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Finland To Introduce Law Next Year Phasing Out Coal (reuters.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the planning-for-the-future dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Finland will introduce legislation next year to phase out coal and increase carbon taxes, a top government official told Reuters, which would require the country to find alternative energy sources to keep its power system stable. Coal produces roughly 10 percent of the energy consumed by Finland, which is the Nordics' heaviest coal consumer and burned about 4.1 million tons of oil equivalent in 2016. "This strategy has a goal of getting rid of coal as an energy source by 2030 [...] We have to write a law [...] and that will be next year," Riku Huttunen, director general in Finland's energy department, said. The law will, however, leave "room for manoeuvre" to ensure security of supply, he said, meaning coal-fired power plants could still be available to avoid the risk of blackouts. Finland is increasing its nuclear capacity, which could replace coal. But that may not be sufficient, a Nordic power trader said, as Finland will receive less nuclear power from neighboring Sweden, which is phasing out two reactors. Helsinki is raising its nuclear power capacity to reduce dependency on Russian energy imports. Two new reactors, Olkiluoto 3 and Hanhikivi 1, are due to go online in 2018 and 2024, respectively.

4 of 176 comments (clear)

  1. Increasing its nuclear capacity? Good. by Viol8 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    At least some countries have the balls to give the finger to the ignorant CND hippies who still equate nuclear power with nuclear weapons because they have the square root of fuck all clue about the different types of reactor design.

    1. Re:Increasing its nuclear capacity? Good. by jedidiah · · Score: 2, Insightful

      > Some of those hippies sure do know more about the dangers of nuclear waste than you.

      We've had the means to re-use spent fuel since the 70s. Anti-nuke hysteria has kept the industry from moving forward with new and better ideas.

      Meanwhile, we just kill ourselves more slowly in our attempts to avoid nuclear power. Coal is really a great example of that.

      --
      A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
  2. Re:Coal gets a bad rap IMHO by MightyMartian · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Absolutely. Even with scrubbing, coal is just simply a dirty fuel that has no business being used to produce enegery in a modern industrialized nation in the 21st century.

    --
    The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
  3. Re:They are going to dig it all up and burn it by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 3, Insightful

    That's not how coal forms.

    That's not even close to how coal forms.

    --
    She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.