Nuclear energy policy in Belgium after Fukushima

Pierre Louis Kunsch and Jean Friesewinkel

ULB Institutional Repository from ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles

Abstract: The Belgian nuclear phase-out law imposes closing down in the 2015-2025 period seven nuclear power plants (NPPs) producing more than 50% of the domestic electricity. This creates an urgent problem in the country because of the absence of well-defined capacity-replacement plans. Though a safety-of-supply provision in the law allows for a delayed phase-out, hopes for a technically acceptable schedule have reduced after the Fukushima nuclear disaster in March 2011. In this article policy investigations are made with system dynamics. A significant finding from such modelling is that, in contrast to common expectations, a too early nuclear phase-out will not serve the deployment of renewable energy sources and rational use of energy. It is indeed found to primarily benefit to fossil fuel, creating unwanted drawbacks regarding safety of supply, dependency on foreign suppliers, price volatility, and increased use of non-renewable and CO2-emitting fossil fuels. © 2013 Elsevier Ltd.

Keywords: Nuclear energy; Renewable energy sources; System dynamics modelling (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ene, nep-env and nep-reg
Note: SCOPUS: ar.j
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (28)

Published in: Energy policy (2014) v.66,p.462-474

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ulb:ulbeco:2013/189447

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://hdl.handle.ne ... lb.ac.be:2013/189447

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in ULB Institutional Repository from ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Benoit Pauwels (bpauwels@ulb.ac.be).