Column by Polina Smertina about the threat of disruption of the “Green Deal” in the EU

As soon as the winter ended, and gas prices in the EU began to decline, European officials forgot about the unanimous desire for energy reforms and returned to their usual squabbles. The Green Deal, which is supposed to help Europe move away from fossil fuels (read: Russian gas) in favor of renewable energy, is again in jeopardy. The reason was the eternal question: consider nuclear energy green or not.

After the outbreak of hostilities by the Russian Federation in Ukraine, loud statements were heard from European countries about the need to speed up the implementation of the Green Deal in order to achieve independence from Russian fuel supplies. But it was not easy to move from words to deeds. After several months of negotiations, the European Parliament half-heartedly approved the new parameters of the RES directive (the key document of the Green Deal), suggesting an increase in the share of green generation in the EU energy mix to at least 42.5% by 2030 compared to the current target of 32%. Initially, the European Parliament proposed a target of 45%, but faced resistance from most EU countries with more realistic plans. For comparison: in 2021, the share of renewable energy in the EU was about 22%.

The hard-won decision may still fail: in May, the document was withdrawn from the vote, and the negotiations returned to a new round, Western media write. The initiator of the revision of the document was France, which decided to fight for the right of nuclear power plants to receive the coveted green status – a guarantee of financing new nuclear projects. France is the second in the world and the first in the EU in terms of nuclear power plant capacity (61 GW, or 62% of the total generation in the country).

France, in the words of the Western media, literally took the directive on renewable energy hostage and led the negotiations to a dead end. Paris demands to increase the contribution of nuclear power plants to achieve the goal of the Green Deal, as well as to recognize the hydrogen generated with the help of nuclear power as green. So far, such hydrogen has received only the derogatory status of “low-carbon”. Slovakia, Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic traditionally take the side of France, also wishing to receive money for the development of power units, albeit expensive to build, but cheap to operate.

A fierce opponent of nuclear construction is Germany, which closed the last nuclear power plants in the country in 2023. Berlin is betting on wind and solar power plants, whose combined share of generation in the country is about 37% by the end of 2022. According to Bloomberg sources, German politicians do not want to make concessions. Berlin claims to be fighting against nuclear energy in the name of safety, but there are suspicions that such an argument is used primarily to fight cheaper and more efficient competitors in a neighboring country. According to the agency, French President Emmanuel Macron will discuss the possibility of a compromise with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz over dinner on Tuesday.