Advantages and disadvantages of nuclear energy

Germany closed its last three nuclear reactors on Saturday, leaving atomic energy behind. With the closure of the Isar 2 (southeast), Neckarwestheim (southwest) and Emsland (northwest) power stations, “an era”, as the power company RWE described it, came to an end.

“The risks associated with nuclear energy are absolutely unmanageable,” said Environment Minister Steffi Lemke.

Germany is today disconnecting its last three nuclear power plants to use energy from the sun and wind

At the beginning of 2000, the German government made the decision to phase out atomic energy, even in 2011, due to the Fukushima disaster, the process gained momentum. Despite this plan, there was doubt about the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, as Russian gas was deprived and there was speculation that a catastrophic situation could arise that the population would even feel, although it did not.

Germany must “expand, not further restrict” energy supply with the risk of shortages and high prices, the chairman of the German chambers of commerce, Peter Adrian, complained in the Rheinische Post newspaper.

The use of nuclear energy fell from 30.8% in 1997 to 6% until 2022. While the percentage of renewable energy increased from less than 25% a decade ago to 46% in 2022.

Germany prefers to focus on its goal of covering 80% of its electricity needs with renewable energy by 2030 and closing its coal-fired power stations by 2038 at the latest.

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Instead, Finland commissioned its Olkiluoto 3 nuclear reactor, the largest in Europe. With 1,600 megawatts, it supplies about 14% of Finland’s electricity production and is the most powerful in Europe.

It was built by the French group Areva and the German Siemens and uses the most modern EPR pressurized water technology.

This technology, considered more powerful and safer, was conceived to revive nuclear energy in Europe after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986.

Olkiluoto is the third EPR reactor in the world, after two already in operation in China.

Nuclear power represents 10% of the world’s electricity and is produced in 32 countries, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), there were 422 reactors in operation worldwide at the end of 2022.

Total nuclear production reached an all-time high in 2021, but the reactor park is aging and renewal is slowing down.

Only ten projects were announced in 2022, half of them in China. In 1976 there were 44.

The United States has 92 reactors whose average age of operation is 42 years, only two of which are under construction. France, on the other hand, has 56 reactors with an average duration of activity of 37 years.

China, on the other hand, has 57 units. The IAEA calculated in 2022 that the installed capacity of nuclear energy will double from now until 2050.