Faced with gas shortages, several EU member states, including France, have announced the extension or reopening of coal-fired power plants that were shut down in response to climate change issues.
In Petershagen, the German town in North Rhine-Westphalia, the fumes from the Heyden-4 coal-fired power plant of supplier Uniper have been bellowing once again since Monday, August 29. After the one in Mehrum, near Hanover (Lower Saxony), this plant is the second to resume operation across the Rhine to mitigate the decline of Russian gas supplies.
At the end of June, Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition gave the green light to restart 27 coal-fired power plants until March 2024. The German government is not the only one to make this decision, even though it is at odds with the fight against greenhouse gases.
Within the European Union (EU), some countries – Austria, Italy, the Netherlands and France – have announced their intent to extend or restart power plants that were shut down, in an attempt to get through the next few months safely. “It’s terrible, but it’s a necessary evil if the EU wants to avoid, at best, blackouts this winter,” said Simone Tagliapietra, an energy specialist at the Bruegel think tank. Provided, however, “that this choice remains very occasional, for one or two winters at the most, and in small doses,” he said.
According to several think tanks, reactivating these plants in Europe could generate between 100 terawatt hours (TWh) and 200 TWh of additional power – a quarter to a half of French nuclear power plant production in 2019, under normal conditions. It is proving too significant to ignore.
“If we remove 40% of electricity production from gas, the ratio of Russian gas imports in 2021, in the short term, half could be made up by greater use of coal-fired power plants and the other half by reductions in electricity demand, the extension of existing nuclear power plants and the acceleration of the development of renewables,” detailed Nicolas Berghmans, an expert at the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI) on energy issues.
