Nuclear Seen As Essential For EU Sustainable Energy Development
Written by NucNet
Tuesday, 01 September 2009
The EU is “well-positioned” to become an energy technology leader thanks to proven experience with nuclear energy, a large share of renewables and the start of carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects, according to a new publication.
The European Commission (EC) publication* gives an overview of EC-funded climate change research for participants at the World Climate Conference, which opened in Geneva yesterday, and for those attending December’s meeting in Denmark of the 15th session of the Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC COP-15).
One of the research abstracts contained in the publication – ‘Probabilistic Long-Term Assessment of New Technology Scenarios’ (Planet’) – describes new nuclear as one of “the main technologies needed” for sustainable energy development.
However, Planets says the EU will need to move ahead to ensure a position as an “energy technological forerunner”.
Planets says its research objective is to “design the evolution of energy technologies” in Europe and globally for the next 50 to 60 years. It also intends to look at how “a series of currently foreseen and future energy and environmental policies will shape the outlook for energy technology development”.
According to Planets, research should include “specific assessments of the main technologies needed for a sustainable energy development” including renewables, CCS, new nuclear and bio fuels.
*The 357-page publication, ‘European Research Framework Programme – Research on Climate Change’ – is available on the EC’s website.
