Rule out extending the deadline for the closure of nuclear
MADRID, 20 May. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Third Vice President and Minister of Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, assured this Friday that the formal approval by the European Commission of the gas cap approved by the governments of Spain and Portugal “will be on time.”
Despite the fact that the decree law that regulates the cap on gas to produce electricity in Spain came into force last Saturday, setting a limit of 48.8 euros for the average price per MWh for the next twelve months, the European Commission has yet to formally adopt support for the standard, which is expected to be an immediate improvement for 37% of domestic consumers and 70% for industrial consumers.
In the extraordinary Council of Ministers last Friday in which the Government announced the approval of the measure, the head of the Ecological Transition portfolio indicated that the approval by Brussels could take around “two weeks”.
“I think it will go very quickly. I cannot put the date on a procedure that the European Commission services themselves manage, but in all the conversations that we are having with them in the terms of the communication, in the understanding that they have very deep into each of the details of the decree laws of Portugal and Spain, it will go very quickly. I am sure it will go on time”, the minister stressed this Friday in statements to the media after an event organized by the Maritime Cluster.
Ribera estimated that thanks to this measure the price of the wholesale electricity market will fall by around 38% in its average price, from 210 euros per megawatt hour (MWh) marked throughout the first quarter of this year to about 130 euros/ MWh. In this way, the only electricity that consumers will pay at the cost of gas will be that produced with gas plants.
Asked about whether the possibility of extending the closure schedule for nuclear power plants in Spain, which is expected to take place in 2035, is on the table, Ribera has been blunt and has limited himself to saying “no”.
On Wednesday of this week, the European Commission proposed to increase the participation of coal and nuclear power plants in the energy mix as part of the REPower EU package of measures, which seeks to reduce dependence on Russian fossil fuels by two thirds during the present exercise to eliminate imports from Moscow by the end of the decade.
The general secretary of UGT Fica (the union’s federation of Industry, Construction and Agriculture), Pedro Hojas, who yesterday asked to extend the timetable for closing nuclear power plants due to the “energy situation that currently exists in Europe” and for the “guarantee of supply offered by this technology”.
Likewise, there have also been pronouncements by the Popular Party (PP) and Ciudadanos to extend the timetable for the closure of nuclear power plants in Spain.
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