WRITTEN QUESTION E-2742/01

by Jorge Moreira Da Silva (PPE-DE) to the Commission

(5 October 2001)

Subject: Internalising the environmental costs of nuclear energy

Given that:

- the implementation of the Kyoto Protocol, which is come into force in 2002, will mean the internalisation of environmental costs (in terms of global warming) in the general weighting of product prices;

- in the energy field, the application of the Kyoto Protocol will give renewable energies and nuclear energy a competitive advantage over energy produced from fossil fuels (particularly coal and hydrocarbons);

- nuclear energy is not a sustainable energy source (although, in global warming terms, it has less impact than other energy sources do);

- if the sustainable development strategy launched in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 is to be carried out, all (and not merely some) environmental costs need to be internalised in the general price-weighting of all products as a matter of urgency,

I would ask the Commission what measures it intends to adopt so as to internalise the environmental costs in determining the price of energy from nuclear power stations (i. e. the storing and management of nuclear waste on the one hand, and on the other, the risk of radioactive pollution)?

Answer given by Mrs de Palacio on behalf of the Commission

(14 December 2001)

The Commission agrees that renewable and nuclear energies do not normally make any significant contribution to global warming. The Green Paper Towards a European Strategy for the security and energy supply(1) estimates that in the year 2010, generating electricity using nuclear energy will help to avoid over 300 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emission in the European Union alone. The Green Paper offers a global picture of the Community energy policy and highlights the inter-relation between the various energy sources in terms of security of supply, competition, environment and fiscal considerations. In the Green Paper, the Commission has also referred to the internalisation of costs linked to degradation of the environment and the need to eliminate major disparities between Member States taxation.

Internalising the external costs of energy production and use is a strategic environmental objective. However, there are considerable technical and methodological problems to overcome in evaluating these external cost. An important source of information on this is the Commission's ExterneE study, that was launched in 1991 and reported earlier this year. This estimated that the average external costs for nuclear was just below 0,4 Euro cents per kilowatt-hour, compared with 1,3 to 2,3 cents/kWh for gas and between 4,3 and 7,3 cents/kWh for oil and coal. Wind energy, with 0,1 to 0,2 cents/kWh had the smallest external cost.

The ExternE study considered the entire nuclear fuel cycle, including waste, radioactive emissions and environmental pollution, radiological impacts on the general public and the risk of accidents.

In the first instance, it is the Member States who are responsible for ensuring that environmental and other external costs of nuclear energy, such as those resulting from authorised radioactive discharges to the environment, waste disposal and security of installations are internalised. However, in general the costs of storing and long term management/disposal of the spent fuel and waste from nuclear electricity production are partly covered by a charge which is included in the price of the electricity. This includes, where necessary, safe transport of the material from one site to another(2). The risk of accidents/radioactive pollution is normally internalised in two ways. One way is the defence in depth of nuclear facilities that reduces the risk of any accidental releases of radioactivity in Western reactor technologies. The other way is through the adhesion of all Member States to the Paris Convention on Nuclear Liability that would come into force in the event of any accident.

Building on the results of the ExternE study the Commission has recently launched a follow up research project (NEWEXT new elements for the assessment of external costs from energy technologies). In its future analysis of this subject the Commission will review the internalisation of environmental costs with regard to the prices of all sources of energy. In addition, the Commission announced in its Green Paper on energy security that it will make a systematic inventory of state aid in the energy sector in order to avoid distortion of competition. This inventory will of course include nuclear energy which, should no longer benefit from aid.

(1) COM(2000) 769 final.

(2) Details of how the funds for covering the costs of radioactive waste management in individual Member States are available in a report Schemes for financing radioactive waste storage and disposal that was contracted by DG Environment and published in October 1998 (EUR 18185).