Polish Energy Policy: A Different Energiewende

AFTER debating the possibility of nuclear energy for years, the Polish government has at last come up with a scheme. On January 28th the economics ministry presented a detailed 150-page plan paving the way for the construction of two nuclear-power plants. By 2016 the sites of the two plants will be picked. Two areas close to the Baltic coast, Choczewo and Zarnowiec, are on the shortlist. Three years later construction is to begin and, by 2024, the first plant should be producing power. A state-owned energy company, PGE, will manage the project, which will cost an estimated 40 billion-60 billion zloty ($ 13 billion-19 billion).The government’s adoption of the scheme is the most important step so far in preparations for the construction of the country’s first nuclear-power station, says Andrzej Bobinski at Polityka Insight, a think-tank in Warsaw. But it does not guarantee that any Polish atoms will actually be split. The scheme fails to answer two of the most important questions: how can it be financed? And how can it be made profitable? The government insists that no public money will be used to build any nuclear-power plant, so it needs to find a private company or a consortium that is willing and able to make such a huge and risky investment.

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The Economist: Europe