The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Grossi, is convinced that it is practically impossible to achieve the global climate targets without nuclear power. In this respect, the end of nuclear energy decided for 2022 in Germany is politically legitimate, but not scientifically justifiable with regard to the climate and the two-degree target.

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Climate change can only be stopped with nuclear power “The scientific fact is that nuclear power plants cause extremely low carbon dioxide emissions,” said Grossi of the German Press Agency in Vienna. It is an empirical fact that a third of clean energy comes from nuclear sources. Citing the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the International Energy Agency, Grossi said: “Any way to achieve the 2-degree threshold set in the Paris Agreement is almost impossible, if not impossible, without nuclear power.”

The Argentine diplomat made a statement shortly before his visit to Berlin, where he met Foreign Minister Heiko Maas (SPD), among others, and took part in the conference of the World Health Summit. Atomic energy: “clean”, “stable”, “part of the solution” “Nuclear power is part of the solution” said he added that nuclear reactors provide a stable power supply that can support less constant renewable electricity from wind, water or sun. The IPCC’s independent scientists have determined that if nuclear power is to expand, greater efforts are required to address nuclear safety, nuclear waste disposal and other risks. Grossi visits Germany in a renewed debate about a repository for spent fuel elements.

Understandable resistance to repository Finland is so far the only country that has built such a permanent nuclear repository. Sweden also recently approved a location. “We have postponed a problem until it is impossible not to address,” Grossi said of the lack of long-term solutions to radioactive waste. People’s resistance to knowing such material around them is understandable, he said. “People prefer a solution that does not bring them close to waste.”

The German nuclear phase-out is practically unique in the world in terms of its consequence and speed, and is a really special approach. Few countries would have decided to exit. Others sought a reduction in nuclear power, but not an exit. Otherwise there is a remarkable trend towards the expansion of nuclear power – be it in China, Russia, India, South Africa, Turkey, Bangladesh, Vietnam, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Argentina or Brazil, according to the boss