Good news or bad news? -- Why do you want to develop nuclear power

The chart below shows the attitudes of governments around the world towards nuclear power as of 2017. The countries painted black are those whose national legislation prohibits the building of nuclear power plants, including Denmark, Italy and Hungary. It is worth pointing out that all of these countries enacted legislation in the last century, unrelated to Fukushima (Italy's legislative push is partly related to Chernobyl).

The countries and regions painted in red are those where the government has announced accelerated nuclear decommissioning, which means shutting down nuclear power plants before they expire. The countries and regions in the world that have so far made it clear that they will accelerate their nuclear abandonment are Germany and Taiwan, which have announced that they will establish a nuclear-free state by 2022 and 2025, respectively. In 2016, nuclear power generation accounted for 14.1% of Germany, and Germany has adopted a very systematic plan to shut down nuclear power, including personnel diversion, shutdown and decommissioning plans, the development of renewable energy, extend the life of hard coal power plants, increase the purchase of electricity from neighboring countries. Even so, Germany is the EU's worst carbon reduction country in the past five years, which is controversial. Due to Germany's dependence on the European grid, even temporary power shortages can be solved by purchasing power from the grid. In Taiwan, China, the slogan of a nuclear-free homeland was raised in order to win the votes of the people after Tsai Ing-wen took office as the regional leader. However, due to Taiwan's energy shortage and total dependence on imports, the distribution and development of renewable energy are poor. After the government forced the shutdown of Nuclear 2 and 3 and the suspension of nuclear 4 plants, the entire Taiwan's electricity reserves remained below the red line of 4%, meaning that small fluctuations can have big consequences. The Taiwan blackout on August 15, 2017 is the most true portrayal, just because a power plant operation error, so that several units off the grid, resulting in 6.68 million households in Taiwan, and caused three fire alarms, one death tragedy. At the same time, it caused chaos to people's lives, the fire department received 730 trapped elevator distress cases, and the most serious power outage in New Taipei City, more than 1,000 intersection traffic lights failed, and during the rush hour, resulting in traffic chaos. According to the estimates of the Ministry of Economic Affairs, manufacturers in the industrial zones under its management lost nearly NT $88 million, and the entire industry in Taiwan suffered heavy losses. Thus, a hasty decision to shut down nuclear power without a clear alternative would be reckless.

The countries painted yellow on the map are those whose governments have announced a time-by-time phase-out, that is, they have not shut down their active nuclear plants in advance, nor have they approved the extension of their service. These include Spain, Belgium, Switzerland and possibly South Korea. Spain's nuclear decommissioning time is 2021, and in 2016, nuclear power accounted for 20.3%. Spain has plenty of sunshine, the British people go to Spain in the winter to bask in the sun, so Spain is vigorously developing photovoltaic power generation and has achieved quite outstanding results. In addition, Spain is also backed by France, a nuclear power country, which can effectively buy low-carbon electricity, so the prospect of Spain's nuclear abandonment is very good. Switzerland is expected to complete nuclear abandonment in 2034, although the proportion of nuclear power in 2016 as high as 33.5%, but Switzerland's small size, small electricity consumption. Although the development of photovoltaic and wind power in Switzerland is extremely slow, the time until 2034 is still a long time, and the Swiss government has plenty of time to adjust its policy. At the same time, by around 2030, the vast array of offshore wind turbines in the North Sea in Britain, Denmark, Germany and Norway should be operational, by which time a large proportion of Europe's electricity will be obtained through this area, Switzerland is no exception. Belgium's nuclear abandonment schedule is set in 2025, but the high proportion of 55.2% of nuclear power, and the shortage of renewable energy alternatives can not be smoothly developed, Belgium's nuclear abandonment journey is difficult. After taking office, President Moon Jae-in announced his intention to build a nuclear-free homeland, but he has not given an actual timetable or roadmap for nuclear abandonment.

As can be seen from the above, there are only six countries and regions in the world where the government has determined to abandon nuclear weapons, of which only Germany and Spain are relatively smooth on the road to abandon nuclear weapons, Switzerland and South Korea are in a wait-and-see state, and Belgium and Taiwan are extremely hard to go. In fact, this shows that when there is no reasonable road map and alternative, it is very unwise to choose to abandon nuclear weapons only from a political perspective.