Poland has issued an environmental permit for the country’s first nuclear power plant. After one and a half years of review, Poland’s General Directorate for Environmental Protection (GDOS) determined that the building and operation of the plant will not harm the environment or natural habitats.
Poland plans to build its first nuclear power plant on its Baltic coast by 2033. Construction will start in 2026. It may take until 2040 to come online.
“This is a milestone in the implementation of an investment that is crucial from the point of view of energy security,” says the
Poland hopes this clean energy source will let it move away from coal which currently supplies 69 per cent of its power.
The Polish Nuclear Power Program plans to build up to six reactors in two or three locations that would generate 6 to 9 gigawatts of energy. That would power 8 million homes.
Poland is also one of several nations slated to receive financial aid from America to use new nuclear technology.
‘Project Phoenix’ also plans to build small modular reactors across Poland. Such reactors are a new technology that has been used largely in pilot projects.
“Nuclear power is the safest form of energy we have, if you consider deaths per megawatt of energy produced,” notes Yale University’s Steven Novella. “Wind turbines, surprisingly, kill more people than nuclear plants,” notes Michael Shellenberger, who was named a “Hero of the Environment” by Time magazine. And “solar panels require 17 times more materials in the form of cement, glass, concrete, and steel than do nuclear plants, and create over 200 times more waste,” such as “dust from toxic heavy metals including lead, cadmium, and chromium.”
Nuclear plants emit no air pollution, only harmless steam. Unlike wind farms, nuclear power plants don’t kill birds. The biggest utility that generates wind power pleaded guilty to federal crimes for killing 150 eagles.
Many years ago, France and Sweden replaced most of their fossil-fueled electricity with nuclear power, and as a result, ended up emitting less than a tenth of the world average of carbon dioxide per kilowatt-hour.
The air in Germany is getting dirtier because of its hostility to nuclear power. Coal-fired power plants are being turned back on to replace nuclear plants that generated no air pollution, but have been closed down. Nuclear power is best for the environment, notes Reason Magazine’s Ronald Bailey. Yet as he observes, “Germany idiotically shut down its last three nuclear power plants” in April 2023. “Until 2011, the country obtained one-quarter of its electricity from 17 nuclear power plants. Shutting down nuclear plants results in more mining of coal, making it harder to protect “natural landscapes.”
