France has 56 reactors – more than any other European nation. What is it like to swim, play and live in their shadow?
Rain or shine, Christiane Lamiraud, 63, likes to swim in the Channel from the beach near her home in the village of Saint-Martin-en-Campagne, north-east of Dieppe. From the water, it is hard to miss the Penly nuclear power station just 700 metres up the coast at the foot of the chalk cliffs, sucking in seawater to cool its two reactors, then pumping it back out to sea a few degrees warmer. But ignore it she does. Reports of incidents do not deter the teacher from her daily swim. “Questions are quickly stifled here. Where there is a nuclear industry, it’s a non-subject. It is hidden behind the cliff and we don’t talk about it,” she says.
Like many villages and towns in close proximity to France’s nuclear plants, St Martin-en-Campagne in the Petit-Caux district is close enough that it could be evacuated in case of an accident. But most residents prefer not to dwell on that, says villager Pierre Pouliquen, 45. “There is a real need for clean energy. The problems of nuclear power aren’t hidden, but we don’t even think about them. Even when we go to the beach, we don’t look at the power station.”
Christiane Lamiraud lives in Saint-Martin-en-Campagne in Normandy, about 700 meters from the Penly nuclear plant. She swims in the English Channel every day, despite the proximity to the power station.
