EU countries remain divided on nuclear power. The uncertainty created by the war in Ukraine, however, has sparked an increased interest among politicians in the technology, the likes of which has not been seen in decades. The big question, however, is whether the agenda-setters are ready to match big talk with big finance, writes Euractiv.
Fourteen of the EU's 27 heads of government gathered in Brussels last month for the first nuclear energy summit, jointly organized by the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Belgian presidency of the EU Council.
The event reflects a remarkable renewed enthusiasm for nuclear power that has not been seen in Europe for decades, and such a summit would have been unthinkable just a few years ago. Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and the energy uncertainty it caused for Europe prompted a reassessment by several countries that phased out nuclear power years ago or were on the fence about it until now.
Nuclear energy 2.0
The change in attitude can be seen not only in national capitals, but also in Brussels. Speaking at the Nuclear Energy 2.0 event jointly organized by France's EDF, Finland's Fortum and Sweden's Vattenfall earlier this month, Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton admitted the Commission's thinking had changed.
"When I joined the Commission, of course I wanted to talk about how more nuclear power is critical for Europe. But they all said to me: "Commissioner, no, no, we are not talking about nuclear energy here." Still, we agreed that I would talk about 'decarbonized transition energy,'" Breton recalls.
With these attitudes changing, he called in his speech for the Commission to propose an EU Nuclear Technology Act that would aim to boost the development of the sector in Europe in a similar way to the Wind Energy Action Plan and the forthcoming Solar Charter.
Europe's historical division over nuclear power means that EU involvement in the sector has so far been limited primarily to safety and waste decommissioning through initiatives such as the Euratom Research and Training Programme. At the moment, the specifics of the initiative, including the time frame, are not clear.
Financial obstacles
These are big projects, and even the small nuclear reactors (SMRs) that are currently in focus require quite a bit of upfront funding. The sector, which recently formed a pan-European union, presented a series of recommendations on how to move funding to European Commission executive vice-president Maros Šefčovič.
These include giving nuclear power equal funding opportunities to solar and wind power, all of which are defined as green technologies; expansion of EU funds to finance nuclear energy; channeling funds towards scaling up the industry; European supply chains; funding training and retraining opportunities to attract workers to the sector.
The Union also requested public financial support, such as the creation of a European Sovereignty Fund dedicated to green technologies, including nuclear, as well as funding from the European Investment Bank to support projects across the spectrum of all nuclear technologies.
However, EIB Vice President Thomas Ostros recently warned that the bank remains cautious about providing money for nuclear power.
High levels of pre-financing
After receiving the recommendations, Commissioner Šefčovič said that he too had seen increased interest in nuclear power.
"It is not surprising that the attitude in the European Union towards nuclear energy is really changing. But it is well known, this kind of projects require very high levels of pre-financing. They are very often subject to budget overspending. And sometimes in the past we've had long construction delays. But despite all this, nuclear power represents one of the most cost-effective ways to provide clean energy at scale and with 24/7 dispatch capacity. I would say that as well as extending the life of existing nuclear power plants within their safe operation, I also believe that we need to focus on several segments of this sector - in particular, consider how we can financially support these projects as a way to continue our green transition while ensuring greater energy security in Europe," said Šefčovič.
According to him, SMRs remain a key area of interest due to their "better scalability and lower initial investment costs" and the Commission therefore has high hopes for the recently launched SMR Alliance.
Long-term costing
Luc Remont, chief executive of EDF, agreed with Šefčovič that despite construction costs, nuclear power could be profitable in the long term.
“Nuclear isn't expensive, it's just a type of infrastructure that's bigger to build because it's the most concentrated power generation capacity there is of any technology. But, of course, it takes a while to build this big infrastructure, and that's where funding comes into play. In electricity, zero investment is possible without a government-backed funding scheme – without it, no investment will happen. Nuclear power needs its own financing schemes to support the investment, as the duration of the investment and the pricing risk need to be covered," Remon explained.