Nuclear and carbon capture are not like renewables solutions. Civil society organisations oppose opening the doors of EU funds to unrealistic decarbonisation solutions.
By giving in to calls of nuclear and carbon capture lobbies for equal treatment with renewables, EU leaders risk syphoning away key climate funds and delaying fossil fuels phase-out.
What is happening?
In the name of climate action, EU institutions are granting more and more financial and administrative support to technologies whose significant contribution to displacing fossil fuels is highly contested.
The latest episode occurred in the EU Council vote on the general approach to the Net Zero Industry Act (NZIA). EU industry ministers have followed the European Parliament in calling for including nuclear power and expanding the scope of Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) in the NZIA list of strategic net-zero technologies.
The original list tabled by the EU Commission doesn’t include nuclear power along renewables, grids, batteries, heat pumps, electrolysers, etc. Industries manufacturing these technologies will benefit from a simpler regulatory framework and easier funding.
With the positions of the three EU institutions now settled, the NZIA will be ultimately defined in inter-institutional negotiations (trilogues), where the Commission stands as the sole legislator opposing the inclusion of nuclear in the list of strategic technologies to be supported.
What is wrong?
According to the latest IPCC report, nuclear power and CCS are the two least effective mitigation options in the fight against climate change.
To meet its 2030 climate targets, the EU must focus on affordable and easily deployable technologies to quickly reduce emissions: renewables, heat pumps, electricity grids, electrolysers and storage.
Precisely, the NZIA was drafted as a tool to rapidly address our limited domestic manufacturing capacity for crucial technologies needed to achieve our 2030 climate targets, as well as our strategic autonomy from imported fossil fuels.
Given the short timeframe and magnitude of the transformation, the NZIA should maintain a limited focus on readily available solutions with higher decarbonization potential to displace fossil fuels in the short term while boosting EU strategic autonomy.
Nuclear power and CCS’s high costs and low cost-effectiveness compared to renewables make them unfit options for achieving 2030 climate purposes. Moreover, granting both of them easier access to EU funding and faster permitting could divert crucial efforts and resources from readily available climate solutions, thereby delaying the phase-out of fossil fuels.
The facts: Nuclear power
Nuclear power cannot be considered a strategic technology for the EU to reach its climate targets for several reasons:
– Prolonged delays: Nuclear power plants currently in construction in Europe have been delayed by over ten years. Europe cannot risk such delays on its path to reduce fossil fuel emissions.
– Cost overruns: Nuclear power plants have faced huge cost overruns. The French nuclear industry has been nationalised. The nuclear industry is seeking to pass costs on to taxpayers and households via state and EU subsidies.
– Geostrategic interests: Nuclear energy is being pushed by powerful lobbies and geostrategic interests and is going against the “strategic autonomy” narrative pushed by EU institutions. The nuclear energy of several EU states depends on the state-owned Russian nuclear firm Rosatom. Uranium is currently imported from outside the EU from several unstable countries.
– Transition model: To quickly decarbonise, Europe must promote easy-to-deploy technologies, like solar panels and windmills. Nuclear power contradicts the vision of a decentralised energy system with citizen engagement.
– Environmental impacts: Nuclear energy is highly polluting: from uranium mining to the intense use of water during operation, or the long-lasting radioactive waste left to future generations for thousands of years.
The facts: Carbon Capture & Storage (CCS)
Technologies designed to capture, transport, and inject greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions back into the ground may be strategic if laser-focused on unavoidable emissions in targeted sectors. However, there are several concerns to consider:
– Highly expensive: The high cost of CCS implementation has not gone down at all in 40 years, in contrast to renewable technologies like solar, wind, and batteries, whose costs have plummeted over the years. Governments putting CCS at the centre of their national decarbonisation plans risk being at a competitive disadvantage, according to an Oxford University study.
– Unproven viability: CCS has not been proven – anywhere in the world – at the scale required to tackle the climate crisis.
– Delaying tactics: If not targeted to uses where GHG emissions are inevitable, CCS can be used to keep fossil fuel projects alive. CCS should never replace emissions cuts through, for instance, ecodesign, electrification, renewables or energy and material efficiency measures
1. Why investing in new nuclear is bad for the climate (LINK)
2. Heavy dependence on Carbon Capture and Storage ‘highly economically damaging’ (LINK)
3. What Europe needs in its race for the industry of tomorrow (LINK)
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