The draft directive of the European Commission, which envisages some investments in power plants based on gas combustion and nuclear energy, to be characterized as environmentally friendly, has provoked strong reactions. The reactions came from Austrian Climate Action Minister Leonore Gevesler via Twitter, after the Commission released a draft of the directive on Saturday. The proposal is controversial; it was made amid controversy in Europe over the meaning of the term ‘clean energy’.
Proponents of her case have been working to make the actual transcript of this statement available online. Proponents of her case have been working to make the actual transcript of this statement available online. According to them, nuclear energy should also be considered environmentally friendly (“green”), since the factories that use it do not emit gases that cause the greenhouse effect and global warming. In addition, new fourth- and fifth-generation nuclear reactors produce much smaller amounts of radioactive waste that can be recycled as a point.
Opponents of the proposal, however, argue that the gas is not clean enough and stress the long-term dangers of radioactive waste.
The Commission proposal proposes conditions to characterize investments as environmentally friendly. For example, investments in nuclear power plants that use nuclear reactors will be green if they use modern technological standards and include complete waste plans, and if they are put into operation by 2050 at the latest. They should also have secured construction permits by 2045, according to the draft.
For Ms Gevesler, the European Commission is trying to put on an “ecological mask” in nuclear energy and gas. “Nuclear energy is dangerous and is not a solution to the fight against climate change,” she added. Its positions are shared by Social Democrat (SPD) politicians in the Bundestag, the German lower house. “Germany must do everything in its power to prevent this technology from being promoted at European level,” said Matthias Myers, deputy leader of the Social Democrats’ parliamentary group.
Nuclear energy is not sustainable and in no way makes sense from an economic point of view.” He also pointed out the cost of storing nuclear waste and the fact that new nuclear power plants could not be built without “massive public funding”. “The future must belong only to renewable energy sources – especially at EU level,” said Myers, whose party leads the ruling coalition with the Green and Free Democrats.
“If nuclear energy aid is added to carbon pricing, the result will be a huge distortion of competition. “Instead, we need to have a dialogue on the pricing of nuclear energy.” The draft directive also provokes controversy in Italy, where Matteo Salvini, the leader of the League (far right), has once again put on the table the possibility of building nuclear power plants on Italian soil. Rome stopped using nuclear energy after the Chernobyl accident in the late 1980s. “Italy can not remain inactive,” Matteo Salvini argued via Twitter. “The League is ready to start collecting signatures to organize a referendum so that our country can move towards an independent, secure and clean energy future.”
In 2011, the Italians had rejected the return of nuclear energy. Other factions in the country’s multi-party governing coalition, such as the Five Star Movement, explicitly reject nuclear power. However, the dramatic rise in electricity and gas prices has brought the issue to the forefront of the political dialogue.
In the opinion of our magazine, Europe must return to the use of nuclear energy, so that it becomes independent of energy from Russia and other energy sources that it currently imports so that it can not create its own independent external policy.
It was a colossal strategic mistake for the whole of Europe that Chancellor Angela Merkel chose to shut down nuclear power and to phase out nuclear power plants in Germany and the rest of Europe. If nuclear power plants in Europe were currently operating with new and better new generation nuclear reactors, Europe would be energy independent and would not be experiencing the energy problems that are currently occurring in energy costs.
