The European Parliament (EP) on Tuesday voted to include the nuclear sector among the green technologies that must be supported to ensure the competitiveness and sovereignty of the European Union (EU) against China and the United States, an important political and symbolic victory for the sector in its full recovery, AFP reports. and News.ro.

The text, which presents a list of technologies with “zero emissions” of greenhouse gases, constitutes the MEPs’ position on the draft regulation, which aims to protect energy production using technologies without carbon emissions in the EU. It aims to produce 40% of the EU’s needs on the territory of Europe by 2030.

The EU mainly plans to offer relaxation of rules to companies that develop and implement green energy technologies. In essence, this text is not decisive for the nuclear industry, which is widely regulated at the national level, but it marks an important political and symbolic victory.

“I am glad that we have been able to integrate the nuclear sphere at the same level as renewable energy sources in technologies with zero net emissions. All these sources of energy production are indispensable for the decarbonization of our economy,” MEP Christoph Grudler from the group “Renew Europe” welcomed this decision.

What will happen next with the EP’s plan for nuclear energy

This proposal is subject to negotiation between Member States. Soon they have to take their own position and may argue for the nuclear industry to be included among the key technologies of the energy transition, alongside solar panels, wind turbines, batteries or heat pumps.

The EU is going to provide regulatory support to these industries with the goal of achieving carbon neutrality in 2050, as well as with the goal of building European energy sovereignty.

The initial draft of the Zero Greenhouse Gas Industry Regulation, presented on March 16, mentioned nuclear power among the means of decarbonizing the economy – a first win for France and about ten other member states, such as the Netherlands, Sweden, Poland and Romania, that rely on the technology .

But in practice, only future nuclear reactors – the fourth generation – and small, modular nuclear reactors, which are also being developed, were targeted. The bulk of the aid was reserved for a narrow list of so-called “strategic” technologies, which excluded nuclear power.

MEPs left it up to member states to choose which “zero emission” technologies they want to include in the expanded list. The plan envisages both simplification and acceleration of procedures and granting of permits to all industrial enterprises, as well as financing facilities.