Latest Report Reveals That, Europe Will Continue To Rely On Gas Power

The three European nations that rely most heavily on fossil gas to generate electricity are Germany, the United Kingdom, and Italy.

A new report claims that Europe’s growing gas power could jeopardize climate pledges and lock in fossil fuels for decades.

According to a briefing from the campaign group Beyond Fossil Fuels, European countries intend to increase their gas-fired power generating capacity by 32%, or 80 GW, in total.

Countries run the risk of being locked into high-carbon power systems as they present themselves as global climate leaders at COP29.

“We didn’t enter the digital age by bulk buying typewriters, and we won’t build a clean power system by constructing so many new gas plants,” said Alexandru Mustață, campaigner at Beyond Fossil Fuels.

Plans for new gas power infrastructure in Europe are seriously out of step with the continent’s climate goals. We run the risk of being locked into decades of reliance on fossil fuels as a result of this overbuild, which will inevitably lead to climate catastrophe.

Beyond Fossil Fuels examined the plans for fossil gas in six European nations’ power systems, both now and in the future:

Poland, Bulgaria, Romania, Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom.

Italy, the United Kingdom, and Germany are the three European nations that rely most heavily on fossil gas to generate electricity.

These three nations, which currently account for 45% of Europe’s total gas power capacity, are planning half of the new additions. By 2035, the governments of all three nations have pledged to decarbonize their electricity sectors.

The United Kingdom has set the most ambitious goal of having clean power by 2030. If gas power capacity isn’t increased beyond what it was in 2023, the nation’s National Energy System Operator confirmed last week that this is possible.

However, none of the three countries—Italy, the UK, and Germany—have any firm plans to cease using fossil fuels at their more than 900 gas power plants, let alone any new ones that are being built. According to the briefing, plans to construct additional gas capacity “severely undermine” the legitimacy of their goals.

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Poland, Romania and Bulgaria are collectively planning to increase their gas plant capacity from 9 to 24 GW. Beyond Fossil Fuels claims many of these projects are being subsidised with taxpayers’ money or funding from the EU intended to help countries “modernise” their power systems and make their economies more “sustainable”.

Fossil gas produced 24% of Europe’s electricity in 2023, with 17% coming from the EU. Only a few nations lack operational gas power plants: Kosovo, Montenegro, Luxembourg, Cyprus, and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Only four of the 855 gas power plants in Europe listed in the Beyond Fossil Fuels database have retired since January 2023. By 2035, when the International Energy Agency says developed countries must decarbonize to remain on a 1.5C warming trajectory, only seven are formally scheduled to close.

According to Beyond Fossil Fuels, these projects run the risk of increasing Europe’s reliance on imported fossil fuels from adversarial governments while taking vital funds away from storage, grids, and renewable energy.

Source: euronews