A fifth of France's nuclear capacity is offline, a record

On Tuesday 20.4 percent of French nuclear capacity was unavailable, the largest shortfall on record, with 13 of EDF's 57 reactors affected: eight fully shut down and five running at reduced power. At Gravelines, Western Europe's largest nuclear plant, a swarm of jellyfish clogged the cooling pumps at five of six reactors. The other outages are down to the heat and low river flows, which limit cooling water. The energy analyst Nicolas Goldberg judges that there is enough leeway that supply is not at risk in the short term.

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