An energy crisis has struck in Norway: they are switching to wood heating

The government is trying to find alternative sources for heat production

In Norway, a critical situation has developed with electricity, the best way out of which is considered to be cooperation with Sweden and the joint development of nuclear energy. The country itself does not have the capacity to generate new energy on a sufficient scale.

Norway should promote the rapid development of nuclear power plants, but they could well be located in Sweden, which has experience in such construction and good conditions for the rapid development of this type of energy. This will be a continuation of the good Scandinavian tradition of cooperation, Ola Borten Mu, a member of parliament from the Center Party (Senterpartiet), told the Norwegian broadcaster NRK.

“If we want to phase out the use of coal, oil and gas, we will need a huge amount of new energy if we want to maintain the standard of living that exists today,” says the parliamentarian. “Given today’s total energy consumption, we will need about the same amount of new energy as we’ve collectively developed since we learned to tame waterfalls in the late 1800s. Ideally this should happen over the next 26 years until we become a net-zero emissions society by 2050.”

Norway has developed plans to build various industrial plants in all parts of the country over the coming decades, which will only increase energy consumption. At the same time, the country itself does not have the capacity to generate new energy on a sufficient scale. One of the most promising types of energy “production” is the use of offshore wind, but this is a very expensive project that will pay for itself after many years. Authorities admit that the era of affordable electricity is ending or has already ended. Now there is a need to use all possible types of electricity: wind (wind power), water (hydroelectric power), solar, bioenergy and nuclear energy.

The most ambitious plans cannot be implemented without taking into account economic and physical realities. Without enough new energy at an affordable price, either jobs, the environment, or both will have to be sacrificed. With today’s technology, Norway will need about 10,000 new onshore wind turbines to further electrify the country and produce electricity equivalent to the amount of fossil energy that needs to be replaced.

Mu cited the example of the Vosen district in Trøndelag, where there are 277 windmills. Achieving economic targets will require the construction of 36 more new ones over the next 26 years. This is very difficult, expensive and practically impossible. It’s time, according to the politician, to think about the development of nuclear energy in Norway, which in the post-war period turned from a strategic investment area into a project to stop the use of this type of energy in the country. The problem is that many important technologies are outdated or lost, and the regulatory framework is simply lacking. Investments in new energy must be profitable. However, already in the spring of 2022, strategic investments were made in educational courses in nuclear chemistry and nuclear physics. However, it is clear that any development of nuclear power in Norway will take time.

“But this is not a reason not to start work, on the contrary,” the politician emphasized, “the faster we acquire the necessary experience and regulatory framework, the faster we can start work. And the longer we wait, the longer it takes. Cooperation with Sweden makes it possible to introduce more nuclear energy into our energy system much faster, since the Scandinavian countries have a unified energy system.”

Norway already has the opportunity to buy nuclear energy from Sweden and Finland in significant quantities.

Let us recall that there is also a long tradition of cooperation between countries to solve common problems. Back in the 1950s, Stockholm financed the construction of a power plant in Tidal, Norway, in exchange for the electricity that began to be generated there. Recently, a joint system with Sweden was created to develop renewable energy sources. The neighboring country has made large-scale investments in new nuclear power to provide sufficient energy at an affordable price. The Swedes have the ability and experience, and therefore have completely different prerequisites for quickly solving the problem. Norway risks finding itself without electricity and heating with wood if it refuses to find solutions to a vital problem.