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“Macron will visit India on March 11, 2018, seven years to the day since the start of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant disaster in Japan… France and India are expected to sign a framework agreement during the visit that would fast track a six-reactor EPR project at Jaitapur on India’s west coast. “The French have no right to inflict the risks and environmental devastation of nuclear power on unwilling communities in India,” said Kumar Sundaram, director of DiaNuke. “The French nuclear sector is preying upon India’s apparent eagerness to buy nuclear plants in order to restore their global reputation, fatally damaged by the failures of their EPR nuclear projects at home and in Finland… Only last week, EDF admitted to substandard weldings at the Flamanville plant which also has a controversial and flawed reactor vessel lid manufactured by the Areva-owned French forge at Le Creusot which was found to have supplied defective parts and falsified quality control documents, eroding trust internationally in the EPR.” (Excerpted from Dianuke-Beyond Nuclear Press Release, found further below.)

“International Solidarity Statement against the French President’s visit to India to push for the Jaitapur Nuclear Power Project [Please Sign]“http://www.dianuke.org/international-solidarity-statement-against-the-french-presidents-visit-to-india-to-push-for-the-jaitapur-nuclear-power-project-please-sign/

Macron a perdu la boussole! French President Macron has clearly lost his mind! If he wants to promote nuclear, Fukushima Day isn’t the day! Is he going to welcome refugees from India to France if there is a nuclear accident? Past time to convert Le Creusot and Chalon away from production of nuclear parts to something safe. Le Creusot was historically a center of crystal glass-making.

Westinghouse, mentioned in the press release below, was owned by Japan’s Toshiba and now belongs to Canada’s Brookfield Asset Management. It hasn’t been American since 1999. Many think that the Fukushima nuclear disaster is much worse than Chernobyl. French State owned Areva has rebranded itself as Orano and its reactor business given the earlier name of Framatome and sold to French State owned EDF with Areva (Orano) exiting the business by 2020: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orano

Via Dianuke.org:
“More Dirty Nuclear Deals, this time France in India: Macron Peddles World’s Largest Nuke Plant on Fukushima Anniversary
MARCH 8, 2018
JOINT PRESS RELEASE — BEYOND NUCLEAR, DIANUKE

Groups condemn French-India nuclear deal to be signed on Fukushima anniversary

TAKOMA PARK, MD, March 5, 2018 — French president, Emmanuel Macron, should not be imposing the untested, expensive and technically troubled French EPR reactor on India, say two international groups opposed to nuclear power in India and across the world.

Macron will visit India on March 11, 2018, seven years to the day since the start of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant disaster in Japan, the second worst nuclear catastrophe after the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear reactor explosion in Ukraine. France and India are expected to sign a framework agreement during the visit that would fast track a six-reactor EPR project at Jaitapur on India’s west coast.

“The French have no right to inflict the risks and environmental devastation of nuclear power on unwilling communities in India,” said Kumar Sundaram, director of DiaNuke. “The French nuclear sector is preying upon India’s apparent eagerness to buy nuclear plants in order to restore their global reputation, fatally damaged by the failures of their EPR nuclear projects at home and in Finland.”

Beyond Nuclear (US) and DiaNuke (India) are calling for foreign corporations not to proceed with nuclear power projects in India. In addition to the French Jaitapur site, a subsidiary of the Russian nuclear company, Rosatom, has a six reactor nuclear project in Kudankulam where two of its VVER-1000 reactors are already operational. The bankrupt US company, Westinghouse, hopes to build six AP1000 reactors in the village of Kovvada in Andhra Pradesh.

There have been vigorous protests at all the foreign-owned nuclear sites from farmers, fishermen and villagers, whose lives and livelihoods, along with scarce water supplies, are threatened. As many as 5,000 people are expected to protest on the eve of Macron’s visit. The Jaitapur EPR project would be the biggest nuclear power plant site in the world if built, producing 9,900 MW of electricity.

“It’s ironic that while Macron is selling nuclear power to India where villagers have been shot protesting it, his government is at the same time tear-gasing nuclear opponents at home,” said Linda Pentz Gunter, international specialist at Beyond Nuclear. “This shows yet again why nuclear energy and democracy are fundamentally incompatible.”

Macron will also visit the New Delhi Solar Summit during his stopover in India. “India is ideally suited to the distributed electricity generation provided by solar and wind energy, given its vast geography and the fact that almost 70% of its population lives in rural areas,” Pentz Gunter continued. “But it is clear that nuclear energy is Macron’s priority agenda.”

The Areva-designed and EDF constructed EPR was supposed to become the French nuclear flagship. Instead, the EPR is mired in controversy. The French Flamanville EPR, as well as one in Olkiluoto, Finland, are massively over budget, years behind schedule, and have been plagued by technical mistakes and charges of fraud and cover-ups.

Only last week, EDF admitted to substandard weldings at the Flamanville plant which also has a controversial and flawed reactor vessel lid manufactured by the Areva-owned French forge at Le Creusot which was found to have supplied defective parts and falsified quality control documents, eroding trust internationally in the EPR.

Even in China, where safety controls are given less scrutiny than in Europe, further delays were just announced at the Taishan EPR site, due to cracks found in a reactor component. It marked the third delay in two years. These troubles have left Areva and EDF, both state-owned companies, fundamentally bankrupt. -30- DiaNuke is an India-based international organization that looks at the interconnectedness between nuclear issues and other struggles for justice, equality, dignity, transparency and democracy. Beyond Nuclear is an environmental non-profit advocacy group based in Takoma Park, MD that advocates for the abolition of nuclear power and nuclear weapons and for the renewable energy pathway.“CC-BY-NC: http://www.dianuke.org/more-dirty-nuclear-deals-this-time-france-in-india-macron-peddles-worlds-largest-nuke-plant-on-fukushima-anniversary/ Original Press Release pdf here: http://www.beyondnuclear.org/storage/press-releases/MacronIndia_PressRelease_Mar5_2018.pdf
Emphasis our own.

These days China appears more concerned with nuclear safety than the west, Russia, or Japan.

“International Solidarity Statement against the French President’s visit to India to push for the Jaitapur Nuclear Power Project [Please Sign]” http://www.dianuke.org/international-solidarity-statement-against-the-french-presidents-visit-to-india-to-push-for-the-jaitapur-nuclear-power-project-please-sign/

French Prime Minister Édouard Philippe was appointed PM by Macron and worked for French state owned nuclear entity AREVA during the period of the Uramin scandal: https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/UraMin. Édouard_Philipp “appointed Director of Public Affairs at Areva, where he worked from 2007 to 2010” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Édouard_Philippe