Nuclear energy - political and economic factors of development

Donskikh Dmitrii Valerevich Postgraduate Student, Department of Comparative Politics, Patrice Lumumba Peoples' Friendship University of Russia 117198, Russia, Moscow, Miklukho-Maklaya str., 6 dimitridonsk@mail.ru Other publications by this author

Melnikov Andrei Olegovich Postgraduate Student, Department of Comparative Politics, Patrice Lumumba Peoples' Friendship University of Russia 117198, Russia, Moscow, Miklukho-Maklaya str., 6 dimitridonsk@mail.ru Other publications by this author

Introduction

Today, nuclear power is one of the most technologically complex branches of energy, which, however, is developing in the geopolitical paradigm of the mid–twentieth century - the Cold War. This is due to a number of factors discussed in this article, but it is most interesting in modern conditions to correlate the geopolitical and geo-economic factors affecting modern nuclear energy.

In this regard, the aim of the article is to identify the geopolitical and geo–economic factors influencing the global development of the nuclear industry. To achieve this goal, a number of tasks have been set and solved.: 1) the dynamics of the development of nuclear energy in the world has been identified; 2) the factors limiting its development have been systematized; 3) the factors of the growth of the use of atomic energy have been formulated.

Solving these tasks required a statistical analysis of the nuclear industry, a comparative analysis of policy decisions on the development of nuclear energy in the EU, USA, Russia, China and some other countries.

The main results of the conducted research are the systematization of constraints and incentives for the global development of nuclear energy at the global level in comparison with the situation in the Russian Federation.

Results

The development of the nuclear industry has always combined three main factors – political, economic and technological. Let's briefly describe each of them. From a political point of view, nuclear energy is an important tool for ensuring national security and sovereignty. This is due to the fact that, in fact, a country with proven technologies for using nuclear fuel in power generation also has the ability to construct nuclear weapons. Classic examples would be Iran and North Korea, which launched nuclear energy programs, but within a few years already possessed nuclear weapons. This allowed these states to maintain their sovereignty, despite pressure from superpowers ^[1;2]. The second issue of a political nature is related to the demonstration of the strength and stability of the state developing nuclear energy. The negative consequences of the destruction of nuclear power plants are known, and accordingly, their presence in the country is intended to demonstrate that it is economically and politically stable and sees no danger in the presence of such facilities on its territory.

The economic factor stimulating the development of nuclear energy is the cheapness of its production, provided there is a nuclear power plant. Indeed, the construction of a nuclear power plant is a rather expensive project ^[3], involving expenses for its further maintenance and purchase of fuel, but the cost of fuel logistics for nuclear power plants is much lower even in the short term (1 kg of nuclear fuel is equivalent to 2000 tons of coal in its energy characteristics ^[4]), the cost of cleaning emissions is virtually zero Due to the capacity of the NPP, the need to locate it close to consumers is effectively eliminated, and electricity generation at the NPP is easily regulated (it is difficult to stop it, but reducing or increasing it within regulatory limits is not a problem). At the same time, the costs of nuclear waste disposal are significantly higher, but in modern conditions this issue is solved by their burial rather than recycling ^[5], which reduces the final costs. Economically, nuclear power plants can provide a significant degree of independence from energy imports on a permanent basis, which occurs during the construction of pipelines, as well as reduce the cost of electricity due to lower costs ^[6].

The technological factor is related to the previous ones, since both political and economic factors directly depend on whether a country has technologies for the development of nuclear energy or whether it buys them.

Having considered the main factors of the development of nuclear energy, let us proceed to the analysis of the dynamics of its development in the world. Let's turn to Figure 1.

Figure 1. Global dynamics of energy generation, TJ

Source: compiled by the author based on IEA data ^[7].

As is evident from Figure 1, global energy production is growing, which is logical given the growth and demand for it. However, natural gas, oil and coal account for the majority of the increase, while renewable energy (RES) shows the highest growth rates. The share of nuclear energy remained fairly stable before the Fukushima disaster ^[8] and the active lobbying of individual EU countries for green energy. Table 1 shows the trends in the development of nuclear energy in recent decades.

Table 1. The share of nuclear energy in the global energy mix

Source: calculated by the authors according to the IEA data ^[7]

Table 1 provides an understanding that today nuclear energy remains a fairly significant source of energy generation, although its share is significantly decreasing. To a certain extent, this is due precisely to political factors, such as the separation of nuclear energy from green energy within the framework of the policies of a number of EU countries, fears of a repeat of nuclear power plant incidents such as the Chernobyl disaster and the Fukushima accident, as well as the fact that Western countries (primarily the EU) are pursuing a policy of abandoning Russian energy resources and technologies in the energy sector due to political motivation. It should be mentioned here that there are quite a lot of restrictions and agreements on nuclear energy and its development – for example, the construction of a nuclear power plant requires much more coordination at the international level than for the construction of any other energy facility ^[9]. This significantly limits the potential use of nuclear energy in the world. Political instability also affects the extent to which investors and the international community are willing to see a country's nuclear power plants. The most important example of the restraining political influence on the development of the industry is the significant pressure on France and 10 other EU countries, which insist that nuclear energy is clean and want to maintain existing capacities in their energy mix. The monopolists of the green energy market in the EU, to which Germany can be attributed, on the contrary, insist that it is necessary to exclude nuclear power plants from the "European Green Deal" and decommission them, which will entail a significant decrease in the energy competitiveness of products from European countries that depend heavily on nuclear energy. Thus, political interests are intertwined – the desire to prove their superiority in a particular region due to the energy factor and economic interests – internal competition in the EU.

The limitations of the development of nuclear energy from an economic point of view are that only a few countries – Russia, the United States, Great Britain, China, France/Germany, which also possess nuclear weapons, as well as Iran and the DPRK - possess the technologies necessary for the use of peaceful atom. In fact, the main technologies are concentrated in Russia, the USA and China ^[10]. The export of technological solutions in the field of nuclear energy brings long-term income to these states, as nuclear power plants require maintenance, fuel supplies and a number of other operations that are usually carried out by the NPP builder. An equally important economic limitation is the capacity of nuclear power plants. In conditions when the country's economy is in a pre-industrial state (as in many African countries, for example) The construction of a nuclear power plant will not bring significant benefits to it, since the plant will be operated in the mode of incomplete energy generation. In addition, the development of power grids also imposes restrictions in this case. If in a developed country with a high density of the electric grid and its high quality, electricity is redistributed or exported, in countries with a low load on the electric grid and their low quality and insufficient connectivity, the question arises that it is very expensive to stop nuclear power plants and then start, respectively, it is necessary to use the generated electricity somehow. Also, an important economic factor is the construction time of a nuclear power plant – here and now it is much more profitable to use renewable energy sources, thermal power plants /CHP or any other type of power generation. Also, an important factor in the economic deterrence of the growth of energy generation at nuclear power plants is the cost of ensuring safety at the facility, but relative to those listed earlier, it is secondary.

In recent years, environmental problems have often been attributed to economic factors. They were partially discussed earlier, but there was an important and virtually unlit point – the disposal of nuclear waste, which is why nuclear energy is considered less green than renewable energy sources. In this matter, it is difficult to point out the cost or economic constraints, rather, the understanding that this problem has not yet been solved and remains an extremely important factor constraining the growth of the number of nuclear power plants.

Summarizing the factors affecting the nuclear industry in the world, let's turn to table 2, which systematizes all the highlighted features.

Table 2. Systematization of incentives and constraints for the development of the nuclear industry in the world

Source: compiled by the author

In Russia, however, the situation is somewhat different from the global one. Since the Russian Federation has nuclear energy generation technologies, a high demand for energy, and a desire to strengthen its position in the international arena, both economically and politically, the Russian Federation intends to strengthen its position in the nuclear energy market. On the territory of the Russian Federation, nuclear power plants accounted for almost 19% of all energy generation in 2019-2020, which is a fairly high indicator.

In fact, there are no factors for the Russian Federation that would restrain the development of the nuclear industry, and therefore innovative projects are being implemented, such as the development of cold fusion technology, the development of new nuclear reactors, and international cooperation in nuclear energy with China. Moreover, Rosatom, as the main state-owned company that implements projects in international cooperation and in the export of Russian nuclear technologies, serves as a state actor in the international energy market ^[11;12].

Conclusion

The main results of the article are that the importance of nuclear energy in the global energy balance has been highlighted, which has been decreasing in recent decades, with the exception of individual countries. This dynamic is determined mainly by a combination of political and economic factors, while environmental and technological factors become part of the economy.

The stimulating factors for the development of the industry include the low cost of electricity generation in the long term, relative environmental friendliness, reliability of energy generation, cheaper fuel logistics, as well as the high role of political motivation in the development of the industry. Among the constraints, it is worth mentioning the dependence on the degree of development of energy infrastructure, the demand for energy in the country, high dependence on technology suppliers, as well as market overregulation and security issues.

In general, it is worth concluding that nuclear energy, despite the prospects of energy generation and many positive factors affecting the energy system, nuclear energy in its current state is experiencing a period of declining interest. In Russia, however, the situation is completely different, including in terms of deterrent factors that are virtually absent in the Russian Federation.