Phasing Out Nuclear Power In Europe
by M.V. Ramana, Daily Times, January 30,
2003
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_30-1-2003_pg3_2
Two weeks ago, Belgium became
one more European country to decide to phase out nuclear energy. The
bill, presented by Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt's cabinet and passed
by both houses of Parliament, orders
the shutting down of Belgium's seven reactors after 40 years of use
and bans the construction of new ones. The first reactors will be dismantled
by February 2015, the last by 2025.
Belgium's phase out decision is an extremely significant one and points
to the dismal future of nuclear energy in Europe. Nuclear energy currently
supplies about 60 per cent of Belgian electricity generation, the second
highest in the world. But as elsewhere nuclear power has been uneconomical
and electricity in Belgium is among the most expensive in Europe.
Economics, however, was not the primary reason for the phase out decision.
The Belgian government's bill focused on eliminating the risk of a disastrous
accident at nuclear reactors and reducing the dangers of
radioactive waste. Environmental sustainability considerations also
played a part and, as part of the phase out, the government promised
to invest in solar, wind, and other renewable energy resources.
Belgium is just the latest of five EU states planning to phase out nuclear
energy. The others are Germany, Spain, Sweden and the Netherlands. Seven
other countries — Austria, Denmark, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg
and Portugal — have either abandoned nuclear power or never established
programmes. The only EU countries that officially maintain faith in
nuclear power are France, Britain and Finland.
The most exceptional of these is Finland, the one EU country that has
authorised construction of a nuclear reactor in recent years. The Finnish
decision was largely based on not wanting to be dependent on Russia
for energy imports. Due to its legacy as a country adjacent to and being
somewhat dominated by the Soviet Union, there are strong public feelings
about importing electricity from Russia. Finland's 2001 decision to
build a final repository for high-level nuclear waste probably also
played an important role. By creating the illusion that the problem
has been solved, this decision undermined one of the main objections
to nuclear power.
Though the Finnish government decided to build a new nuclear reactor,
its plans may not be realised so easily. The decision prompted financial
firm Standard & Poor to revise its credit rating of the electric
utility
Teollisuuden Voima Oy (TVO), which intends to build the reactor, from
"stable" to "negative". TVO plans to raise most
of the construction cost from international money markets and a poor
credit rating is bound to
have a negative effect.
Poor economics has also plagued the English nuclear industry. British
Energy, which controls 9,600 MW of nuclear generating capacity and 2,000MW
of coal-fired energy, announced last month that it had lost £337
millions in the past six months. It continues to lose £2 million a day
due to lower wholesale electricity prices. Last September the company
was forced to seek a £650 million bailout from the UK government, but
the legality of this subsidy has been challenged on the grounds that
it violates European Union criteria. Despite such government support,
there are no plans for new nuclear reactor construction. The reference
forecast scenario of the US Department of Energy's International Energy
Outlook 2002 predicts that this will be the case till at least 2020.
With most EU countries abandoning nuclear energy, the French are getting
more isolated. France still has the highest percentage of nuclear generated
electricity in the world (about 80 per cent) and the French nuclear
lobby is extremely strong. But, as the Annie Makhijani of the Institute
for Energy and Environmental Research points out, since the French government
started investigating possible sites for storing nuclear waste, the
public has become concerned about the management of nuclear waste. This
in turn has led to a debate about the future of French nuclear power.
One consequence of this debate has been a reassessment of reprocessing
of spent nuclear fuel to extract plutonium. In July 2000, the Charpin
report commissioned by French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin found that
reprocessing and the use of so-called MOX fuel that contains plutonium
are uneconomical and will remain so for the foreseeable future.
(An English summary is available at: http://www.ieer.org/sdafiles/vol_9/9-2/charpin.html)
The report also concluded that reprocessing does little to reduce the
burden of long-lived nuclear waste. Being official, it used only data
furnished by the nuclear industry. The true costs would be even higher
since the
French government has a long history of massively subsidising the nuclear
industry.
The French nuclear programme has also suffered other setbacks. Since
1991 no new reactors have been ordered. All of the latest N-4 series
of reactors have been plagued with problems. Preparatory work at Le
Carnet for a prototype of the European Pressurized Water reactor was
stopped in 1997. (Details can be found at the World Information Service
on Energy website at www.antenna.nl/wise) French plans for fast breeder
reactors have come crashing down with the dismal performance and early
closing of the Superphenix reactor.
Despite the nuclear industry's strident claims about the necessity for
nuclear power and promises of a nuclear renaissance, nuclear power is
being phased out in Europe. Three concerns have largely fuelled opposition:
poor economics, the dangers of nuclear reactor accidents and the public
health risks from nuclear waste that takes tens of thousands of years
to decay to safety. A fourth has been the intimate connection between
nuclear power and nuclear weapons. All of these concerns are not specific
to Europe and should guide the future of nuclear energy everywhere.
Unfortunately, Indian and Pakistani officials do not appear to have
learnt these lessons. In his Hind Swaraj Mahatma Gandhi made a remarkably
prescient observation: "And it is worthy of note that the systems
which the Europeans have discarded are the systems in vogue among us.
Their learned men continually make changes. We ignorantly adhere to
their cast off systems." Even after half a century of independence,
the statement still rings true.