Why Germany Hates Nuclear Power

This is Germany in the 80s. Before the Berlin Wall fell. It remains fractured in two between two world super

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s, and this is the map of the

nuclear

power

plants that powered the country. The 1980s were an eventful period for this recovering nation. Chernobyl, located here, just north of kyiv, exploded. Bathing Europe in radioactive material. The seriousness of the incident may be difficult to understand in retrospect. Iodine tablets were distributed throughout Europe. An emergency preventive medication to ensure that the thyroid gland is saturated with non-radioactive iodine, preventing it from absorbing radioactive iodine present in fallout. Where it could rot and cause cancer.

The consequences of Chernobyl spread throughout Europe with westerly winds. And the news spread even faster. The people of Europe were afraid. “The local population received 7.4 milligrams of radiation per hour. Radioactive cesium is recycled in moss. Because I've been thinking all day about this radiation and nothing else. The Chernobyl disaster could bring a bitter harvest for farmers in the far northeast of Poland. If the worst has already passed, the first cases of leukemia should appear now.” Chernobyl obtained the highest classification on the International Nuclear Event Scale. At 7, a serious accident with a large release of radioactive materials.

Or, in less technical terms, Europe was covered in cancerous dust. This event, understandably, made a huge dent in support for

nuclear

energy around the world. But this was not the genesis of the antinuclear movement in Germany. In 1975, 30,000 protesters occupied the construction site of a new nuclear power plant in southwestern Germany, on the border with France. In 1979, seven years before Chernobyl, 200,000 protesters took to the streets of Germany following the 3 Mile Island nuclear disaster in the United States. The anti-nuclear movement in Germany was a grassroots movement, led by the people and driven by fear of the very real danger posed by nuclear energy.

There was enormous political pressure to begin phasing out these plants, and these protests led directly to the creation of Germany's Green Party in 1980. The 1986 Chernobyl accident simply strengthened support for the Greens' political ideology. Phase out nuclear energy completely. In 1998, the Green Party came to power for the first time and the true end of nuclear energy in Germany was practically assured. It was decided that no new nuclear power generators would be built in the country from then on, and in 2002 a law was passed prohibiting new nuclear power. Shortly after, two nuclear power plants in Germany were prematurely taken offline.

Angela Merkel and her opposition party, the CDU, called these deactivations “destruction of national property.” However, after the Fukushima disaster, even Merkel's opposition to the anti-nuclear movement began to falter. Fukushima is the only other incident in the history of nuclear energy to be ranked on par with Chernobyl, receiving the highest possible rating due to its impact on the environment and people of Japan. The power of the Green Party in Germany was now at its highest point, gaining control in influential and powerful southern German states for the first time. The anti-nuclear movement was too big a political football, or perhaps a nuclear football, to ignore, and Merkel's CDU party joined the anti-nuclear movement.

Nuclear power had lost this war and the last nuclear power plants in Germany began to shut down. On April 15, 2023, the last nuclear power plant was closed. Enduring the energy crisis caused by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, it finally met its planned end. Images of the protesters, celebrating the end of their 50-year war against nuclear energy, were met with anger and disgust by pro-nuclear activists online. Reflecting outrage over Merkal's “destruction of national property” in the early 2000s. How can you celebrate something that so clearly harms Germany's clean energy goals? The closure of its nuclear facilities has made Germany much more dependent on fossil fuels than its neighbor France.

This is a typical day in France. The base load is provided by nuclear energy. It provides between 65% and 75% of the country's energy depending on the time of day. Wind, solar and hydropower also play their part, with a small number of flexible gas-powered plants available to grow quickly when needed. Releasing only between 30 and 40 grams of carbon dioxide per kilowatt hour generated. France is in a group of few. An industrial giant. Energy independent. Do not depend on foreign imports of fossil fuels. And not only does it power its own country with low-carbon energy, it also supports its own economy by exporting massive amounts of this energy to its neighbors via high-voltage interconnections.

A rare example of a country with few fossil fuel resources of its own becoming an energy exporter. Germany couldn't be more different. Germany emits 440 grams of carbon dioxide per kilowatt hour generated. Due to the fact that 20-25% of Germany's energy comes from coal, which is an environmental disaster. Another 10-15% comes from gas. The rest of the energy comes from wind, solar and biomass energy. While Germany receives a large percentage of its energy from renewable sources, without adequate energy storage or nuclear baseload, the country has become extremely dependent on fossil fuels. This dependence became even more evident when natural gas imports from Russia were cut off, causing electricity prices to skyrocket across Europe.

This feels like a blatant own goal. A 10-fold increase in carbon emissions. The Germans are also unaware of the damage that coal is causing to their environment. There have also been protests against coal mine expansions and Germany's Green Party has been criticized for its vote of approval for the expansion of an open pit mine. If ever there was an icon of industry-driven climate change, it has to be the colossal bucket excavators roaming this mine. The German government has expressed its desire to phase out coal-fired power soon, but its only realistic option to do so currently is to import even more natural gas.

One thing needs to be recognized in this debate. Ultimately, both sides of this argument want the same end goal. Clean, safe and sustainable energy. We are on the same team. The disagreement is over what is considered clean and safe. This exact argument reached the European Parliament in 2022, where France fought for EU legislation to label nuclear energy and natural gas as green. That second part will seem strange, but natural gas plays a vital role in the expansion of renewable energy in the absence of adequate energy storage. That topic needs a complete video to explain it. This legislation divided the European Union, with 328 votes in favor and 278 against.

The success of the legislation infuriated many, with politicians calling it “a hateful attempt at greenwashing with Macron (the French president) as its director.” Clearly, this is a divisive issue, and GreenPeace is currently trying to sue the EU over it, but this legislation paves the way for more countries to emulate what France has done and invest more money in nuclear energy while also complying. the sustainable energy targets required by the EU. . France, on the surface, feels like the gold standard of climate policy. But let's take a deeper look at how this came to be and the challenges France faces in maintaining this energy policy.

For that we need to go back 50 years. It is 1973. Egyptian and Syrian forces launched a surprise attack on Israel on the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur in an attempt to reclaim land in the Sinai Peninsula, seized from Egypt in 1967 during the Six-Day War. Israel's Western allies rushed to support its counteroffensives, and in retaliation, the Arab Oil Exporters Union embargoed exports to these countries, causing oil prices to soar around the world. Although France was not the target of these embargoes, it was a wake-up call for the powerful country. With few energy resources of its own, its economy was extremely vulnerable to outside manipulation.

Nuclear power was the answer, and beginning in 1974, nuclear power capacity grew rapidly. Scene of nuclear power plants coming into operation and increasing their capacity. Over these 23 years, France increased its nuclear capacity at an impressive rate, building 56 reactors in 19 different locations. However, new construction stopped abruptly after Chernobyl, and only two new reactors began construction after this disaster. Civaux 1 and 2, with a duration of 8 and 9 years. They came into operation in 1997 and 1999. They are the youngest nuclear power plants in France. 24 and 26 years old. The oldest nuclear power plant currently is the Bugey 2 reactor. Launched online in 1978, it is now 45 years old.

Its older brother, Bugey 1, began service in 1972 and was decommissioned in 1994. It was an obsolete design, tempered with graphite and cooled with carbon dioxide. It was necessary to deregister for security reasons. Nuclear power plants typically have a useful life of between 20 and 40 years, which poses a problem for the French national grid and for the European grid in general. I listed all the nuclear reactors in France in this Excel sheet and, honestly, I was surprised when I hit the average function. The average age of nuclear reactors in France is now 39 years, and these aging reactors are starting to cause major headaches.

In 2022, amid an energy crisis sparked by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the country's nuclear watchdog ordered France's energy supplier, EDF, to inspect all plants after a 23-millimeter crack was found. depth in a 27 mm thick cooling system. pipe that circulates low-level radioactive cooling water to the reactor. The cracks formed as a result of thermal fatigue in a weld seam, where heating and cooling cycles caused the pipe to expand and contract. This crack could have broken the pipe at any time, and its presence raised alarms about the state of nuclear energy in the country, with subsequent cracks being found in other reactors.

In the wake of these discoveries, the country's nuclear energy production fell to its lowest level in 34 years, while these plants were taken offline for inspection and repair. This problem was the result of decades of underinvestment and mismanagement of nuclear energy in France and, to make matters worse, the technical skills needed to solve the problem have disappeared in France as a result of the 30-year gap in investments in nuclear energy. and construction. France is now rushing to invest and support welding schools to recover this important skill. And they desperately need it. Now, just as the Yom Kippur War woke France up to its energy situation, the war in Ukraine and these power outages are spurring the political movement.

France has begun a frenetic cycle of reinvestment in nuclear energy. Just days after narrowly escaping being toppled from government by a failed no-confidence vote, a new nuclear energy investment plan has won a landslide victory. The plan, which will gain bipartisan support, will allow $56 billion to be invested in the construction of six next-generation EPR2 nuclear reactors. The first generation EPR began construction in northwest France in 2007. More than 16 years ago. When the average age of French nuclear reactors was just 21 years. It has not yet delivered energy and is almost five times over budget, that is, $13.2 billion. Very far from the 3,000 million dollars and the construction period of 8 years initially planned.

The second generation design has been redesigned specifically to address these cost and construction issues. The design challenge of making these nuclear reactors safe, with all the knowledge we have gained from accidents over the years, is immense. This is not an isolated incident. This study states that of 180 nuclear construction projects, 175 exceeded cost estimates. It costs on average 117 percent more than estimated and requires 64 percent more time than projected. The latest delay of this new reactor was again due to simple welding problems. When even your welds require specialized heat treatments, skilled labor, and strict safety controls, they will cause you headaches.

The reality is that nuclear energy continues to become more expensive as new safety standards are implemented with each accident that occurs. While renewable energies continuebeing cheaper. The first of the six next-generation EPR2 reactors will not begin construction until May 2027. Optimistically, its construction will take about 8 years, at which point the average age of nuclear reactors in France will be 49 years. Aging nuclear reactors, to say the least, are not ideal. Raising major reliability issues, as we've already seen, but also a potentially disastrous security hazard. France faces the risk of major instabilities in the power grid due to decades of underinvestment in nuclear energy.

Nuclear power, when done well, is clearly the best solution we have now for reducing carbon dioxide emissions, but the problem is that it is often not done well. So, we have to ask ourselves. Is Germany right? Were they right to close these nuclear reactors? Or perhaps a middle ground was needed between France and Germany. Slowly reduce nuclear power while developing new renewable energy resources with the energy storage needed to create a stable grid. Or perhaps we need to acknowledge the fact that nuclear energy as it stands is not viable in the long term, and we need to invest in future technologies that will make it safer, cleaner and cheaper.

The reactor still under construction in France costs $8 million per megawatt. While wind turbines cost between $1 million and $2 million per megawatt, most importantly, they can be installed gradually without having to commit billions to a single project. In a sense, wind turbines are modular. Smaller, cheaper and easier to replace. A future technology currently being worked on aims to give nuclear energy this same advantage. Small modular nuclear reactors aim to make smaller reactors that generate less power, but to which additional modules can be added over time to increase capacity. Reduce initial capital investment, making it easier to replace aging modules and allowing reactors to be placed in locations not suitable for larger traditional power plants.

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