Poland\u2019s second-richest man may beat the government in building the nation\u2019s first nuclear power plant.<\/p>\n
Michal Solowow\u2019s Synthos SA, the second-largest European maker of synthetic rubber, signed a memorandum with\u00a0GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy\u00a0to build a small 300-megawatt reactor next to the company\u2019s factory in southern Poland, which could be completed as early as 2027. That\u2019s six years earlier than the government expects to build its first plant in a plan to construct at least 6 gigawatts of nuclear and cut the nation\u2019s reliance on coal for electricity generation.<\/p>\n
\u201cSmall modular reactors can play a significant role in addressing Poland\u2019s energy challenges,\u201d Sololow said Tuesday in a statement. They \u201cwill improve our chances to move away from coal and have a positive impact on our industry and nation.\u201d<\/p>\n
Poland, which gets about 80% of its electricity from burning coal, is slowly coming to terms with the fact that it has no choice but to shed the dirty fuel to meet European Union climate goals. To do so, it\u2019s energy policy is counting on gas, offshore wind, solar energy and nuclear, which it sees generating about 20% of its needs by 2040.<\/p>\n
Solowow hopes that GE\u2019s small modular reactor will be licensed in North America in 2024, which would would allow the company to build the unit in 2027, he said by telephone on Tuesday. Katherine Poseidon, a European policy analyst at BloombergNEF, said she doesn\u2019t expect the first SMR to be online before 2026.<\/p>\n
Solowow, whose energy-intensive businesses also produce ceramic tiles and wood flooring, seeks to produce cheaper and cleaner electricity than coal, which is becoming more expensive in power generation as the EU\u2019s climate policy makes carbon-dioxide permits more expensive. The richest Pole, Zygmunt Solorz, earlier this year announced a\u00a0push to promote green solutions.<\/p>\n
The estimated costs of large nuclear projects in France, the U.K. and Finland have repeatedly been increased. Poland\u2019s Energy Ministry in the 2040 policy published last year doubted that small reactors could be used any time soon and said investing in them would be \u201cirrational.\u201d<\/p>\n
GE Hitachi says that small reactors are as much as 60% less expensive to build than regular ones and could compete with gas-fired plants and renewable energy.<\/p>\n
\u201cSmall modular reactor technology is still a long way from commercialization,\u201d BNEF\u2019s Poseidon said. \u201cIt is definitely a big step for Poland — it shows they\u2019re serious about developing zero-carbon power generating capacity.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Poland\u2019s second-richest man may beat the government in building the nation\u2019s first nuclear power plant. Michal Solowow\u2019s Synthos SA, the second-largest European maker of synthetic rubber, signed a memorandum with\u00a0GE Hitachi Nuclear…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4355,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[46,48,57,68,76,77,82,86,87,90,96,99,103,107,109,111,113,137,139,146,148,160,174,183,184,201,202,209,222,230,232,233,244,246,249,256,262,263,267,277,279,280,285,288],"class_list":["post-4334","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","tag-aramco","tag-athens","tag-baroudi","tag-carbon","tag-climate","tag-climate-change","tag-co2","tag-cyprus","tag-decarbonising","tag-democracy","tag-doha","tag-eastmed","tag-egypt","tag-embargo","tag-emissions","tag-energy","tag-energy-peace","tag-gas","tag-gazprom","tag-greece","tag-greenenergy","tag-international-maritime-disputes","tag-lebanon","tag-maritime-boundaries-east-mediterranean","tag-maritime-disputes","tag-offshore","tag-oil","tag-opec","tag-pollution","tag-poverty-alleviation","tag-putin","tag-qatar","tag-rosneft","tag-roudi","tag-russia","tag-saudi","tag-solar","tag-solar-power","tag-straddling-hydrocarbons-reserves","tag-total","tag-trump","tag-turkey","tag-unclos","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4334","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4334"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4334\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4355"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4334"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4334"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4334"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}