Greta Thunberg says shutting down nuclear power plants in Germany would be ‘a mistake’

the climate activist Greta Thunbergpromoter of fridays for future and one of the most critical and dissonant voices with the institutions due to climate change and the lack of action by governments, has declared to a German media outlet that disconnecting the nuclear plants in the country would be “a serious mistake”.

“If they are already working, I think it would be a mistake to close them down and turn to coal,” he said in an interview with ARD (a public media conglomerate in Germany). “It’s a bad idea to rely on coal as long as the other stuff is around,” Thunberg added.

His statements refer to the German government’s decision to keep two of the three nuclear power plants in reserve until “mid-April 2023”, even though they were due to be withdrawn by the end of this year. The energy crisis and dependence on gas due to the war in Ukraine have led Germany to make a decision “of necessity”, as explained last September by the Minister of the Economy, Robert Habeck.

[La sequía limita la energía hidráulica en España, la nuclear en Francia y el carbón en Alemania frente al gas ruso]

The decision “linked to many emotions” is made to avoid an electricity crisis that, despite the threats of the harsh winter that is coming in terms of energy, Habeck considers “extremely unlikely”.

Asked if the nuclear power plants should be closed once the current crisis phase ends, Thunberg replied that “depends on what happens”. In addition, he believes that there are other alternatives to coal. “I think there are other ways to move forward. With renewables.”

More gas consumption

A new factor is added to the energy crisis already in force: a colder, drier and less windy winter than normal. This has been warned by the European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF).

Such a scenario would have disastrous consequences for the German economy. Although the country has already filled up to 90% of its gas stores, the institutes IFO from Munich, DIW from Berlin, IfW from Kiel, IWH from Halle and RWI from Essen already warned in September that if the winter were cold, the country’s economy was going to sink by 7.9%.

Not surprisingly, Germany could eventually nationalize the country’s main gas company, Uniper. Based in Düsseldorf, the entity needs more help from the state after having taken advantage of a support package that could be worth up to 20,000 million euros.

Rising natural gas prices and supply cuts from Russia have caused daily millionaire lossesprompting the government to step in with a rescue package in July that included a 30% stake.