German election outcome threatens meltdown for nuclear power in EU

Date: 14/01/1999

As the Bonn government prepares to start talking to industry representatives later this month about its plan to phase out nuclear power, the sector is becoming increasingly unpopular throughout the Union. Gareth Harding investigates the 'Homer Simpson' factor, and other developments threatening the industry's future

THE European nuclear industry is on the look out for a new public relations supremo. Whoever lands the job will have to be one hell of a spin doctor, because as the sector prepares to enter its fifth decade, it is less popular than ever before.

Demand for new nuclear power stations in Europe has dried up, public hostility to the transport of nuclear waste has hardened and a host of EU countries have either abandoned atomic power, agreed policies to phase it out or shelved plans to build more plants in the future.

And then there is Homer Simpson, of course. Apart from being fat, bald and stupid, the world's most infamous cartoon character also happens to work in a nuclear power plant which is notorious for its lax safety standards and tyrannical money-grabbing boss.

Industry sources grudgingly admit that Homer has not done much to improve nuclear power's image. But in recent years, little has.

Despite the industry's overall safety record, memories of Chernobyl and Three-Mile Island are still etched on people's minds and nuclear energy has failed to shrug off its early association with atomic weapons. "Unfortunately, they are all lumped together," says Jean-Paul Honoret of the industry's trade body FORATOM.

Honoret admits that, in the past, the industry has made mistakes and failed to get its message across. But he believes this has as much to do with perception as reality. "The public has a fear of all things radioactive," says Honoret. "What they don't realise is that we all live in a sea of radioactivity."

Politicians have to be seen to respond to the public's concerns, even if they don't always act on them. Hence the spate of recent promises either to stop building more plants or do away with nuclear power altogether.

Of the 15 EU member states, almost half have no atomic energy, two are committed to phasing it out in the future and one is in the process of doing so already. Most significantly of all, for the first time in more than 40 years, no new nuclear power stations are being built in western Europe. "The end of the nuclear construction programme in the EU means the end of the nuclear industry," claims Antony Froggatt of the environmental campaign group Greenpeace.

A quick review of Europe's capitals reveals that Froggatt's prediction may not be too wide of the mark.

The Italian parliament decided to dismantle the country's three remaining reactors almost a decade ago and in 1997 the public voted to halt the construction of any new nuclear installations. The Netherlands plans to shut down its last atomic power station within the next five years. The UK government has effectively withdrawn its support for the expansion of nuclear energy and the Spanish government has a moratorium on the building of any nuclear plants dating back to 1983.

But by far the most controversy has been created by the decision of the Swedish and German governments to phase out nuclear power.

Sweden, which relies on nuclear energy for almost half its electricity, decided nearly two decades ago to phase it out. But this timetable has slipped due to shifts in public opinion and political support for this goal.

The recent move in Europe towards Socialist and Green parties - which have traditionally been less glowing about nuclear power than their Conservative counterparts - has increased the threat to nuclear power, and nowhere has this been more apparent than in Germany.

The victory of the red-green coalition in last year's elections is being seen as something of a turning point for the future of the industry.

After weeks of tortuous negotiations, the two parties agreed in October to phase out the use of atomic energy "comprehensively and irreversibly".

Talks between the German government and the nuclear industry to achieve this goal are due to start later this month, but the Greens, who run the environment ministry, have wasted no time in starting to dismantle the industry they have spent more than 25 years fighting against.

This has not only angered the nuclear industry, which claims the move will cost about €45 billion and mean the loss of as many as 150,000 jobs, but it has also sparked a bitter row among the Greens' Social Democrat partners, who would prefer a more leisurely wind-down.

The political fall-out from the German elections has been felt all over Europe, but in particular in France and Belgium, which rely on nuclear energy for their electricity more than any other countries in the EU.

Although no one expects France to get rid of its reactors in a hurry, questions are being raised for the first time about the long-term viability of relying so heavily on nuclear power.

A recent study carried out by France's energy planning committee concluded that the amount of electricity generated by nuclear power looks certain to decline between now and 2010-2020.

The reason for this is that the country's early, ageing nuclear reactors will need to be replaced after 2010. By then, France's energy market will have been opened up - almost certainly leading to a greater take-up of gas and combined heat and power.

With France's last nuclear plant due to be completed this year and the decommissioning of its Superphenix fast breeder reactor planned for 2001, the French nuclear industry is understandably jittery. Hence, last week's decision by the country's largest nuclear firm COGEMA to launch a €1.8 million campaign to persuade the public of the ecological merits of reprocessing nuclear waste.

The money might have been better spent trying to bring Belgium round to its point of view, because last month the government scrapped its contract with COGEMA.

At the same time, Brussels launched a review of its energy policy and set up a working group to look at replacing older nuclear power stations with renewable energy sources.

It is not only political pressures which are putting the squeeze on atomic energy. Liberalisation of the European electricity market and the falling price of fossil fuels are likely to lead to a greater use of gas-generated power. The EU's climate change commitments, made at the 1997 Kyoto conference, are also forcing member states to produce more energy from renewable sources such as wind, wave, solar and hydroelectric power.

Paradoxically for an energy source seen by many as environmentally suspect, the nuclear industry regards climate change as "the best friend we have had in the past 40 years".

For, unlike most other forms of energy, nuclear power does not emit carbon dioxide. Replacing nuclear plants with coal, oil and gas in countries such as Germany and Sweden will therefore lead to an increase in emissions of greenhouse gases, leaving Europe's Kyoto commitments in tatters.

The fact that so many EU member states either do not have nuclear power or are busy phasing it out, makes the treaty on which Union nuclear energy policy is based appear anachronistic.

Signed in 1957, the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom) Treaty aims to promote nuclear energy in the EU "by creating the conditions necessary for the speedy establishment and growth of nuclear industries".

However, given the hostility of many countries to atomic energy, both the European Commission and Council of Ministers have found it enormously difficult to agree any sort of coherent policy for its promotion.

This has left the nuclear industry in something of a limbo. For although one quarter of the Union's electricity comes from nuclear power, European policy-makers are loathe to acknowledge the fact. Thus, at a time when clean energy is needed more than ever before, the nuclear industry appears to be slowly but inexorably heading towards meltdown.

Major feature. See also Section 11.9.