WNWR 2019 — 6. COSTS AND FINANCING
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the utilities set aside provisions for interim storage of their waste; the estimated discounted costs were around €5.8 billion in 2014.276 After the financing reform, this amount was transferred to an external segregated fund and all interim storage costs, including for spent nuclear fuel that will arise from continued operation, will be paid by the public fund. In Sweden, the costs for the centralized interim storage facility CLAB are paid by the Nuclear Waste Fund. The most complex financing situation for interim storage of spent nuclear fuel is in the US. The Nuclear Waste Policy Act required the Department of Energy (DOE) to take over spent nuclear fuel in 1998. This created a significant liability for the DOE. The absence of a high-level waste repository forces local utilities to store spent fuel on their own sites, including already decommissioned sites. For this interim storage, the utilities request substantial financial compensation from the DOE, which has spent over US$10 billion in legal penalties so far. DOE estimates that total damages could amount to US$20.8 billion, if it begins accepting fuel in 2020. With further delays, the liabilities could increase by hundreds of millions of dollars annually.277 The US Department of Justice manages a Judgment Fund of taxpayer money, about US$2 million per day, on all nuclear power plants, operating or shut down, to help manage their spent nuclear fuel. In France, EDF estimates an additional €18.7 billion (US$21.1 billion) for spent fuel management (for example storage, reprocessing), and another €1.2 billion (US$1.4 billion) for waste removal and conditioning.278 This amounts to €51 billion (US$57.5 billion) only for handling and storing the waste generated from operation. FINANCING SCHEMES FOR DISPOSAL The polluters are not always financially liable for disposal (and partly waste management, too); in some cases, liability is transferred to a state-governed organization that is also responsible for radioactive waste.279 Most countries require funds for the long-term management of radioactive waste to be managed externally and segregated from the operator or licensee. In France, for instance, the operators of nuclear power plants must bear all costs related to waste management, but an external fund for the construction and operation, final closure, maintenance, and monitoring of the intermediate- and high-level waste disposal installations was created. ANDRA, the state-owned waste management agency, holds and manages the fund (Article 16 of the 2006 Waste Law).280 In addition, there is also an internal, restricted ANDRA fund for research for future storage facilities. The two funds are fed by payments from the operator’s internal funds at the time they are needed. However, the only fund fed right now is the research fund, as there is still no construction license. Instead, the operators make payments from their internal fund (for waste management) to ANDRA’s general budget to finance operations related to the storage facilities for short-lived, medium-level waste.281 Due to the 2006 Waste Law, the assets in the funds of EDF and Areva have to be reported separately, and the market value has to be at least as high as the liabilities to be covered. If EDF goes bankrupt, the state can claim right over the assets. An administrative authority supervises the internal funds; it can impose corrective measures, including the right to impose payments to ANDRA’s budget. 276 Warth & Klein Grant Thornton AG Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaft, 2015. 277 US Department of Energy 2012, “Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s nuclear future”. 278 EDF 2019, “Consolidated Financial Statements at 31 December 2018”. 279 Wuppertal Institut 2007. 280 Government of France 2006, The 2006 programme act on the sustainable management of radioactive materials and wastes,
Office parlementaire — Assemblée nationale. 281 Wealer, Hirschhausen, and Seidel 2019.
