Is nuclear energy about to make a comeback? Austria stands across – Austria
The majority of EU countries support nuclear energy in the fight against climate change, the EU Commission wants to classify nuclear power as “green”. But Austria is one of the biggest nuclear opponents in the EU.
Nuclear power is making a comeback in Europe. In order to achieve the self-imposed climate targets, the majority of the EU states are now in favor of classifying nuclear power as low-CO2, green energy and thus promoting modern nuclear power plants in Europe. Austria, which has been gilded for years as one of the greatest opponents of nuclear power in Europe, has little tailwind in its struggle. The number of countries that see the future in nuclear power plants is growing much more.
France with 70 percent nuclear power
As the driving force behind the nuclear proponents, France is gilded. The country covers 70 percent of its energy needs with nuclear energy. Clear supporters of nuclear power are also Austria’s eastern neighbors, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Slovenia, as well as Croatia, Bulgaria, Romania and Finland. The states argue with the need for nuclear energy as an affordable, stable and independent energy source that is also CO2 neutral.
14 EU countries are in favor of nuclear energy
A total of 14 of the 27 EU countries are currently using nuclear power. Croatia does not operate its own nuclear power plant, but is co-owner of the Krsko nuclear power plant in Slovenia. Together, a total of around 110 reactors in operation in the EU produce 765,337 gigawatt hours and thus 26 percent of the total electricity produced. There are currently new construction projects for nuclear reactors in Bulgaria, Finland, France, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Hungary.
Poland and Italy are planning to start using nuclear power
The 15th Landwerk in Poland to enter nuclear power by 2025. Germany and Belgium, on the other hand, decided to phase out nuclear power, but plans in Belgium are now dying again. Politicians in the Flemish and French-speaking parts of Belgium are questioning the planned exit date and justifying this with climate protection.
In Italy, too, which phased out nuclear power one year after the Chernobyl reactor disaster in 1987, right-wing parties are calling for a re-entry. However, the Italians only rejected the same request in a referendum in 2011.
Is nuclear energy sustainable?
In addition to Austria, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Denmark and Luxembourg have campaigned against the EU Commission’s plans to classify nuclear energy as sustainable – without success, as the EU Commission’s plans that became known on New Year’s Eve show.
To stop the project, a qualified majority of 27 percent of EU residents would be needed. This is currently not in sight. Even in the EU Parliament, where a simple majority would be enough for a veto, such a veto is not foreseeable. Climate protection minister Leonore Gewessler (Greens) has therefore already threatened to file a lawsuit. It is questionable whether others like Germany would take legal action.
Austria sued the European Court of Justice
Austria was unsuccessful with its action before the European Court of Justice (ECJ) against state aid for the planned British nuclear power plant Hinkley Point C. In 2015, the government demanded before the ECJ that the approval of the EU Commission for this aid must be declared null and void. The court of the European Union in Luxembourg dismissed the action in the first instance in 2018, and in 2020 the judgment was confirmed after an objection by Austria. Austria was only supported by Luxembourg in the process.
Austria also sued the ECJ in the autumn of the expansion of the Hungarian Paks nuclear power plant. A verdict is still pending, but it is likely that the verdict on Paks 2 will be based on that of Hinkley Point.
Austria is storming against nuclear energy
In other respects, too, Austria has been running a storm against the expansion of nuclear energy in neighboring countries to the east for years. The construction of the nuclear power plant in Temelin in the Czech Republic before the EU’s eastward expansion was already putting a strain on relations between Prague and Vienna. There were also protests from Austria against weak safety standards at the power plants near the border in Bohunice and Mochovce in Slovakia, Dukovany in the Czech Republic and Paks in Hungary and Krsko in Slovenia.
After the nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan in 2011, the EU took up the Austrian demand for European “stress tests” for nuclear power plants in the European Union. The report presented in 2012 by the European High-Level Group on Nuclear Safety and Waste Disposal (ENSREG) The report lacks an assessment of the individual nuclear power plants, their shortcomings and problems. In addition, the review schedule was too short, criticized the federal government.
Blockade of nuclear program
Together with Luxembourg, Austria also blocked an agreement on the next billion euro program in November 2019. The reason for the no was that. The program mentions that. Nuclear power is sustainable and that. Austria had already blocked the Euratom research program in 2011, but ultimately gave up resistance after a strengthening of security research was enshrined in the program. The current Environment Minister Gewessler is now trying to reform the EURATOM Treaty with more security, stronger liability rules for nuclear power plant operators and a stop to state subsidies for nuclear energy.
In the government program, the turquoise-green federal government 2020 has committed itself to the fight against the “new construction and expansion of nuclear power plants in Europe, especially in neighboring countries, with all available political and legal means”. The commissioning of the Slovak reactors Mochovce 3 and 4 should therefore be prevented. The strict anti-nuclear course is shared by all parties in Austria. In Europe, on the other hand, the majority are in favor of nuclear power and are looking forward to a renaissance of nuclear power.