If Rusty is serious, the Federal Council is likely to lift the ban on new nuclear power plants.
Seven years after voters decided to phase out nuclear power, the energy secretary wants change: He's asking to allow new nuclear power plants to be built again.
Energy Minister Albert Rosty wants to remove the ban on building new nuclear power plants from the law.
Photo: Adrian Moser
Few popular initiatives have been formulated with such brevity. Stop the Blackout Initiative.Which was launched by circles close to the Republican People's Party and the Free Democratic Party. The text of the initiative includes two basic demands:
-
In the future, all climate-friendly energies should be allowed in Switzerland – and this is also the case. New nuclear power plants (nuclear power plants).
-
The energy source must be climate friendly.
Federal Chancellor Albert Rösti now wants to address the central point of the people's initiative with a counter-proposal: He is formally demanding that the Federal Council remove the current ban on the construction of new nuclear power plants from the law. By doing so, we would go a long way towards accommodating the initiators.
The Federal Council spoke about Rösti's request for the first time on Wednesday. However, no decision has been taken. According to people close to the Federal Council, government colleagues have sent Rösti back to fix it: He has to clarify various questions. Among other things, says a person close to the Federal Council, the reasons given by Rösti were very primitive.
The population should not automatically have a say.
It is a fundamental decision: Is there a counter-proposal to the “Stop the blackout” initiative, yes or no? As is usual in such cases, Rösti did not have a ready-made template ready yet. Instead, he presented the Federal Council with a discussion paper. The key point: The energy minister aims to propose an indirect counter-proposal to the initiative. This means that although parliament will have to deal with the issue, voters will not necessarily have to do so.
The population will only be able to have a say if parliament passes the change in law and a referendum is held. This in turn means: all it takes is a majority of people to agree to allow new nuclear power plants to be built again. The additional number of countries that would be necessary for the initiative will be eliminated. Thus, the obstacles facing supporters of nuclear power plants will be fewer.
Since the initiators would achieve their most important goal with this counter-proposal, Rösti can assume that they will withdraw their initiative. Before his election to the Federal Council, Rösti himself was a member of the Swiss Energy Club, which is behind this initiative.
Rusty doesn't want to ask voters.
Rösti’s colleagues in the Federal Council had questions and objections about this. One of them was democratic politics. Only in 2017 did voters approve the energy strategy, which relied on renewable energies and completed the phase-out of nuclear power. The referendum was a direct result of the nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan, in 2011. Since then, the construction of new nuclear power plants has been prohibited by law in Switzerland.
Rösti now wants the government and parliament to abolish the referendum in less than ten years – without consulting the population itself. Opponents of nuclear power plants should have no difficulty in collecting the signatures needed to hold a referendum. But they may claim that the Federal Council wants to ignore the number of voters – which could play into their hands.
Will subsidies for nuclear power plants come soon?
Other questions concern the financial consequences. According to reports, Rösti only wants to lift the ban on new construction – initially without promoting the construction of new nuclear power plants with financial incentives or even government subsidies. However, such questions are likely to quickly become the focus of debate. Swiss power companies say quite frankly that they have no economic interest in building a new nuclear power plant. This is because safety and disposal costs are high, and nuclear power plants are difficult to operate profitably.
Critics therefore argue that if the ban on new construction is lifted, calls for state guarantees or subsidies will immediately rise. In contrast, supporters of new nuclear power plants say that renewable energies such as photovoltaic and hydropower will also be supported by the state.
There is little doubt that the SP’s federal chancellors are against lifting the ban on new construction. Central Federal Chancellor Viola Amherd is also likely to criticize the plans, as it was her immediate predecessor Doris Leuthar who pushed through the ban on nuclear power plants against strong opposition.
But the FDP and the vice president’s party have long spoken out against the ban on the technology. The two parties represent four of the seven members of the Federal Council. So there is a good chance that Rösti will find a majority for a counter-proposal in the second reading. That could be the case on Wednesday. That would mean a full-fledged nuclear debate in Switzerland, 13 years after the Fukushima disaster.
the morning
The perfect start to the day with news and stories from Switzerland and the world.
More Newsletters
Found an error? Report it now.
Lifelong foodaholic. Professional twitter expert. Organizer. Award-winning internet geek. Coffee advocate.