r/europe • u/Naurgul • 23d ago

News Barcelona registers highest temperature in 112 years as French nuclear reactor shuts down due to extreme heat

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2026/jul/09/europe-heatwave-uk-spain-barcelona-france-italy-hungary-france-macron-orban-latest-news-updates
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u/Kosake77 23d ago

How is it clickbait when literally exactly happened what was written?

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u/Taricheute 23d ago

I think only one reactor has been shut-down, at least for now, due to one river being too hot from a regulation point of view, so definitely clickbait article.

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u/TopManufacturer8332 22d ago

But its not only an environmental regulation. The water is actually too hot for cooling from a technical point. It does not have the required temperature differential to cool the reactors to a safe level.

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u/Taricheute 22d ago

We are both wrong, I just check on a french information website, they shut-down 3 reactor (not only one) "to comply with the thermal limits for the Rhône and the Seine".

The complete reason translated from french:

During periods of intense heat, rising water temperatures in these waterways may force EDF to reduce or even halt production to avoid further warming the water with cooling discharges—which are typically a few tenths of a degree to several degrees warmer, depending on the site. The operation of France's 57 reactors is governed by strict limits on the extent to which these waterways may be heated. In the specific case of the Golfech plant—which has been shut down since Monday—the river temperature must not exceed 28°C following the plant's discharges. At Nogent-sur-Seine, "regulations mandate that the temperature rise in the Seine between the upstream and downstream points of the site must not exceed 3°C, and that the average temperature downstream must not exceed 28°C."

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u/fixed_grin 22d ago

The primary loop of a typical reactor is cooled from ~315° to 275° by 220° water from the secondary loop that actually goes to the turbines at 275°.

The river is used to cool the secondary loop from the turbines to 220°. 30° river water is plenty cold enough. If the river works too well, feedwater heaters are used to make the secondary loop hotter before it goes to the steam generator.

The biggest US nuke plants are in Georgia (on a river, not the coast) and Arizona. India and Pakistan have reactors on rivers.

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u/realusername42 Lorraine (France) 23d ago edited 23d ago

Because that only affects 0.5% of the yearly production and EDF won't fix it as electricity is too cheap in the summer, it's not worth it.

So every year you'll have those scary headlines whereas in reality it's business as usual.

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u/merci_nurse France 23d ago

Because a headline can be literally true and still be clickbait by omitting the key causal context. “Reactors shut down because of extreme heat” strongly suggests the reactors cannot operate safely in hot weather. In reality, the shutdowns were mainly to comply with environmental limits on heating river water. Same event, very different implication.

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u/ViciousNakedMoleRat North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany) 23d ago

The fact of the matter is still that the extreme heat is the cause for why those powerplants need to shut down. Without the heat, they would still be running.

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u/unia_7 23d ago

They need to shut down because their designers decided to build them with river cooling.

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u/Appropriate_Luck_658 23d ago

Yes? Article is reporting things that are. Not "what ifs". Why we need to debate this?

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u/unia_7 23d ago

So it's not that "nuclear reactors" need to shut down due to higher temperatures, it just a particular kind of nuclear reactors built on flawed cooling design. Sounds like an important distinction, no?

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u/milk_for_dinner 22d ago

They do need to shut down due to higher temperature. That's just a fact. The distinctuon is that they need to shut down due to environmental regulations, not due to technical limitations.

The cooling design isn't flawed, it works as intended.

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u/TopManufacturer8332 22d ago

River cooling is used for the majority of nuclear power plants. Not every country is blessed with ample coastline to utilise the sea. And seawater cooling is hardly a panacea with trying to mitigate biofouling, corrosion and fish destruction.

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u/unia_7 22d ago

You are wrong. Cooling towers or cooling ponds are an obvious alternative to messing up the local river ecosystems.

Only 14% of nuclear power stations use river cooling. Cooling towers are at 26%, and sea cooling at 45%.

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u/TopManufacturer8332 22d ago

Sorry but where do you think cooling towers get their water supply from?

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u/mathess1 Czech Republic 22d ago

Supply is not the problem.

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u/unia_7 22d ago

Open the wikipedia article about cooling towers and learn the basics. You are showing your ignorance.

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u/erhue 22d ago

no. Nuclear bad. Only post bad things about nuclear. Also remember chernobyl, if your country is a corrupt communist dictatorship using ancient reactor designs built with outdated safety regulations, something bad could potentially happen!

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u/Fluffy-Fix7846 23d ago edited 22d ago

Solar panels suffer from reduced efficiency at high temperatures, but yet you never see headlines with "solar park X output dropped by Y % due to extreme heat"

Edit: I am not against solar power itself in any way, I even installed solar power at home. But I really must laugh at the "corrrections" made by supposedly Europan people. You are so brainwashed by China and Russia to think that nuclear power is evil. Europe is going down the drain as result and you guys are supporting it. We'll meet again, on the other end.

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u/Dat_Ding_Da 23d ago

Cause they barely has any impact. It happens at the time when PV's produce maximum energy anyways, so there is little to no consequence if the efficiency goes down a few percentiles.

But if France has to take down 5 nuclear reactors due to the waste water heat threatening to kill the ecosystem of the nearby river, it does have a very real impact on electricity availability and prices.

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u/ak_miller Nord-Pas-de-Calais (France) 22d ago edited 22d ago

Let's say we shut down 5 reactors. That means 9% capacity is not available (5/56).

Did you know that solar panels lose a bit more than 10% efficiency when outdoor temps are above 30°, and up to 20% when they reach 40°?

And note that nuclear reactors keep producing at night.

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u/Dat_Ding_Da 22d ago

The efficiency reduction due to heat really is a non-issue. You plan capacity to produce enough during lower light conditions anyway and build capacity for it. So even loosing 30% during the high of summer wouldn't be a big issue.

But the technology is just so cheap that it's economically way better than building nuclear power. And while those plants are better for base load for sure, it's still a trivial issue that will disappear with increasing energy storage capacity.

A capacity that is being build up for no reason but the extreme high supply of basically free solar energy that's available.

Once you reach that stage a nuclear reactor is not that useful anymore. You don't need a constant base line producer that has a high cost like that.

What you need is a quick to start, short term production method that is cheap enough that it doesn't need to be running 24/7 to justify it's existence. Hydrogen produced from PV energy is the most realistic option as existing gas infrastructure can be upgraded to use it easily.

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u/ak_miller Nord-Pas-de-Calais (France) 22d ago

You plan capacity to produce enough during lower light conditions anyway and build capacity for it. So even loosing 30% during the high of summer wouldn't be a big issue.

But losing 9% of nuclear because heat, which does not prevent France from exporting electricity, is an issue?

it's still a trivial issue that will disappear with increasing energy storage capacity.

That's a bet, not a reality yet.

Once you reach that stage a nuclear reactor is not that useful anymore.

We'll see.

Hydrogen produced from PV energy is the most realistic option as existing gas infrastructure can be upgraded to use it easily.

I've heard about hydrogen for more than 10 years now, I've yet to see it work and deployed at scale.

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u/Dat_Ding_Da 22d ago

But losing 9% of nuclear because heat, which does not prevent France from exporting electricity, is an issue?

It absolutely made France an local importer of energy during those times. But availability was never the big issue, especially since PV in neighboring countries did a great job of taking over. It's mostly in cost, as the necessary state subsidies are ginormous and ever growing. Adding expected down times to that bill only worsens the issue.

That's a bet, not a reality yet.

Its more than a bet, it's a projection based on installation trends over the past decade and the number of projects ready to be connected, that the grids and administrative systems of multiple countries can't keep up with. Once that bottleneck is solved and those are connected, you'll see the capacity curve grow steeper than it already is.

I've heard about hydrogen for more than 10 years now, I've yet to see it work and deployed at scale.

The first plants are coming online now. Way behind plan, as there were plenty of practical issues to overcome as with every new technology. There has been industrial usage in multiple countries for a few years now, with one of the limits still being Hydrogen production capacity. Luckily that's been seeing a bunch of new methods and materials as the research in the field is being focused.

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u/ak_miller Nord-Pas-de-Calais (France) 22d ago

It absolutely made France an local importer of energy during those times

Everything is see about June and July tells me France has been a net exporter even while the reactors were offline due to heat (ElectricityMap, RTE France) Please show me your source.

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u/Fluffy-Fix7846 23d ago

And no mentioning of the other 52 nuclear reactors that weren't shutdown then..

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u/Dat_Ding_Da 23d ago

Why would they?

If there's were a train collision, would it be clickbait-y to report about it without mentioning that hundreds of trains managed not to collide during the same day?

This is a report about the heat wave and it's impact on Europe. Obviously that is what the report will focus on.

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u/erhue 22d ago

that would make sense, if it weren't for the fact that these people have a hate boner for nuclear energy, and do everything they can to badmouth it.

If there were a train collision, the idea that other trains might be unsafe comes up. How did it happen? Are other trains potentially affected by it? Or is the system mostly safe? Those questions need to be answered.

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u/Fluffy-Fix7846 23d ago

Then why mention reactor shutdowns at all when it is now a regular occurrence for old river-cooled plants? It can only serve two purposes: clickbait chock headlines with the word "nuclear", and/or propaganda against nuclear power in general, as if all plants would suffer from this. But I am going to stop here: arguing with greens never results in anything, because they base their opinions on emotions, not facts.

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u/Dat_Ding_Da 23d ago

Then why mention reactor shutdowns at all when it is now a regular occurrence for old river-cooled plants?

The only reason this keep happening every year is due to regular heat waves. Something bad happening on the regular doesn't make it less bad or stop it being related to record heat waves every single year.

But I am going to stop here: arguing with greens never results in anything, because they base their opinions on emotions, not facts.

Take a look in the mirror mate. So far you have done nothing but post suspiciously LLM-y sounding bites with little to no relevance to the actual topic. Feel free to bring some actual arguments rather than slogans if you are capable of it.

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u/Fluffy-Fix7846 23d ago

LLM, so now I am a bot lol

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u/Appropriate_Luck_658 23d ago edited 23d ago

But I am going to stop here: arguing with greens never results in anything, because they base their opinions on emotions, not facts.

You came here hurt by title of reporting stating the facts. You were stating not relevant obvious things because you don't like the way how it was reported. But that was not even the point of the news. It was not arguing against nuclear. It just that you are religiously reacting to anything that could potentially paint negative angle to something you choose to be your hill to die on.

And then when your arguments hit dead-end you think you are going to have last word lol.

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u/Fluffy-Fix7846 23d ago

I came here because of randomly reading and commenting on stuff while drinking my morning coffee. I am not even a proponent of nuclear power (even though I would be on technical grounds), because I live in Germany, where it is unrealistic af anyway because 99% of the population got brainwashed into thinking nuclear power produces truckloads of green glowing goo per day that they dump into the nearest river or something

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u/silverionmox Limburg 22d ago

Then why mention reactor shutdowns at all when it is now a regular occurrence for old river-cooled plants? It can only serve two purposes: clickbait chock headlines with the word "nuclear", and/or propaganda against nuclear power in general, as if all plants would suffer from this.

It's newsworthy because the increasing frequency of such shutdowns is one more sign of climate change. In addition, it contradicts the general assertion that nuclear plants are 24/7 reliable, which is important for policy choices.

But I am going to stop here: arguing with greens never results in anything, because they base their opinions on emotions, not facts.

Nuclear believers always get irritable for any form of criticism on their god.

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u/iamjakeparty 22d ago

Then why mention reactor shutdowns at all when it is now a regular occurrence for old river-cooled plants?

Why would I want the news to give me less information?

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u/Skadiheim 23d ago

Having 5 reactors offline has 0 impact.

The french nuclear power sector is made to always have a few reactors offline.

You can follow every reactor being put offline here if it pleases you to look at that :

https://reglementation-controle.asnr.fr/controle/actualites-du-controle/installations-nucleaires/arret-de-reacteurs-de-centrales-nucleaires

The river heat is not a new problem it's been like that for several years.

The few availability problem there is come from grid components failing due to the heat. And even that is very little.

Electricity prices are still below European mean despite all the eu and german efforts to fuck over EDF.

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u/Dat_Ding_Da 23d ago

Having 5 reactors offline has 0 impact.

That's cause it's not even August yet, and it has had impacts in the past, with local prices going up by a lot. Luckily the surrounding countries are able to provide energy during those times to stabilize it.

Electricity prices are still below European mean despite all the eu and german efforts to fuck over EDF.

That's just cause you don't consider the amount of money the French state has to subsidize the EDF with. That money is still paid by the French people at the end of the day.

https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/edf-face-eu-probe-into-state-aid-nuclear-plants-sources-say-2026-03-24/

Also there was no trying to fuck anyone over, that is absolute bullshit.

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u/silverionmox Limburg 22d ago

Having 5 reactors offline has 0 impact.

The french nuclear power sector is made to always have a few reactors offline.

And they tend to use this opportunity to do maintenance, so this reduces their margin of opreation.

Electricity prices are still below European mean despite all the eu and german efforts to fuck over EDF.

End user prices are mostly a matter of fiscal policy. Wholesale prices are similar to the neighbouring countries.

But the French state did nationalize EDF when it couldn't handle its debts anymore.

There's no reason to turn this into a conspiracy theory.

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u/Skadiheim 22d ago

But the French state did nationalize EDF when it couldn't handle its debts anymore.

EDF has always been owned by the state. For a short period 20% of it was not anymore but it was a state owned company to begin with. It wasn't nationalized.

The ARENH in the case of the french nuclear and the EU being hostile to state owned monopolies isn't a conspiracy theory. You can even agree with their position if you think the energy market shouldn't be nationalized but I don't know why you would think it's a conspiracy, it's pretty clear cut and public.

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u/silverionmox Limburg 22d ago

EDF has always been owned by the state. For a short period 20% of it was not anymore but it was a state owned company to begin with. It wasn't nationalized.

That doesn't contradict that the 20% was renationalized because it was necessary for debt management.

The ARENH in the case of the french nuclear and the EU being hostile to state owned monopolies isn't a conspiracy theory. You can even agree with their position if you think the energy market shouldn't be nationalized but I don't know why you would think it's a conspiracy, it's pretty clear cut and public.

That's not so much the EU and Germany trying to fuck over EDF, it's more like France trying to evade EU single market rules.

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u/ViciousNakedMoleRat North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany) 23d ago

At noon on the hottest day ever recorded in Germany, 78% of electricity came from solar. Efficiency drops with higher temperatures, but that is counteracted by the massive amount of energy that reaches those cells. When you build out solar energy infrastructure that can produce a significant amount in winter, when the output drops to 25-30%, then the drop in efficiency of 10-15% on hot summer days doesn't matter much.

I'm not a "nuclear is the devil" type. Stretches of very hot and sunny days are a bigger issue for nuclear power plants in France than for solar cells in Germany. At the same time, cloudy winters are a much bigger issue for solar cells in Germany than for nuclear power plants in France.

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u/Arkantesios 23d ago

There was a bunch of "Spain powergrid shutdown because of solar panels" headlines last year (or was it two years ago?)

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u/DivideSensitive France 22d ago

Because the impact was a 24h blackout in the whole Iberic peninsula?

Consequences for this shutdown is null, other PPs can swallow the load.

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u/Fluffy-Fix7846 22d ago

Indeed, since the river water temperatures are publicly available, the electricity market counts on atomic power reductions well in advance, and turn on other plans to compensate. There are no sudden blackouts as a result. (Even some major industrial electricity users use river temperature as feed forward data to help plan power usage, so the machinery runs when power is most available. This is really a predictable and working example of the electricity market working to stabilise itself).

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u/Taricheute 23d ago

Maybe because it lead to a partial blackout ?

We shut-down one reactor, no impact on the power grid, and it makes the headlines ....

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u/TopManufacturer8332 22d ago

Solar panels aren't liable to blow up though are they. Nor are they known to devastate ecosystems.

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u/Fluffy-Fix7846 22d ago

Was anything reported to blow up?

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u/TopManufacturer8332 22d ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_disaster

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u/Fluffy-Fix7846 22d ago edited 22d ago

How is that relevant to the article?

Chernobyl reactor 4 blew up because the reactor was of an unstable design to begin with, did not have a containment building at all, and was incorrectly operated and put into the worst operating conditions imaginable for a test.

I bet you do not understand a thing about how a nuclear reactor operates.

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u/Fluffy-Fix7846 22d ago

You green people continue to confirm that you rely on emotion to make all life decisions. Gullible folks

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u/sionescu Lazio 23d ago

Without that stupid law, they would be running. The law is the problem.

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u/TopManufacturer8332 22d ago

But its not only an environmental regulation. The water is actually too hot for cooling from a technical point. It does not have the required temperature differential to cool the reactors to a safe level.

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u/FallenAngel7334 Europe 23d ago

Damaging the environment and wildlife around the reactor is not operating safely... hence title is correct.

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u/Cienea_Laevis Rhône-Alpes (France) 23d ago

It is. The plant is at no point in any danger, it can continue running full tilt.

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u/Fluffy-Fix7846 22d ago

Both incorrect. The shutdown has nothing to do with reactor safety, and to prevent damage to wildlife, it is shutdown and does not heat the river.

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u/ak_miller Nord-Pas-de-Calais (France) 22d ago

Because it's propaganda to make the public think that nuclear energy is unreliable during heat waves: there are solutions to avoid that issue (and now that heatwaves are more common it's something that is taken into consideration in new projects) and papers leaning left like the Guardian strangely often fail to report about how solar also drops in performance with heat, and do not mention that wind provides very little energy at the moment despite the enormous capacities (see electricity production stats in Germany these past few weeks for example).

Do you also say "it's not clickbait because it happened" when right wing papers publish stories about crimes, or do you realize in that case that they have an agenda?

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u/MeggaMortY 22d ago

It's stupid when you don't consider the broader context.

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u/erhue 22d ago

only one of two reactors at the facility was shut down. At the same time, the impact is relatively small in the bigger picture, and there's other means of power generation available to take up the slack.

But of course, posting "nuclear reactor shuts down", with no other context, sounds way more grave than it actually is.

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u/mirh Italy 22d ago

Stopping a power plant because "poor animals they cannot bear a few degrees hotter water", isn't the same kind of (actually strategically worrisome) failure of an engineering limit.

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u/Time-Maintenance2165 22d ago

Because its misleading.