Posted on 04/20/2006 10:09:36 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - Twenty years after Sweden alerted the world to the meltdown at Chernobyl, it aims to phase out nuclear power and end dependency on fossil fuels, putting the country in the vanguard of green energy policy.
With soaring oil prices, rising demand, uncertain supply and the need to cut greenhouse gas emissions, energy is in focus and the European Union is calling for coordinated policy.
But the Nordic region -- united by history, a shared concern for the environment and a harsh climate which puts heavy demand on power -- is divided on energy, not least nuclear power.
When a reactor at a nuclear plant in the Ukrainian town of Chernobyl exploded in 1986 and spewed radioactivity across Europe, the Nordic region was on the front-line: its pristine lakes and forests were polluted and Arctic reindeer meat and lichen contaminated.
Long before radiation on a Swedish power worker's shoes alerted the world to history's worst nuclear accident, Sweden had voted to get rid of atomic energy, in a 1980 referendum.
It now aims to break with fossil fuels by 2020, when it also wants greenhouse gas emissions, blamed by many for global warming, cut by 25 percent against 1990 levels.
"We have to transform into a non-oil economy," said Stefan Edman, who heads the Swedish government's oil dependency panel. "We have very high ambitions, although I don't think it is realistic that not a drop of oil will be used in 2020."
Sweden has already cut oil use in home heating by 70 percent in the last 20 years and has kept consumption flat in industry since 1994, despite a 70 percent increase in production.
The big challenge will be to do something about oil used in the transport sector, where it accounts for 98 percent of energy used, said Professor Christian Azar at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg, also on the oil panel.
"If we could achieve a 50 percent reduction, that would be an enormous achievement."
While worries about oil prices and supply and climate change are major drivers, the government also hopes that environmental technology will be a money-spinner for Swedish companies.
"Sweden has a chance to be an international model and a successful actor in export markets for alternative solutions," said Mona Sahlin, minister for sustainable development.
"The aim is to break dependence on fossil fuels by 2020. By then, no home will need oil for heating. By then, no motorist will be obliged to use petrol as the sole option available. By then, there will be better alternatives to oil."
Sweden produces around 35 percent of its energy from oil and with nuclear power on the way out, finding alternative power sources is a priority.
DIFFERENT STROKES
In Finland, however, nuclear power is seen as part of the future and its fifth atomic power plant -- the first built in Europe for more than a decade -- is due to come online in 2009.
"The main reason was increasing demand for energy," said Anneli Nikula, spokesman for private power generation firm Teollisuuden Voima, which owns the new power plant.
Finland does not want to rely on neighbors Russia, Sweden and Norway for power and has many old fossil fuel plants which have to be replaced in order to meet climate change goals.
"Cutting down carbon dioxide emissions has sparked debate on nuclear energy in many European countries," said Nikula. "The second coming of nuclear energy is true."
In Norway and Denmark, atomic power has never been an option.
In the 1970s, when other Western nations were building nuclear plants, Norway started developing the vast oil and gas reserves that make it the world's third biggest oil exporter behind Saudi Arabia and Russia.
But the fact that hydropower dams still generate almost all the nation's electricity has dampened environmental concerns.
Controversy surrounds opening up new areas of the Arctic for oil exploration, and using natural gas to supplement hydropower to meet growing demand. But opposition to nuclear power is so entrenched that the center-left government did not even mention it when outlining its policies on taking office in October.
"Nuclear power is not an option for Norway," Oil and Energy Minister Odd Roger Enoksen told Reuters.
Denmark -- home to Vestas, the world's largest wind turbine maker -- hopes use of sustainable sources such as wind and biofuels will reach 36 percent by 2025, from 25 percent in 2003.
It also uses oil and gas from its North Sea fields and the government's 20-year energy plan emphasises keeping that industry competitive.
Iceland also aims to become the world's first oil-free nation, setting its sights on 2050, by shifting cars, buses, trucks and ships over to non-polluting hydrogen.
By then, in theory, the only oil used on the volcanic North Atlantic island would be in planes. About 70 percent of energy needs are already met by geothermal or hydropower -- only the transport sector is still hooked on oil.
For all these countries, the speed of change will depend on the price of oil. As Azar at Chalmers University put it: "The political momentum will drop as fast as the oil price."
There's going to be an awful lot of Swedes slowly freezing to death because of this policy...
I know Sweden has a high suicide rate, but it's extraordinary to watch a country slowly kill itself, too.
""Sweden has a chance to be an international model and a successful actor in export markets for alternative solutions," said Mona Sahlin, minister for sustainable development.
"The aim is to break dependence on fossil fuels by 2020. By then, no home will need oil for heating. By then, no motorist will be obliged to use petrol as the sole option available. By then, there will be better alternatives to oil.""
I looked everywhere in the article for what this "better" alternative is - couldn't find it. They seem to be betting their future on magical wishful thinking.
A minister of "sustainable development"!?! They're doomed - soviet style central planning all over again.
You want sustainable development? We have it - it's called capitalism.
OK, call me ignorant but what heats the water that supplies the island of Lidingo (a Stockholm suburb) with heat and endless hot water for showers, laundry, and the like?
Somebody is burning a lot of fuel to deliver this hot water as a utility. And if its not going to be by fossil fuel...what then... solar???
So glad I'm heading home this year....
Yes the market takes into account all of the variables. Our oil/coal energy economy is actually more environmentally friendly then the old animal power economy. All those millions of acres that the horses and other work animals needed to graze on, returned to the wild.
Now as the price of oil and other resources move up, we'll go to the next level, nuclear power. The environmentalists will fight and delay it in some places, but they can't stop it.
"Now as the price of oil and other resources move up, we'll go to the next level, nuclear power. The environmentalists will fight and delay it in some places, but they can't stop it."
Don't be so sure about that... Once they get in power (and they have in large part in Europe - witness the fact that Sweden has a "sustainable development" minister) they can abolish the "free market". As I said earlier, "sustainable development" is nothing more than rigid central planning and it will end up encompassing every detail of one's life, just like the old USSR.
It's about a lot more than energy - it's any resource. So they'll be putting limits on the car you drive (if at all), the house you live in, the food you eat (and how much), etc, etc.
Does this mean they will close the Volvo plant in Gothenburg?
Geothermal?
I agree sustainable development is just code word for centralized planning. And global warming and crap like that is to scare people into accepting the control of their new masters.
At least the real soviet communists were pro-development though.. I'll give them that. They actually built apartments so people had a place to live, they built nuke plants, and they built industry.
The new left is against all human progress, some even against agriculture... wanting a pre-agricultural style of life like the native Indians.
According to this website
http://www.sweden.se/templates/cs/Article____8796.aspx
The likely sources in Sweden to be expanded are hydroelectric and wind with geothermal perhaps forming a minor component.
They already have very extensive rail that could be electrified and perhaps they may be planning on using hydrogen for motor vehicles.
>they may be planning on using hydrogen for motor vehicles.
So what generates this hydrogen? Maybe the nuclear power plants in Finland?
The electricity generated by wind or hydro can generate hydrogen from water just as easily as the electricity from nuclear.
"The new left is against all human progress, some even against agriculture... wanting a pre-agricultural style of life like the native Indians."
I think there are several factions at work here (you see them well represented at any street protest) and it's worth differentiating them, even though, they all are allied for the time being. As the saying goes, politics makes strange bedfellows.
The new-new left believes pretty much the same thing as the old-new left - they want to impose utopia on us - they're driven by unbearable guilt at the inequalities that exist, and they want to relieve that guilt by making everyone equal. What they don't realize is that there is no hell worse than enforced equality. Above all, for them this means getting rid of capitalism. They're in favor of "sustainable development" because this gives them centralized control, and thus the power to do what they want. In a warped, elitist, misguided and controlling kind of way, you could say that they care about people's suffering.
Their allies are the environazis, however they are motivated by different aims. They too feel guilt and are trying to relieve themselves of it. The source of their guilt is not people suffering, but the suffering of "mother earth". As a matter of fact, they hate the human race, do not consider it part of nature or the environment and the cure to their malaise is to exterminate the human race. Short of that, they want to keep as much of the planet off limit to us vermins, and create legal barriers to take us back to the stone age. So, like the left, but for different reasons, they hate capitalism, and so they join forces... for the time being.
However, they would be at each other's throat if either one of them ever actually gained control.
I love the idea of not being beholden to the oil whims of the middle east etc, and think it's wonderful that Sweden is able to do this...that said, calling Sweden's energy policies a model for other countries is ridiculous...this is small scale energy management. It isn't applicable to the size and needs of most states in this country. In the end this is a move away from petro-chemical power...not a true reduction in energy useage.
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