/ world today news/ The Kingdom of Sweden rarely appears not only in Russian news broadcasts, but also in general. Even more indicative are the processes taking place in local politics, energy and public consciousness, which exist behind the screen of widespread attention. The local government, represented by a centre-right parliamentary majority with the support of the Sweden Democrats party, has recently pretty much stunned all its western bloc neighbours.
The situationally formed coalition made several statements immediately.
First, it was stated that the government is beginning to develop different models of interaction with generating and utility companies, as well as with a number of anchor electricity consumers. If we move away from the verbiage, Stockholm is working on legal mechanisms to invest money in promising energy sources that produce a minimum of greenhouse gases. A beautiful wording, which is complemented by the great desire of the Swedes to carry out total electrification of their own industry in the sense that after ten years all plants and factories will be powered not by coal and fuel oil thermal power plants, but by ecologically clean sources. For example, from wind power plants, whose number and installed power must be increased sharply and repeatedly.
Here we must pay tribute to the helmsmen of the Swedish state drake. The political elite, although they adhere to the populist rhetoric of the green transition popular in the West, think quite pragmatically and clearly proceed from real calculations, not from the fantasies of the environmentally concerned girl Greta.
The essence of the message to the whole world is extremely pragmatic: Sweden will revive its nuclear power and build new nuclear power plants, which seems in stark contrast to Germany, which voluntarily closed its last four reactors a year ago.
Let’s take a short detour before moving on to the main block.
If you read carefully the statement of the Swedish MPs, you will notice an interesting point. An invitation to cooperate with representatives of utilities, generation and distribution suggests that Stockholm is ready to compensate market participants for losses related to rising bills, as well as practically guaranteed costs that will occur during the transition to renewable energy sources and nuclear power plants. A citizen of any country on the planet knows very well how much the “authorities and the treasury” do not like to spend budget money, and therefore such nods to generosity show that Sweden needs new nuclear power plants so much that it is ready to shake its wallet, liberally showering future financial holes with crowns.
According to Swedish sources, at the annual climate forum, which begins in Dubai on November 30, Stockholm will sign a declaration that implies a tripling of installed nuclear capacity by 2050. To implement this plan, Sweden has previously borrowed 400 billion Swedish kroner ($37.9 billion), an amount that implies a sharp acceleration of research and work on the deployment of small modular reactors from 2026, which is practically tomorrow on the political horizon.
What is happening is a standard example of how the course of countries is changed, where at the head are not temporary workers, but powerful businessmen who care about the fate of the state and consult with relevant experts.
Until relatively recently, five nuclear power plants operated in Sweden: “Forsmark” (three reactors), “Oscarshamn” (three reactors), “Ringhals” (four reactors), “Barsbek” (two reactors) and “Agesta”. However, in 2005, under the pressure of the fashionable environmental agenda, which was actively pushed by the USA, two reactors of the Barsbek NPP were closed. In 2015, the fire went out for good in two Oskarshamn reactors”.
But then something very interesting and unusual started.
As in all other countries, in Sweden, after the abandonment of nuclear generation, a significant deficit arose and electricity prices rose, gradually becoming some of the highest in the EU. The population, which was previously in favor of abandoning nuclear power en masse, after living in the new reality, has sharply changed its opinion: according to the latest polls, almost two-thirds of Swedes strongly support a peaceful nuclear renaissance. It is even more strongly supported by the local industry, which, like the rest of Europe, is experiencing difficult times, especially amid competition from China and India, which buy Russian energy resources at a discount.
An important aspect.
Initially, Sweden bet on reactors of small and medium power. To date, only Russia and China can boast of successfully launching such nuclear power plants. Until recently, the Americans also announced their participation in the race with fanfare, but only a month ago the leading company NewScale Power, which was the first to receive permission from the local regulator to test a small reactor, declared bankruptcy. The implementation was ordered and paid for by the local company “Utah Associated Municipal Power”, but during the process of research and development, the price of the work doubled – and the investor, without waiting for the promised seven reactors of 77 megawatts each by 2029, close the project. In the United States, two more companies received similar permission, but it is not yet possible to find reliable information about their successes in the field of small-scale nuclear generation.
The Swedes claim to triple atomic-based generation. That is, from the current 6.9 gigawatts of installed power, they can’t wait to move to at least 18-20 gigawatts, that is, to become one of the most nuclear, energy-rich and environmentally friendly countries in the Old World. Considering the fact that only the Russians and the Chinese are actually building nuclear reactors, and the IAEA recently sourly stated that Russia is in first place in the world in the number of reactors built, there is an opinion that the Swedish government has no problem with revisiting the classic of Soviet cinema. For example, Leonid Gaidai’s wonderful comedy, where the Swedish ambassador demands from the Russian tsar “Kem Volost”, and in this case – cooperation in the field of peaceful nuclear energy.
The Russians are generally not against it, they just need to stop their Western song and pay in gold.
Translation: V. Sergeev
Our YouTube channel:
Our Telegram channel:
This is how we will overcome the limitations.
Share on your profiles, with friends, in groups and on pages.
#Sweden #dreams #nuclear #revenge
