The French Armed Forces Ministry has announced a "partnership" with state-owned energy giant Électricité de France (EDF) to produce tritium, "a rare and decisive gas for nuclear weaponry."
The collaboration involves harnessing the power of the two nuclear reactors at the Civaux power plant in western France to produce tritium, alongside the French Atomic Energy Commission (CEA), the Ministry stated. The long-term plan follows a recent visit from the French Defence Minister, Sébastien Lecornu, to Civaux.
France is the only EU Member State to possess nuclear weapons. The French nuclear deterrence strategy, supported by its seaborne (nuclear submarines) and airborne components, must continually adapt and renew to remain credible. After the US, Russia and China, the country ranks fourth among nuclear powers, followed by the UK.
Long-term strategy
The project involves the installation of a material irradiation service on the site. "The power of the two Civaux reactors will be used to irradiate materials containing lithium as part of unchanged electricity production. Once irradiated, these materials will be transferred to a CEA site to produce tritium," Lecornu detailed.
"This partnership has been under consideration since the 1990s and forms part of a long-term strategy, standard for defence industry tools." EDF is aiming to run a small-scale test during one of the scheduled shutdowns in the power plant in 2025.
Tritium is a "difficult gas to produce, which spontaneously disintegrates and disappears," the Ministry underlined, adding that "every stock is reduced by 50% every 12 years, 75% every 25 years, and 99.5% every century." Therefore, regular production is essential.
