The European Union (EU) is now on the verge of including natural gas (albeit on a transitional basis) and nuclear activities in the EU taxonomy.
Why is this a big deal?
The taxonomy is a European Commission program designed to facilitate access to capital on favourable terms for environmentally sustainable economic activities within the region.
Earlier this month, the European Commission released a draft text of the Taxonomy Complementary Delegated Act (CDA) to member states for consultation. World Nuclear News reported that,
“The proposed CDA elevates three distinct nuclear energy activities into the taxonomy: demonstration units for advanced nuclear technologies; the construction of new nuclear power plants using best available technologies; and electricity generation from existing nuclear installations.”
Prior to the document’s release, nuclear power was already making a comeback in certain European jurisdictions. A month ago, the new coalition government of the Netherlands placed nuclear power at the heart of its energy policy. Per World Nuclear News,
“…the government said it would provide financial support to the goal of building new nuclear power plants. It outlined EUR50 million (USD56 million) for this in 2023, EUR200 million in 2024 and EUR250 million in 2025.
It anticipated that cumulative support for new nuclear would reach EUR5 billion by 2030, while not assuming the power plants would be online by that time.”
Earlier this week, Thierry Breton, the European Commissioner for the Internal Market, claimed in an interview with Le Journal du Dimanche that a ‘colossal’ US$565 billion of investment in nuclear power will be needed by 2050 if the EU is to hit its carbon neutrality targets. According to the commissioner,
“Existing nuclear power plants alone will require 50 billion euros of investment by 2030. And 500 billion by 2050 for new generation ones. This effort represents around 20 billion euros per year.”
And, although countries like Germany and Belgium plan to phase out nuclear energy, several scenarios have warned that those countries risk missing out on their CO2 emissions targets by a wide margin, and possibly increase their energy dependence if they were to follow through on those policies.
While Belgium announced that it will go ahead with the phase-out of current nuclear power plants, the country will now turn to Small Modular Nuclear Reactors as a potentially viable future technology. Reuters’ Philip Blenkinsop reported in December that,
“Belgium will also invest 100 million euros ($113 million) over four years in research into nuclear power technology, emphasising smaller modular reactors and possibly cooperating with France and the Netherlands.”