COP 28. Triple Nuclear Power by 2050
Decarbonization: At the UNFCCC COP 28 conference in Dubai, the United States, backed by about twenty countries, from France to Japan, announced that it “wants to triple nuclear power by 2050.” The joint declaration, however, lacks the signatures of Russia and China.
At UNFCCC COP 28, the leaders of 22 countries agreed on the need to triple the world’s nuclear power capacity by 2050 compared to 2020, with the goal of offering humanity a viable alternative to fossil fuels.
The announcement in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, home of the United Nations Annual Climate Change Conference (COP 28), was made by President Joe Biden’s US envoy John Kerry, along with several leaders, including French President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister of Belgium Alexandre de Croux.
To create the energy transition, electricity generation must increase dramatically. Wind and solar installations are good, but renewables alone “will not provide the energy sustainability that can be ensured by nuclear power plants, which produce virtually no carbon dioxide emissions.”
The Joint Declaration was signed by representatives of approximately twenty countries, including, in addition to the United States and France, Bulgaria, Canada, Czechia, Finland, Ghana, Japan, Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden, Ukraine, South Korea, and Great Britain. However, international public opinion was impressed by the fact that “the world’s two main nuclear power plant manufacturers, China and Russia, were missing from the signatures.”
When introducing the Joint Declaration, John Kerry emphasized that “the key role of nuclear energy is recognized in achieving carbon neutrality by 2050 and supporting the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.” According to the US representative, “we know from science, facts, and evidence that we cannot achieve carbon neutrality by 2050 without nuclear power.” French President Emmanuel Macron said nuclear energy, including small modular reactors, is an “indispensable solution” to combat climate change. Oliver Stone, a famous American film director, also took the side of nuclear energy: “Long live nuclear energy to win the climate battle,” he wrote on his X social page (formerly Twitter).
Signatory countries also asked shareholders of international financial institutions, such as the World Bank, to include nuclear energy in their financing. To produce safe nuclear energy, new plants will be required, with reactors using some advanced technologies based not on fusion, but on fission of nuclear fuel. And to make the process of strengthening nuclear energy more specific, Belgium announced that in March 2024, together with the International Atomic Energy Agency (AIEA), it will organize the first world nuclear summit.
Various environmental groups immediately condemned the decision to triple the generation capacity of nuclear power plants, because the use of peaceful atoms as a clean alternative to fossil fuels is very controversial, and there are a number of risks to the safety of nuclear power plants as such, as well as strong doubts about the disposal of radioactive waste.
