracks in the reactor vessels and sabotage in Doel 4, you have to solve that. But government policy will never be able to prevent something being sabotaged or what appears to be a mistake.

Anyone with 15 km of copper cable and 50 pylons should contact the Belgian Embassy.

Note that the comment about Maasbracht being uneconomic to run relates to it being uncompetitive vs. coal and subsidised wind, biomass, etc. The plant started up in 2012 and was hailed as the largest and most efficient gas-fired power plant of the Netherlands.