According to the EU Commission’s plans, investments in nuclear power and natural gas are to be classified as sustainable.
(Photo: imago images / Future Image)
Undermining your own climate goals, sending a fatal signal, greenwashing – or the pragmatism needed to achieve the climate goals: The debate on the EU Commission’s plans to classify investments in nuclear power and natural gas as sustainable is in full swing.
Climate protection organizations sharply criticized the plans: Labeling nuclear power and natural gas as sustainable deprives the taxonomy of any credibility, commented Deutsche Umwelthilfe, for example. Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck is also critical of the EU Commission’s proposal. “The proposals of the EU Commission dilute the good label for sustainability,” said Habeck of the German press agency. It is wrong to label nuclear energy of all things as sustainable.
In contrast, large parts of the economy in this country consider natural gas to be an important bridge towards climate neutrality, referring to the slow expansion of renewable energies and the security of supply that must be ensured.
How do you feel about this topic? How sensible are the EU Commission’s plans? Are you mocking the idea of sustainability and slowing down the energy transition? Or are they rather necessary so that every country can go its own way in terms of climate protection? What consequences could this have for Germany and its citizens?
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Write us your opinion in five sentences [email protected]. We will publish selected contributions on Thursday in print and online, with attribution.
Specifically, the proposal of the EU Commission provides for the following: Planned investments in new nuclear power plants, as they are planned primarily in France, can be classified as green if the plants meet the latest technical standards. An additional requirement is that a specific plan for the operation of a disposal facility for high-level radioactive waste must be submitted by 2050 at the latest. In addition, the new nuclear facilities must receive a building permit by 2045.
More on the debate:
In addition to investments in new nuclear power plants, investments in new gas-fired power plants should also be able to be classified as green temporarily, especially at Germany’s request. A relevant factor here is how much greenhouse gases the systems emit. For those power plants that are approved after December 30, 2030, according to the proposal, only up to 100 grams of so-called CO2 equivalents per kilowatt hour of energy would be allowed – calculated over the life cycle.
The EU Commission justifies its proposal with the fact that the energy mix in the member states currently still varies widely. Some countries are increasingly relying on the burning of coal, others on nuclear energy. With the taxonomy, these different starting points should be taken into account and each country should nevertheless have the opportunity to move towards climate neutrality accordingly.
The EU member states now have until January 12 to comment on the draft. It can still fail if at least 20 EU countries come together, which represent at least 65 percent of the total population of the EU, or at least 353 members of the EU Parliament. Due to the large number of countries in favor of nuclear power, this seems rather unlikely.
If you would like to have your say in the Handelsblatt on this topic, please write us a comment, either by email [email protected] or on Instagram at @handelsblatt.