A jellyfish swarm lowered output by 2.4 gigawatts at French utility EDF’s Paluel nuclear plant after coming into the filters of the pumping station, EDF mentioned on Thursday (September 4, 2025), the second time jellyfish have impacted manufacturing in a month.
Electricity manufacturing on the 5.2 GW Paluel nuclear plant in northern France was practically minimize in half late on Wednesday (September 3, 2025) because the quantity 4 reactor was shut down and energy on the quantity 3 reactor was lowered in a preventative method, EDF mentioned.
The Paluel plant is linked to and cooled by waters from the English Channel, the place each native and invasive jellyfish have skilled wider breeding home windows as a result of hotter temperatures, growing the scale of swarms.
Reactor #1 is working at full capability and quantity 2 is at present shut down for upkeep.
The Gravelines nuclear plant was shuttered in mid-August after a separate “massive and unpredictable” swarm of jellyfish entered its cooling programs.
This will not be the primary time that jellyfish have disrupted nuclear vegetation usually. Scotland’s Torness confronted comparable issues in 2011, whereas Gravelines itself was disrupted in 1993.
Scientists warn that such occasions may develop into extra frequent as a result of elements together with world warming, the arrival of invasive marine species, habitat lack of predators, and over-fishing.
