Project Manhattan
economy fact Check
The only study regarding the economic impacts that has been conducted on a global scale has been made for AREVA, a French energy multinational. The study contains two interesting graphs. On the left side we can see the job creation distribution, according to the job sector and the year. What strikes at first sight is that the majority of the newly created jobs falls into the construction sector. Another interesting point is the timeline of job creation. A vast majority of the new jobs has been created in the first few years (or even before, that is to say: when the construction of a power plant is announced).
This table confirms what we've just seen with the graphs. A single nuclear power plant creates an average of 8350 new jobs, even though it is not working yet. This number is only for the time that the public authorities look for a fitted place to locate the power plant plus the time it's being build. It is during this very time that the power plant already generates 660 Million € per year. During the time of exploitation this number falls down to 1650 jobs. Even though this study looks in academic terms as a serious one, nevertheless it's outcomes have to be treated with caution, since AREVA was the one financing this study. Unfortunately, there has not been made any other study to this extent.
On the right side we can see the distribution of the added value. Again, we can see that a huge amount of the added value is produced by the simple construction of the power plant. Nevertheless, a significant part is generated by the work of the power plant. According to this graph, the average added value of a power plant in times of normal work is around 200 million € per year.
In general, the economics of new nuclear power plants is a controversial subject. Nuclear power plants typically have high capital costs for building the plant, but low direct fuel costs (with much of the costs of fuel extraction, processing, use and long term storage externalized). Cost estimates also need to take into account plant decommissioning and nuclear waste storage costs. On the other hand measures to mitigate global warming, such as a carbon tax or carbon emissions trading, may favor the economics of nuclear power versus fossil fuels.
Interesting fact: As the costs of the closure of a nuclear power plant and the storage of radioactive waste are estimated to make up several billions of euros until 2050, Luxembourg said it was ready to help financing an alternative. «Conscious of the workplaces which are threatened», the neighboring country of France «would be ready to participate financially in a cross-border project to establish a project in Cattenom which will be different to the nuclear one», declared Prime Minister Xavier Bettel.
Xavier Bettel
To implant a nuclear plant, engineers need to consider the territory under different aspects. First of all, they are economic considerations, and then engineering factors, environmental quality, and socio-economic impacts, among others. The following mathematical calculation is supposed to weight if it brings more than it costs to implant a nuclear plant somewhere.
For instance, the engineers suppose that the acquisition cost differs greatly among a set of sites, while water availability varies little. A decision maker may be tempted to give acquisition cost a higher weight, as it is more likely to make a difference in the decision.
In order for a weighting summation model to be theoretically valid, weights must be proportional to the relative value of unit changes in their attribute value functions.
How much does Germany pay for the phase-out of their nuclear reactors?
Following the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, costs are likely to go up for currently operating and new nuclear power plants, due to increased requirements for on-site spent fuel management and elevated design basis threats. For example, dismantling costs in Germany are estimated by the companies at €857 million per reactor. (About 20€ a month per average household).