☢️ Germany’s lost nuclear decade: A Quick Q&A with … energy researcher Jan Emblemsvåg

'If they had just kept what they had, they would've had hundreds of billions of euros saved, but with a cleaner grid, and with the same power production as they do today.'

Germany’s “Die Energiewende” policy is a major investment into a clean energy future — just one that doesn’t involve nuclear. How ironic, given that Germany once led the charge into Europe’s nuclear energy future. Following the meltdown of Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi power plant in 2011, Germany took a decisive turn away from this safe and efficient form of clean energy.

Jan Emblemsvåg explores the devastating opportunity cost of this fateful decision in his paper, “What if Germany had invested in nuclear power? A comparison between the German energy policy the last 20 years and an alternative policy of investing in nuclear power.”

Emblemsvåg is a professor in the Department of Ocean Operations and Civil Engineering at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. He previously served as SVP and Shipyard Director of Innovation and Process Improvements in Vard, as well as SVP Ship Design & Systems in Rolls-Royce Marine, and was general manager at Midsund Bruk.

---

1/ What best explains German hesitancy to operate nuclear power plants? Is it just fear of catastrophe or malfunction, or is it broader than that?

Germany was quite close to Chernobyl in ’86, so the German population probably got some scare back then. Of course, the reactor design in Chernobyl was a very old fashioned, Generation II reactor, et cetera, et cetera. So a lot of reason for this.

But then when the accident came in Fukushima, which was a more modern kind of facility — although not like the ones we have today, but still, it was relatively more modern — the political pressure in Germany became too high. I think it's also important to be aware that this came out of the anti-nuclear weapon movement in Germany from the ’80s.

2/ In other countries, there seems to be a bit of a nuclear revival going around. Germany seems to be an exception to that. Do you see that changing?

Oh, absolutely. What happened was that Angela Merkel struck a deal with the Green Party, and the Green Party were the ones who were very, very against this. But now this has become marginalized. The Green Party in Germany has lost quite a lot of political power after the energy crisis, which cost Germany enormous amounts of money. Deutsche Bank estimated at around 1500 billion euros, which is an enormous amount. I see now that Angela Merkel’s former party has now changed course, they are now actually discussing reopening the nuclear power plants that they have been closing. So my best guess is that after the next election, Germany will probably start changing course.