Nuclear power has been a political issue since the 1970s, and before the 2022 election it is highly topical again. There are several reasons. The climate crisis requires significantly more electricity than Sweden produces today. And skyrocketing electricity prices have raised major questions about how our energy system works.
So there are good factual political reasons to debate energy policy before the election. The Swedish Energy Agency has admittedly made scenarios that indicate that the problems can be solved without nuclear power. But at the same time, climate change is far too slow. The expansion of wind power has been remarkable but constantly encounters patrols.
There is also strategic political reasons for raising energy issues in the debate. Moderate leader Ulf Kristersson is forging a new government alternative that includes the completely untested Sweden Democrats. It is important for him to find common denominators to build this collaboration around. There, energy policy has become important, and the profile issue that M, KD, SD and L gather around is: more nuclear power.
Energy policy is grateful to Ulf Kristersson. Electricity prices are concrete and tangible for households, especially when inflation picks up. At the same time, nuclear power has an ideological dimension. It can be described as a guarantor of economic development coupled with reduced emissions.
The Social Democrats are striking a more delicate balance in the nuclear issue. The government has always carefully pointed out that the energy agreement from 2016 will keep the door open for nuclear power also in the future. In recent times, those signals have become even clearer. Last week, the government commissioned the Swedish Radiation Safety Authority to investigate what the permit processes should look like if someone wants to build new reactors of the SMR type. It is an event that looks like a thought that just a week later, state-owned Vattenfall will announce that it wants to investigate precisely those possibilities.
The Social Democrats can point to this and say: We do not say no to nuclear power, so what are you arguing about? The government party’s problem, which the right wing will highlight as soon as possible, is that S has a government base (MP, V, C) where skepticism about nuclear power is widespread. Without a change of government, there will be no Vattenfall’s plans, the right-wing says.
But the debate is also about the extent to which the state should actively create favorable conditions for nuclear power. Defenders of the market economy The Moderates want massive subsidies, while the Social Democrats believe that the market should solve it on its own.
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