Iberdrola has joined Endesa in its requests to review the progressive closure calendar of nuclear power plants from 2027 that the electricity and the government agreed in 2019. Taking advantage of the parliamentary weakness of the government, the two companies want to reopen the debate, but they demand that an improvement in the remuneration of this technology.
This request has been carrying out Endesa years ago, which concentrates almost all of its business in Spain, and the nuclear forum, the lobby that represents this sector. Now the executive president of Iberdrola, Ignacio Sánchez Galán, has adhered to it. And the debate is economical, because in current price conditions, numbers do not come out.
Last January, in the Davos forum (Switzerland), the first Executive of the largest Spanish electricity already urged to maintain nuclear energy in Europe “to keep the lights on at a time when new demands grow such as data centers that require stable supply 24 hours a day during the seven days of the week.”
Now, Galán has extended this request to Spain. She has done so after the vice president and minister for the ecological transition, Sara Aagesen, has insisted that no company has requested that extension, and after the approval on February 12 in the Plenary of the Congress of a PP initiative (supported by Vox and UPN and with the abstention of ERC and Junts), urging the government to extend the useful life of the seven central between 2027 and 2035.
This Wednesday, the Senate approved another Vox motion in the same direction with the support of the PP that goes further and asks to eliminate the “existing taxes”, including the rate that the dismantling must finance, and promote the construction of small nuclear reactors, known as SMR. A few weeks ago, President Extremadura, María Guardiola (of the PP), came to ask Pedro Sánchez that the state assumes Almaraz to avoid its closure, although she refuses to reduce the eco -echo to the central with which her government raises 90 million a year.
The president of Iberdrola was key to the closure in 2013 of the nuclear of Garoña (exploited to the alimon by these two companies) and in 2018, as soon as Pedro Sánchez arrives in Moncloa, he described as viable the gradual closure of the nuclear as they turned 40. That was the horizon that collected the radioactive waste plan in force at that time (approved in 2006), which would have forced to close the centrals between 2021 and 2028 and that was not respected with the protocol signed in 2019 with Enresa (the public company that manages the waste).
Now Galán exhibits a speech similar to that of the CEO of Endesa, José Bogas, and this Thursday both claimed that the Government proposed to modify that roadmap appealing to the common good.
“We want the best for citizenship and we also want the best for the system and we want the best for Spain,” Galán said at a conference with analysts to present the record results of 2024. The Executive said that in recent years the energy scenario “has changed throughout the world, both in Spain and in the rest of Europe”, due to the greater demand for data centers or air conditioning, and by geopolitical factors (after the energy crisis (after the energy crisis (after the energy crisis that It caused the war in Ukraine), and warned that a change in nuclear in countries such as Germany or Belgium is already being seen.
Public aid
For the latter country, the European Commission, and specifically the portfolio of the Executive Vice President, Teresa Ribera, has just approved a package of aid of 32,000 million euros for the extension of two reactors very similar to those that exist in Spain that were initially going to close in 2025.
“I think that the European Commission is already giving support, or at least wants to give its approval, to state financing to be able to reopen or increase the useful life of nuclear power plants. And this is happening in other countries, in Britain and also in the United States, ”said Galán.
Hours later, Endesa’s first executive stressed that idea in a press conference to present the results of 2024 (with an increase in 154% benefits in a year) by pointing out that “the circumstances that were in 2019 are very different” to the current ones. The International Energy Agency (IEE), the climate summits “and even the European Commission have changed its position a bit” about nuclear. The extension, Bogas said, would result in “in the good of the economy” and price competitiveness.
“There has been a change regarding this nuclear policy in the world” and “some countries are changing their positioning,” said Endesa’s first executive, who summoned Germany, Belgium and Italy. In this country, which does not have nuclear power plants and rejected this source in a referendum in 2011, the ultra -rightist Giorgia Meloni is considering building SME reactors.
The first Executive of the Spanish subsidiary of the Italian Enel acknowledged that they have not made a request to the Spanish Government to review that calendar because it is necessary to “adapt” the fiscal burden of the nuclear. According to Bogas, this technology “supports very high fiscal charges”: 64-65 euros/MWh of total cost, the “fiscal charges” are 17 euros, to which the so-called Enresa rate is added, set at about 11 euros since 2024, when the Government approved an increase of 30%.
The objective of this increase was to finance the management of radioactive waste, after the lack of consensus to build the centralized temporal warehouse (ATC), whose abandonment resorted to electricity, and the decision to disperse radioactive garbage in independent temporary stores (ATI), waiting for the future deep geological warehouse (AGP) that should be available for 2073 and whose total cost is uncertain.
The nuclear forum has been denouncing the “suffocating” fiscal pressure (state, but also autonomic and local) that the reactors support. Adding the Enresa rate and the encumbrances to the reactors, this lobby ensures that in the last five years “70%has increased, from € 16/MWh to € 28/MWh, discriminating the nuclear generation against other technologies and making its economic viability unsustainable”.
Bogas defended this Thursday that “removing fiscal charges,” the nuclear “would be one of the most competitive technologies”, and that the elongation “practically” does not increase the costs of storage or the management of nuclear waste, but “generates many more fiscal charges”, so they could be reduced. ”
While Naturgy has remained outside this debate, Endesa and Iberdrola argue that nuclear are necessary for system stability and supply safety. Bogas explained this Thursday that “it is difficult” that in 2030 the hypotheses of the National Integrated Energy and Climate (PNIEC) is met with respect to the pumping; And the batteries have been “very importantly” but they are not yet “what we expect.”
“Our fear is that these hypotheses really do not occur, there is an increase in demand greater than expected, that I hope it will be good for everyone,” and that the nuclear closure supposes “a very important increase” of CO2 emissions due to the greater production of natural gas, something that the IEA warned in a report published this week. The other risk that pointed out is that “there may be supply security problems.”
Bogas anticipated “some kind of problem” with the supply “by 2030-2035” in Catalonia in the face of the slow penetration of renewables there and the slow deployment of storage in the whole of Spain.
In line with the demonstrations that the president of the Community of Madrid has made in recent days, Isabel Díaz Ayus competitive by far) tried to close combined cycle plants (which burn gas).
The first Iberdrola executive on Thursday asked for “dialogue” on this matter to the government. The possibility of reviewing the calendar, he said, “has to be analyzed in depth to see what is the impact that a potential closure could have.” “The nuclear fleet of Spain is safe, efficient, reliable, and I say it as an electrical engineer. They are absolutely necessary to maintain stability. ” It has already been seen in other countries “where there have been blackouts.”
Last Wednesday, the president of Redeia, the former minister Beatriz Corredor, denied that the supply is at risk due to the closure of the Central Center. The seven reactors currently operating – Almaraz I and II (Cáceres), Ascó I and II (Tarragona), chest (Valencia), Trillo (Guadalajara) and Vandellós II (Tarragona) – represent approximately 6% of the electrical power installed in Spain and contribute about 20% of electricity. The decision to close any central has to authorize the Government in any case, after an electricity network report.
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