EDF_REGISTRATION_DOCUMENT_2017

6.

FINANCIAL STATEMENTS Balance Sheet

an internal authorisation procedure for the operator, independent of operational ■ personnel and audited by the ASN, allowing some specific work to be started ahead of the authorised safety procedure; finally, once these operations are complete, declassification of the facility to ■ remove it from the legal regime governing basic nuclear facilities. The decommissioning scenario adopted by EDF complies with France’s environmental code, which requires as short a period as possible to elapse between final shutdown and dismantling in economically acceptable conditions and in compliance with the principles laid down in Article L. 1333-1 of the public health code (radioprotection) and section II of Article L. 110-1 of the environmental code (protection of the environment). The intended end-state is industrial use: the sites will be restored to their original condition and will be reusable for industrial facilities. The ongoing operations concern plants that were constructed and operated before the current nuclear fleet (“first-generation” plants), and the Superphenix plant and Irradiated Materials Workshop at Chinon. These operations cover four different technologies: a heavy water reactor (Brennilis), a sodium-cooled fast-neutron reactor (the Superphenix at Creys-Malville), natural uranium graphite gas-cooled (UNGG) reactors (at Chinon, Saint Laurent and Bugey) and a pressurised water reactor (PWR at Chooz). Each of them is a first for EDF, and apart from the PWR, they concern reactor technologies for which there is little or no international experience. They therefore require development of new methods and technologies that are riskier than technologies for which feedback already exists. Decommissioning of the Chooz PWR is benefiting from past experience (essentially in the US and limited), but the reactor has the specificity of being located in a cave, making this a unique operation, generating experience that is not immediately transposable and involves specific risks. The experience gained from dismantling the Chooz PWR will make the studies and estimates of future decommissioning of the nuclear fleet currently in operation (“second-generation” plants) as robust as possible. But so far, neither EDF nor any other operator has begun a decommissioning programme on a scale comparable to the current PWR fleet, and as a result the estimates include both opportunities and risks, especially the risks associated with the scale effect. The decommissioning provisions cover future decommissioning expenses as described above (excluding the cost of removing and storing waste, which is covered by the provisions for long-term waste management).

In application of this Ministerial Order, the cost of the Cigéo project will be regularly updated, at least at each key milestone in the course of the project’s development (authorisation to create the facility, commissioning, end of the “pilot industrial phase”, safety reviews) in accordance with the opinion of the ASN. Design studies for future facilities are currently in process with ANDRA and stakeholders. They include technical and economic optimisation and the responses to the safety option report sent by ANDRA to the ASN in April 2016. The law of 11 July 2016 also clarified the concept of reversibility. In 2017 ANDRA opted for a new configuration to provide the basis for the preliminary project. Under the schedule prepared by ANDRA, the application to built Cigéo (classified as a basic nuclear facility) should be made during 2019 and permission is expected to be granted in 2022. After an industrial pilot phase starting in 2026, the first waste packages should be received in 2031. On 15 January 2018, the ASN issued its opinion on the Cigéo safety option report (DOS Cigéo). It considers that the project has reached satisfactory overall technological maturity at this stage and requires examination of alternatives to the current proposals for storage of bituminous waste at Cigéo. FOR NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS EDF bears full technical and financial responsibility for decommissioning of the nuclear plants it operates. The decommissioning process is governed by French Law of 13 June 2006, Decree 2007-1557 of 2 November 2007, and the French Environment Code (Articles L. 593-25 and following). It involves the following operations for each site: a shutdown declaration, to be made at least two years prior to the planned ■ shutdown date; since the Energy Transition Law of 17 August 2015, the final shutdown, which ■ takes place during the operating phase of the basic nuclear facility, is considered separately from dismantling, as a notable change of lesser importance (simply requiring a declaration by the operator to the Minister and the ASN); an application for decommissioning, which after examination by the authorities ■ and a public inquiry, leads to a single decree authorising the decommissioning; key progress reviews with the ASN, included in a formal safety procedure specific ■ to dismantling operations; DECOMMISSIONING PROVISIONS 28.3

Details of changes in decommissioning provisions for nuclear power plants are as follows:

Other changes (2)

Increases

Decreases Utilisations

2016

Operating Financial (1)

2017

(in millions of euros)

Provisions for decommissioning of nuclear plants in operation

10,899

2

461 197

(13)

267 11,616

Provisions for decommissioning of shut-down nuclear plants 3,223

-

(118)

2

3,304

TOTAL PROVISIONS FOR NUCLERA PLANT DECOMMISSIONING

14,122

2

658

(131)

269

14 920

Cost of unwinding the discount and effects of changes in the net discount rate for provisions without related assets. (1) These are changes of estimate with a corresponding adjustment to property, plant and equipment (see note 1.15.1) or reclassifications of provisions. (2)

In 2014 the Dampierre study was reviewed by EDF to make sure that the previous calculations were still valid in view of recent developments and experience, both internationally and internally. For this revision, the decommissioning provisions for plants in operation were based on costs resulting from the Dampierre study, in order to incorporate best estimates and feedback from inside and outside France. This change of estimate had no significant impact on the level of provisions at 31 December 2014.

For nuclear power plants currently in operation (PWR pressurized water reactor plants with 900MW, 1,300MW and N4 reactors) Until 2013, provisions were estimated based on a 1991 study by the French Ministry of Trade and Industry, which set an estimated benchmark cost for decommissioning expressed in €/MW, confirming the assumptions defined in 1979 by the PEON commission. These estimates had been confirmed from 2009 by a detailed study of decommissioning costs conducted by EDF at the representative site of Dampierre (four 900MW units), and its results were corroborated by an intercomparison with the study carried out by consultants La Guardia, based mainly on the Maine Yankee reactor in the US.

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EDF I Reference Document 2017