Sweden’s new, center-right government has had enough of Green schemes.

🇸🇪 #Sweden: Government Preparing Legislation For Construction Of New #Nuclear Power Plants. #NuclearEnergy #NuclearPower

Country aiming for ‘more reactors in more places’, including SMRshttps://t.co/jgQRcpl4uF

— NucNet Nuclear News (@NucNetNews) January 11, 2023

Feeling the warm glow, if you will.

Sweden is preparing legislation to allow the construction of more nuclear power stations to boost electricity production in the Nordic country and bolster energy security, Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said on Wednesday.

Kristersson has made expanding nuclear power generation a key goal for his right-wing government, seeking to reverse a process of gradual closures of several reactors in the past couple of decades that has left the country relying more heavily on renewable but sometimes less predictable energy.

…The proposed new legislation, which still needs to be passed by parliament, would allow new reactors to be constructed at additional locations across Sweden and was seen being in place in March next year.

…The new legislation would scrap existing rules that caps the total number of reactors at ten and prohibits reactor construction in other locations than where they currently exist, opening the door to building smaller reactors that many see as the most cost-effective nuclear option.

Even with their relatively small population, the maintenance shutdown of the country’s largest reactor in December had the government warning of possible power outages. The prime minister was forced to ask Swedes to conserve even more power than they already were in the face of pricing pressures…

…”As it gets cold, the risks are simply much, much greater and the situation worsens even more today, literally speaking, when Sweden’s largest nuclear power reactor Oskarshamn 3 is shut down,” Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson told a news conference.

“Many Swedes have saved electricity for purely cost reasons. Now we want to ask the Swedish people to save electricity also to reduce the risk of power cuts,” he said.

…and I’m guessing he would prefer not to be in that situation again if there was anything he could do about it. He is wasting no time getting the gears in motion because actually building that first reactor can take forever. Proactive and keeping campaign promises.

…Sweden’s environmental law sets a cap of 10 reactors, and new nuclear power plants may only be built in places where there are already reactors. The government want these provisions to be removed. The plan is to have the amendment enter into force in March 2024.

There are currently six nuclear reactors at three locations: Forsmark, Oskarshamn and Ringhals.

…When forming his three-party coalition last year, Kristersson signaled an expansion of nuclear power, which previous Swedish governments had started to dismantle. In October, he said Sweden’s goal on electricity production would change from “100% renewable” to “100% fossil-free,” which leaves room for nuclear energy.

The new coalition can’t start a minute too soon reversing the years of renewable destruction wrought by previous governments. Nuclear doesn’t happen in a year or five, for that matter.

Their neighbor Finland is a good example of that with the construction of the country’s first nuclear plant in over four decades and Europe’s first new plant in fifteen years.

This was the headline in March of last year.

Finland starts much-delayed nuclear plant, brings respite to power market

Finland’s much-delayed Olkiluoto 3 nuclear reactor started test production on Saturday, operator TVO said, delivering power to the national grid which over time is expected to reduce the need for electricity imports and lead to lower prices.

YAY, right?

Do you know when it was originally scheduled to fire up?

2009

Guess when they broke ground?

2005

At least it’s finally produc…HOLD YOUR HORSES TRONS!

This is the headline from last month, about that brand-new facility.

Finland warns of power outage risk over nuclear plant startup delay

Finland faces a greater risk of power outages in coming months because of another delay in starting up the new Olkiluoto 3 (OL3) nuclear reactor, national grid operator Fingrid said on Friday.

Fingrid and the state energy authority have told citizens and companies to prepare for possible blackouts, particularly if OL3 does not prove reliable, as countries across Europe seek to curb energy usage, grappling with reduced Russian gas and other energy supplies because of the Ukraine war.

“There will be less domestic production capacity available than was previously estimated which highlights the importance of saving electricity and timing its usage to safeguard its sufficiency,” Fingrid said in a statement.

What a boondoggle! It’s not projected to come online until February now. What year is this? I can do that math. They’ve been clanking around with this project for 18 years and still don’t have the lights on. They’d also shut off another reactor in anticipation, counting on this one being operational to pick up the slack.

Oops.

…In October, the operator said cracks were found in the OL3 reactor’s four feedwater pumps after test production, further delaying startup originally planned to be in 2009.

Test production has been postponed until Dec. 25 at the earliest, from Dec. 11, TVO said, while full production will begin on Feb. 6 at the earliest compared with Jan. 22.

Normally, there’s some sort of alternative sourcing plan. The Finnish backups used to be the Swedes, who wound up sweating their own electrical bullets this go-round, so absolutely none to spare…

…Adding to Finland’s concerns, neighbouring Sweden, a major electricity exporter, switched off its Oskarshamn 3 nuclear reactor for maintenance from Dec. 9-18 and its Ringhals 4 reactor is offline until late February.

…and, until that pesky Ukrainian thing, importing Russian electricity. Brilliant.

Everyone’s shooting the fish in one barrel. Every last European Union country’s fallback plan has been to rob Peter to pay Paul to keep the lights on if they run short.

Where they’ve jonesed themselves is that they’ve all run short at the same time. Winter has hit them all – as it tends to do – exacerbating the ruinous decisions imposed by their individual governments to hie down the Yellow Brick Road to the Emerald Green Energy City without replacing the wattage generation they switched off. In some cases, irrevocably.

There is no Wicked Witch’s wand to wave to restore power generation of the magnitude they need.

In toto.