Skip to main content

Spain: Addicted to Natural Gas

By Eric McErlain
From Bloomberg:
Spain's Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero is a self-proclaimed anti-nuclear warrior.

When the aging Jose Cabrera nuclear reactor, about 100 kilometers (63 miles) east of Madrid, was shuttered in April, Zapatero refused to consider a new atomic plant. Instead, the reactor will be replaced with a generator that burns North African gas. Zapatero pledged last month to unveil a plan by the elections in 2008 to phase out all nuclear reactors.

Four decades after dictator General Francisco Franco bet on nuclear power to reduce dependence on foreign energy, Spain is Western Europe's fastest-growing natural gas importer. The shift has come with a steep price tag: The cost of energy imports rose 66 percent in two years to 32.1 billion euros ($41 billion) in 2005, the National Statistics Office in Madrid said.

``We are putting ourselves at the mercy of gas,'' Pedro Rivero, the chairman of Madrid-based Unesa, a utilities' trade group, said in an interview last month.

Gas-fed reactors produce power for about 35 euros a megawatt-hour compared with 14 euros for nuclear plants, according to Madrid-based Union Fenosa SA, owner of the Jose Cabrera plant. Spain gets 75 percent of its energy from fossil fuels, more than the 50 percent average for the European Union.
When you're addicted to natural gas in Europe, it means you're addicted to Russian, Algerian and Iranian natural gas. As we've seen, that's awfully problematic.

Technorati tags: , , , , , , ,

Comments

Anonymous said…
Has any work been done on nuclear
photovoltaic cells? The advantages
over solar photovoltaic panels would seem to drive research in that direction.
October 15, 2006 at 5:35 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Fluor Invests in NuScale

By
You know, it’s kind of sad that no one is willing to invest in nuclear energy anymore. Wait, what? NuScale Power celebrated the news of its company-saving $30 million investment from Fluor Corp. Thursday morning with a press conference in Washington, D.C. Fluor is a design, engineering and construction company involved with some 20 plants in the 70s and 80s, but it has not held interest in a nuclear energy company until now. Fluor, which has deep roots in the nuclear industry, is betting big on small-scale nuclear energy with its NuScale investment. "It's become a serious contender in the last decade or so," John Hopkins, [Fluor’s group president in charge of new ventures], said. And that brings us to NuScale, which had run into some dark days – maybe not as dark as, say, Solyndra, but dire enough : Earlier this year, the Securities Exchange Commission filed an action against NuScale's lead investor, The Michael Kenwood Group. The firm "misap...
1 comment
Read more

Nuclear Utility Moves Up in Credit Ratings, Bank is "Comfortable with Nuclear Strategy"

By
Some positive signs that nuclear utilities can continue to receive positive ratings even while they finance new nuclear plants for the first time in decades: Wells Fargo upgrades SCANA to Outperform from Market Perform Wells analyst says, "YTD, SCG shares have underperformed the Regulated Electrics (total return +2% vs. +9%). Shares trade at 11.3X our 10E EPS, a modest discount to the peer group median of 11.8X. We view the valuation as attractive given a comparatively constructive regulatory environment and potential for above-average long-term EPS growth prospects ... Comfortable with Nuclear Strategy. SCG plans to participate in the development of two regulated nuclear units at a cost of $6.3B, raising legitimate concerns regarding financing and construction. We have carefully considered the risks and are comfortable with SCG’s strategy based on a highly constructive political & regulatory environment, manageable financing needs stretched out over 10 years, strong partners...
Post a Comment
Read more

Wednesday Update

By
From NEI’s Japan micro-site: NRC, Industry Concur on Many Post-Fukushima Actions Industry/Regulatory/Political Issues • There is a “great deal of alignment” between the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the industry on initial steps to take at America’s nuclear energy facilities in response to the nuclear accident in Japan, Charles Pardee, the chief operating officer of Exelon Generation Co., said at an agency briefing today. The briefing gave stakeholders an opportunity to discuss staff recommendations for near-term actions the agency may take at U.S. facilities. PowerPoint slides from the meeting are on the NRC website. • The International Atomic Energy Agency board has approved a plan that calls for inspectors to evaluate reactor safety at nuclear energy facilities every three years. Governments may opt out of having their country’s facilities inspected. Also approved were plans to maintain a rapid response team of experts ready to assist facility operators recoverin...
Post a Comment
Read more