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France and other pro nuclear countries push for nuclear to be included as ”sustainable” in EU taxonomy.

Mairead McGuinness urged to reclassify nuclear power as possible ‘green’ solution for EU https://www.independent.ie/news/environment/mairead-mcguinness-urged-to-reclassify-nuclear-power-as-possible-green-solution-for-eu-41028296.html

Irish Commissioner under pressure amid global warming and energy crisis, John Downing .

November 08 2021  Ireland’s EU Commissioner Mairead McGuinness is under pressure to reclassify nuclear power as “green energy”, giving it a central role in the battle against global warming and easing Europe’s energy crisis.

Commissioner McGuinness hopes to decide in the coming weeks on a controversial move which could also give natural gas a transition role in scaling down carbon emissions burning the planet.

Decision time comes amid a major EU energy crisis, with spiralling prices in every member state, and an increasing demand for real action on the pledged 55pc reduction in carbon emissions by 2030 with zero carbon by 2050.

If Ms McGuinness gets the move through the policy-guiding Commission, the issue will then pass to member governments and the European Parliament where battle-lines are already drawn.

On one side, pro-nuclear countries like France will promote the change as a “pragmatic solution” – but others will speak of “greenwashing” and creating more problems to solve immediate issues.

Ms McGuinness told the Irish Independent that member states must ultimately decide their own energy mix whatever the outcome.

There is an important debate ongoing about the role of nuclear energy and natural gas in the transformation of the EU energy sector and their potential inclusion in the EU taxonomy – a classification system for sustainable investments,” Ms McGuinness said yesterday.

“To be part of the EU sustainable investment taxonomy, an energy source must make a significant contribution to the fight against climate change. Nuclear energy is low carbon,” she added.

But she also warned that other aspects of nuclear power were still being studied, looking at “the requirement to do no significant harm” to the environment.

“Right now our work is focusing on scientific reports on this aspect of nuclear power,” Ms McGuinness said.

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen gave a strong hint on the direction of travel when speaking to reporters after a leaders’ summit in Brussels on October 22.

“The energy mix of the future needs more renewable and clean energy. Alongside this, we also need a stable source, nuclear energy, and during the transition, also natural gas.

“That is why – as called for by many leaders – the Commission is going to come forward with a taxonomy proposal in the near future,” said Ms von der Leyen.

A pivotal issue in all of this will be the attitude taken by the new German government which is expected to be in place by December 6, the feast of St Nicholas and an important national day.

Back in June 2011, the now outgoing German chancellor, Angela Merkel, committed to ending all nuclear power in the state by December 2022.

She will be replaced by Social Democrat leader Olaf Scholz, heading a three-party coalition of the Green Party and the Liberal FBD.

The Green Party is, by definition, committed to ending nuclear power generation in Germany but the current energy crisis, aggravated by undue dependence on Russian natural gas, complicates this matter as coalition negotiations continue.

France gets 70pc of its electricity from nuclear power stations.

Ireland is committed to creating a ‘Celtic Interconnector’, taking power from France via an undersea powerline due for completion by 2026.

France and other pro nuclear countries push for nuclear to be included as ”sustainable” in EU taxonomy.

November 9, 2021 Posted by | climate change, EUROPE | 1 Comment

Unfair restrictions on observers at COP26 climate talks

The legitimacy of the Cop26 climate summit has been called into question
by civil society participants who say restrictions on access to
negotiations are unprecedented and unjust.

As the Glasgow summit enters its
second week, observers representing hundreds of environmental, academic,
climate justice, indigenous and women’s rights organisations warn that
excluding them from negotiating areas and speaking to negotiators could
have dire consequences for millions of people.

Observers act as informal watchdogs of the summit – the eyes and ears of the public during
negotiations to ensure proceedings are transparent and reflect the concerns
of communities and groups most likely to be affected by decisions. But
their ability to observe, interact and intervene in negotiations on carbon
markets, loss and damage and climate financing has been obstructed during
the first week, the Guardian has been told.

 Guardian 8th Nov 2021

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/08/cop26-legitimacy-questioned-as-groups-excluded-from-crucial-talks

November 9, 2021 Posted by | civil liberties, climate change | Leave a comment

The biggest delegation of all at COP26 is that of fossil fuel lobbyists

There are more delegates at COP26 associated with the fossil fuel industry
than from any single country, analysis shared with the BBC shows.


Campaigners led by Global Witness assessed the participant list published
by the UN at the start of this meeting. They found that 503 people with
links to fossil fuel interests had been accredited for the climate summit.


These delegates are said to lobby for oil and gas industries, and
campaigners say they should be banned. “The fossil fuel industry has spent
decades denying and delaying real action on the climate crisis, which is
why this is such a huge problem,” says Murray Worthy from Global Witness.
“Their influence is one of the biggest reasons why 25 years of UN climate
talks have not led to real cuts in global emissions.”

 BBC 8th Nov 2021

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-59199484

 Drill or Drop 8th Nov 2021

COP26: Fossil fuel industry has biggest delegation at climate talks – study

November 9, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change | Leave a comment

At People’s Summit for Climate Justice, campaigners accuse COP26 of failing the climate

COP26: Campaigners accuse UN talks of failing climate as they hold counter
summit for most marginalised. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
(UNFCCC) was found guilty of “violating its charter” because it had
“forged an intimate partnership with the corporations”.

At the start of the People’s Summit for Climate Justice, the UNFCCC was also found guilty
of failing to: address global social and economic injustices. recognise,
promote and protect the rights of nature; The Sudanese diplomat, Lumumba Di
Aping, said: “The UNFCCC has allowed itself to be converted at best into
a catering company for the G7, at worst into a carbon noose for the global
south.” Global Justice Now, one of the summit’s organisers, said:
“There’s one technology that the UNFCCC has an unwavering faith in –
it is the market. It promotes the ponzi scheme of capitalism. The UNFCCC no
longer represents us, we need to represent ourselves.”

 Drill or Drop 7th Nov 2021

 https://drillordrop.com/2021/11/07/cop26-campaigners-accuse-un-talks-of-failing-climate-as-they-hold-counter-summit-for-most-marginalised/

November 9, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change | Leave a comment

The People’s Summit forClimate Justice plans ambitious pressure on governments for real action

 A counter climate summit kicks off in Glasgow on Sunday amid mounting
criticism from activists about greenwashed solutions and stalled action
from corporations and rich nations inside Cop26.

The People’s Summit for Climate Justice will bring together movements and communities from across
the world to amplify voices, ideas and solutions it believes are largely
absent from Cop – including the global green new deal, polluters’
liability, indigenous ecological knowledge and the gulf between net zero
and real zero emissions.

Organisers hope that sharing expertise onequitable and transformative non-market solutions to the climate emergencywill help create a powerful grassroots collective to force governments to
be more ambitious and less beholden to big business.

 Guardian 7th Nov 2021

 https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/07/counter-climate-summit-kicks-off-as-activists-lament-cop26-inaction

November 9, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change | Leave a comment

COP26 – Why Nuclear is NOT a Solution.

Don’t Nuke the Climate press conference in Glasgow: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjSMd1pmsqQ
Sasha Gabizon, Executive Director – Women Engage for a Common Future hosts this COP26 panel on why nuclear energy is NOT a climate solution.


The panel members:
— Makoma Lekalakala, Earthlife Africa https://earthlife.org.za/ SEGMENT: https://youtu.be/LjSMd1pmsqQ?t=281
— Ayumi Fukakusa, Friends of the Earth Japan https://www.foejapan.org/en/ SEGMENT: https://youtu.be/LjSMd1pmsqQ?t=868
— Angelika Claussen, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) https://www.ippnw.org SEGMENT: https://youtu.be/LjSMd1pmsqQ?t=1168

— Günter Hermeyer, Don’t Nuke the Climate https://dont-nuke-the-climate.org/ SEGMENT: https://youtu.be/LjSMd1pmsqQ?t=111
— Gavan McFadzean, Australian Conservation Foundation https://www.acf.org.au/ SEGMENT: https://youtu.be/LjSMd1pmsqQ?t=1538
——————————————————
Don’t Nuke the Climate statement now signed by 461 organisations around the world (including 50+ in Australia):
https://dont-nuke-the-climate.org/cop-26-statement

November 9, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change | 2 Comments

Progress report on Glasgow climate talks

The Guardian view on climate progress: now for the detail, Editorial  https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/nov/05/the-guardian-view-on-climate-progress-now-for-the-detail

Pledges made during Cop26’s first week were encouraging. But without adequate finance and monitoring they don’t mean much

f week one of the climate conference in Glasgow set out a strong outline, the task for next week is to fill in as many details as possible. The long-term ambition of the global environmental policy now being negotiated would have been hard to imagine just a few years ago. While it is not yet clear exactly where the various pledges will get us to in terms of limiting temperature rises, the new agreement on methane spearheaded by President Joe Biden and a commitment by India to get half of its energy from renewable sources by 2030 are highly significant.

Also encouraging is the more integrated approach to the many environmental challenges humanity faces. Previously, conservation and biodiversity were to some extent viewed as separate issues from the changing atmospheric chemistry that drives global heating. Now, with a promise to reverse deforestation and provide funding directly to indigenous people to help them protect their lands, there is greater recognition of the vital part that nature plays in regulating the climate.

The pledges made so far are far from sufficient, and must be viewed as part of a continuing process. The decisions by China’s Xi Jinping and Russia’s Vladimir Putin to stay away inevitably undermine confidence in the overall project. Their refusal, along with India, to join the methane agreement is worrying. The possibility of a return to office by Donald Trump, or the election of a Republican in a similar mould, must be regarded as a serious threat. But there is a sense of momentum in Glasgow, and many climate scientists are relieved that the goal (a net zero planet) is increasingly accepted, even as arguments about how to get there continue to rage.

Investment in new technologies such as “clean” aviation fuel should be encouraged, as subsidies for fossil fuels are cut off. The pace of development in the wind and solar industries has been astonishing. There are some grounds for optimism about the role that the private sector can play in the transition ahead. But nonexistent technology, and the hopes invested in it, played an oversized role in the UK government’s recently launched net zero strategy. One of the challenges of the coming days is to ensure that the plans put forward by governments, known as nationally determined contributions, are not built on wishful thinking. Years of delays mean that the timetable is incredibly tight. Leaders cannot afford to be passive.

Once commitments have been made, mechanisms must be developed to measure and report on progress. This is an enormous task that will not be completed at the first attempt. With regard to the $100bn (£70bn) of climate finance that is supposed to be provided annually by rich countries to poorer ones, for example, more transparency is needed. Poor countries cannot be expected to choose green energy over fossil fuels unless they are supported. Calls from India and African countries for massively increased sums (Narendra Modi has suggested $1tn annually) make the establishment of a trusted carbon accounting system all the more urgent.

After a dip during the pandemic, global emissions have jumped alarmingly. Unless they start to fall dramatically over the next two years, Cop26 will have been a failure. Overshadowing all the technical details is the overwhelming injustice of a situation in which the countries that have contributed least to global heating are already suffering most from its effects. This is a moral point, but also a practical and political one. Eliminating carbon emissions is a collective endeavour in which our civilisation must succeed if it is to continue to thrive. Questions of environmental justice, engaging the past as well as the future, must be confronted head-on in the days ahead.

November 8, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change | Leave a comment

Nuclear power, fossil fuel companies represented at COP26 climate talks

Revealed: 1,000 fossil fuel and big business reps at COP26, The Ferret, Rob Edwards November 6, 2021,

As many as 141 people registered for COP26 from the nuclear power industry across the globe, including the UK’s Nuclear Industry Association and the World Nuclear Association.

More than 20 were part of the Young Generation Network of nuclear professionals.

Nearly 1,000 representatives from the fossil fuel industry, big business and nuclear power companies have registered to attend the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, according to an analysis by The Ferret.

They include executives from Shell, BP, Equinor, Chevron, Total, Gazprom and other major oil and gas companies, as well as multinational corporations such as McDonald’s, Bayer, Walmart, HSBC, PepsiCo, Nestlé and Microsoft.

There are also delegations from the coal industry, tobacco companies and pesticide manufacturers. Eleven people from two climate sceptic think-tanks have registered for the summit.

Campaigners are outraged that the oil and nuclear industries were being allowed to influence COP26, and called for polluters to be kept away from the summit. They warned of the “corporate capture of climate policies”….. They include executives from Shell, BP, Equinor, Chevron, Total, Gazprom and other major
oil and gas companies, as well as multinational corporations such as McDonald’s, Bayer, Walmart, HSBC, PepsiCo, Nestlé and Microsoft. There are also delegations from the coal industry, tobacco companies and pesticide manufacturers. Eleven people from two climate sceptic think-tanks have registered for the summit. [details of these participants is given]…………………..

 As many as 141 people registered for COP26 from the nuclear power industry across the globe, including the UK’s Nuclear Industry Association and the World Nuclear Association. More than 20 were part of the Young Generation Network of nuclear professionals.

The nuclear industry promotes itself as a low-carbon solution to the climate crisis. But some environmentalists argue that it’s too expensive, unreliable and dangerous, compared to renewable energy……..

This list is described as “provisional”, with a final version due to be issued after COP26 has closed. It does not include so-called “overflow” delegates which under UN rules can been added by countries without their names appearing on the official list of participants.


Friends of the Earth Scotland called for polluters to be kept out of COP26. “Many different groups in society need to talk and work together to tackle the climate crisis,” said the environmental group’s director, Dr Richard Dixon.

“But the last people you want at the COP are the big oil firms who continue to profit from fuelling climate change and the nuclear, carbon capture and carbon market enthusiasts who are peddling solutions that are no solution at all.”

The campaign group, Glasgow Calls Out Polluters, decried “political failure” at COP26. “These big polluters’ climate plans are a death sentence for many, but they are nevertheless appeased by the authorities at the COP,” said the group’s Scott Tully from Glasgow.

“The presence and access of these big polluters is in stark contrast with the exclusion of civil society, which draws into disrepute the legitimacy of these talks.”

The anti-poverty charity, Oxfam Scotland, said it was “worrying” that those who have fuelled the climate crisis were given so much access. “Civil society groups, in particular from poorer countries in the south, have found it so hard to attend or even to observe the talks,” said the group’s head, Jamie Livingstone.

“Unless COP26 prioritises the voices of those facing the consequences of climate inaction, it will be impossible for the talks to deliver climate justice.”

Dr Will Dinan, an expert on lobbying from the University of Stirling, accused fossil fuel companies of lobbying to delay action to cut climate pollution. “Climate campaigners have long been concerned about corporate influence on UN environmental decision-making in general, and the corporate capture of climate policies in particular,” he said………….. https://theferret.scot/1000-fossil-fuel-big-business-cop26/

November 8, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change, politics international, spinbuster | Leave a comment

Positive announcements at COP26 do give some hope

Lang Banks, director of WWF Scotland, compared the start of COP26 to the
weather in Glasgow. He said: “During the opening days, it was overcast
and dreich with too few commitments from countries and too little money on
the table to address the climate crisis. “But as the week progressed, and
the weather improved, so did the ­signals coming out of COP. “There were
positive announcements from India to ramp up the use of renewables by 2030,
agreements by nations to cut methane emissions by 30% by the same date and
moves by some to phase out use of coal. “Coming in to COP, the UN
­estimated the emissions reductions pledges on the table were leading us
to 2.7 degrees of warming.

 The National 7th Nov 2021

https://www.thenational.scot/news/19699994.cop26-activists-encouraged-delegates-begin-reach-genuine-agreement/

November 8, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change | Leave a comment

Nation after nation at Glasgow pledges to abandon use of coal

 The floodgates have broken. In shock after shock, diehard coal nations across the developing world have been lining up in Glasgow to forswear use of the dirtiest of fossil fuels. Four of the biggest coal emitters in East Asia have signed the pledge, promising to abandon new projects and shut down existing plants far earlier than almost anybody expected. “It’s a
massive deal.

The whole region is turning around and this really puts the screws on China to do more,” said Dave Jones from the anti-coal group Ember. “The really big surprises for all of us are Indonesia, Vietnam and the Philippines. These were countries that were planning an aggressive expansion of coal and now they are on the list. So is South Korea, which is the fifth biggest coal user in the world. We never thought we’d see this in Glasgow,” he said. Malaysia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Egypt, Morocco, Ukraine, Poland, Chile, Zambia, and Cote d’Ivoire, among others, have signed the global ‘coal to clean power’ statement, vowing never again to issue new coal permits.

 Telegraph 5th Nov 2021

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2021/11/05/coal-power-consigned-history-glasgow/

November 8, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change | Leave a comment

Cop26 week one: the impression of progress – but not nearly enough

Cop26 week one: the impression of progress – but not nearly enough.
Analysis: the ‘significant outcomes’ came thick and fast but there are
question marks about credibility

 Guardian 6th Nov 2021

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/06/cop26-week-one-the-impression-of-progress-but-not-nearly-enough

November 8, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change | Leave a comment

Despite all the criticism, the COP climate process has made historic steps forward

The tidal wave of broadly positive announcements at the COP26 Climate
Summit this week has been met by a storm surge of molten hot media takes,
far too many of which have singularly failed to engage with the historic
significance of what might be happening in Glasgow.

For every potentially transformational net zero pledge, there have been naïve assessments of
whether or not any given announcement represents a ‘win’ for the UK hosts.
For each multi-billion dollar coal phase out plan, there have been
accusations of hypocritical virtue signalling, as if governments and
financiers seek to overhaul entire economies on a whim.

For all the evidence the Paris Agreement has catalysed an era-defining array of clean
tech innovations and a remarkable shift in public opinion, there have been
baseless arguments that the entire COP process is an exercise in futility.


We do not yet know how the denouement to the Glasgow Summit will play out.
But if the media allows the response to COP26 next week to be stripped of
context, shorn of nuance, and shaped by climate sceptic talking points,
then the efforts of thousands of people to deliver an historic step forward
in the global mission to avert climate disaster will have been done a grave
disservice.

 Business Green 5th Nov 2021

https://www.businessgreen.com/blog-post/4039877/cop26-taking-takes

November 8, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change | Leave a comment

Prospects of limiting global heating to 1.8C on the basis of commitmentsmade at the Cop26 climate summit are, though good, only “a hypothesis”

Prospects of limiting global heating to 1.8C on the basis of commitments
made at the Cop26 climate summit are only “a hypothesis”, the godfather
of the Paris climate agreement has warned.

Laurent Fabius, the former
French prime minister who was president of the 2015 Paris summit, said he
was “very impressed” by the commitments made in the first week of the
Cop26 conference, including a deal to reduce the potent greenhouse gas
methane, a net zero target from India, plans from China to reduce emissions
and commitments on coal.

If those plans are fulfilled, according to the
International Energy Agency, global temperature increases could be limited
to 1.8C, which is below the Paris agreement’s upper goal of limiting
rises to 2C but well below its tougher aspiration of capping heating at
1.5C above pre-industrial levels.

 Guardian 5th Nov 2021

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/05/president-of-paris-summit-says-18c-commitment-is-only-hypothetical

November 8, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change | Leave a comment

The EU Taxonomy is designed to identify which activities are green: it’s about science, not promoting business

 the EU Sustainable Taxonomy’s design is aimed at defining which economic activities are green – not which economic sectors are needed for the transition to a net-zero by 2050 economy

Decision-makers cannot let economic questions on energy security and cost thwart the scientific integrity of the EU Sustainable Taxonomy and still have an opportunity to save the credibility of the EU’s sustainable finance policy framework. It is now up to them to take responsibility

How to save the scientific integrity of the EU’s green finance taxonomy,  By Elise Attal and Jan Vandermosten, 29 Oct 21  Decision-makers cannot let economic questions on energy security and cost thwart the scientific integrity of the EU Sustainable Taxonomy, write Elise Attal and Jan Vandermosten.

Elise Attal is Head of EU Policy at the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI), a United Nations-supported international network of investors. Jan Vandermosten is a Senior Policy Analyst at PRI

It is crunch time for the EU Sustainable Taxonomy; a classification framework developed to help investors direct capital towards sustainable economic activities.

Member states and industry are heavily lobbying to include gas-fired electricity and nuclear energy within the definition of sustainable activities for climate mitigation.

While these sectors may be needed in the short-term to secure energy supply, their inclusion would fundamentally undermine the scientific integrity of the EU Sustainable Taxonomy – the bedrock on which the entire credibility of the EU sustainable finance framework relies.

Policymakers and industry should consider the risks of tarnishing investor confidence in this carefully designed and sophisticated framework aimed at providing long-term certainty.

The EU Sustainable Taxonomy regulation delineates an economic activity as sustainable if it “substantially contributes” to one out of six environmental objectives while at the same time “doing no significant harm” to any of the other five objectives. Screening criteria, based on best performance thresholds and life-cycle analysis, for instance, are under development for each environmental objective by an independent expert group, the Sustainable Finance Platform.

The Platform’s assessment relies on conclusive scientific evidence and – in the case of the climate change objective under the EU Taxonomy – whether the economic activities contribute to the long-term temperature goal of the Paris Agreement. First screening criteria for climate change mitigation and adaptation were adopted by the European Commission in April. Still, a decision on gas-fired power and nuclear was postponed at that time.

The inclusion of gas-fired electricity would seriously compromise the EU Sustainable Taxonomy’s ability to act as an independently and scientifically designed tool for guiding investment into environmentally sustainable activities in line with the EU’s goal of reducing emissions by 55% by 2030.

Research on net-zero by 2050 pathways for the energy sector, including the recent IEA World Energy Outlook, stresses that there is no remaining carbon budget for new gas investments and that existing gas-fired power plants will have to be phased out by 2035 in the OECD and 2040 globally.

The current EU Sustainable Taxonomy screening criteria for climate mitigation state that power generation from different technology sources can only make a substantial contribution to climate change mitigation within an emissions threshold of 100g CO2e/ kWh. Most existing gas production today would even fall above the ‘significant harm’ threshold for climate change mitigation, which has been set at 270g CO2e/kWh.

The merits of including nuclear energy in the EU Sustainable Taxonomy are also debatable.

Nuclear energy’s potential substantial contribution to climate mitigation objectives is clear, but important questions remain over its ability to meet the “do no significant harm” criteria with regards to other environmental objectives. A report by the Joint Research Centre that was commissioned to inform a decision on this matter has been criticised (e.g. SCHEER, Heinrich Böll Stiftung, Austrian Institute of Ecology) for not sufficiently addressing risks related to the storage of nuclear waste, severe incidents and nuclear proliferation.

Proponents of the inclusion of gas-fired electricity and nuclear energy in the EU Sustainable Taxonomy will argue that these economic activities have a role to play in the energy transition.

This argument is beside the point: the EU Sustainable Taxonomy’s design is aimed at defining which economic activities are green – not which economic sectors are needed for the transition to a net-zero by 2050 economy……..

Decision-makers cannot let economic questions on energy security and cost thwart the scientific integrity of the EU Sustainable Taxonomy and still have an opportunity to save the credibility of the EU’s sustainable finance policy framework. It is now up to them to take responsibility. https://www.euractiv.com/section/energy-environment/opinion/how-to-save-the-scientific-integrity-of-the-eus-green-finance-taxonomy/

   

November 6, 2021 Posted by | climate change, EUROPE | Leave a comment

Nuclear industry pushing its spin and doing deals on the sidelines at COP26


Nuclear Power Is COP26’s Quiet Controversy, TIME   BY ALEJANDRO DE LA GARZA  NOVEMBER 5, 2021 In the midst of the COP26 climate talks yesterday, U.S. and Romanian officials stepped aside for a session in the conference’s Blue Zone, establishing an agreement for U.S. company NuScale to build a new kind of modular nuclear power plant in the southeastern European country. …….

NuScale CEO John Hopkins sees the agreement as part of a broader recognition that nuclear power has a big role to play as the world decarbonizes. ……

But others at COP26 aren’t convinced that NuScale’s small reactors can help avoid climate catastrophe. Some point to the fact that NuScale has yet to build a single commercial plant as evidence that the company is already too late to the party. “We have to get everything done in the next 25 years,” says Tom Burke, co-founder of climate think tank E3G. “The idea that you’re going to scale up a technology you don’t even have yet, and it’s going to be commercially viable [in that time], just seems to me like la la land.”

( More broadly, the NuScale controversy underscores larger disagreements about nuclear power’s role in bringing the world to a post-carbon future. On one side, institutions like the International Energy Agency say that the nuclear industry, which has been shrinking for years, will need to nearly double in size over the next two decades in order for the world to meet net-zero emissions targets.)

Meanwhile, the U.S. has embraced the power source as a solution for developing countries, announcing yesterday that it will spend $25 million to help build reactors in Kenya, Brazil and Indonesia. Russia’s environment minister told Reuters last month that the country planned to push for other nations at COP26 to acknowledge its nuclear power plants as environmentally friendly, while the Czech Republic, France and a slew of other European nations announced an “alliance” to promote nuclear energy (as well as natural gas) as sustainable investments under the E.U.’s upcoming climate finance rules.

But opposition to the idea of including nuclear power in a green energy roadmap is equally fierce. Germany and Belgium have long been drawing down their nuclear sectors, while nations like New Zealand and Austria have opposed classifying nuclear as a clean power source alongside renewables like wind and solar.

Lukas Ross, Climate and Energy Justice Program Manager at Friends of the Earth U.S., points to ballooning costs for nuclear projects in the U.S. and the U.K., and calls the energy source a “distraction” and a waste of scarce resources compared with renewables like wind and solar. “[Nuclear] is too expensive and too slow to be relevant to the climate crisis,” says Ross.

Still, Sergey Paltsev, deputy director of the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change and a senior research scientist at the MIT Energy Initiative, says the economics of nuclear energy are improving thanks to new technology like NuScale’s modular reactors, and that fission energy can help the world’s electricity systems meet crucial “baseload” needs, providing a steady current of power even when the sun doesn’t shine and the wind doesn’t blow.

But other experts say that the whole notion of baseload power is an outmoded concept, predicated on old assumptions about the ways that grids work. And Paltsev admits that, despite nuclear’s apparent promise, the industry still must prove that the technology is safe and cost effective.    https://time.com/6114156/nuclear-power-is-cop26s-quiet-controversy/

November 6, 2021 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change | Leave a comment

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