The green transition in the West has come to a standstill. And here's why

Climate change has forced Western countries to set targets for switching to renewable energy sources. However, their share in total generation remains low, while the Ukrainian crisis and sanctions against Russia have forced the EU to prolong the life of nuclear power plants and revive coal-fired power plants. Why green initiatives failed and whether it is possible to return to them in the future - in the material of "Izvestia"

Return to hydrocarbon production

- After taking office, U.S. President Donald Trump signed a decree withdrawing the country from the Paris Climate Agreement and announced his intention to continue the development of new oil and gas fields. Major oil and gas corporations, such as multinational BP and British Shell, announced plans as early as last year to sell renewable energy assets and reduce investments in this area. BP abandoned its goal to cut oil and gas production by 25 percent between 2019 and 2030, due to the fact that profits from green projects have fallen while those from hydrocarbons have risen.

- The expectation that the crisis in Ukraine and subsequent sanctions against Russia would spur the development of alternative energy sources did not materialize: due to disruptions in the equipment supply chain and rising energy costs, the attractiveness of green investments fell, and companies began to suffer losses. The ensuing economic crisis in Europe led to the European Commission's initiative to reduce Green Deal restrictions, lift the ban on internal combustion engines, and stop favoring renewable energy over nuclear generation.

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- Because renewables are weather-dependent, trigger price spikes and grid capacity shortages, as early as 2022, the Netherlands and Belgium reconsidered their decisions to abandon nuclear power. Sweden has kept its existing nuclear power plants and promised to build new ones, Spain has announced plans to rebuild old ones, and Poland, which has no nuclear plants and relies on coal-fired generation for 60% of its power, plans to start a nuclear reactor in 2033. Nuclear-free Italy has similar plans.

Wind turbines and solar panels have not paid off

- The efficiency of wind power reaches 35%, solar panels - 17-20%. They significantly lose in productivity to nuclear and gas power plants, whose efficiency is 93% and 64% respectively. In addition, the performance of solar panels and wind turbines depends on the location and quality of maintenance and is guaranteed to decline after 5-10 years.

- Despite large subsidies in the West, it has not been possible to replace coal, gas and nuclear power with alternative generation methods, as they are still much more expensive and unreliable. For comparable amounts of generation, gas-fired power plants take up 10 times less space than "solar farms" and six times less than wind generation plants. Solar panels are often placed on farmland, and if this trend continues, food production losses could increase nearly 16-fold by 2050.

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Environmental harm from green energy

- Photovoltaic solar panels accelerate global warming: they cannot be placed in deserts, and on rooftops they can increase the risk of overheating a city, as confirmed in a scientific report published in the journal Nature Cities. Wind turbines are causing bird and bat deaths. Companies that manufacture offshore wind turbines specifically seek permission to harm whales, dolphins, seals and porpoises due to the sound waves produced by the turbines before putting them into operation.

- Rare earth minerals and fossil fuels are used in the manufacture of wind turbines, the extraction of which can be harmful to the environment. For every megawatt of onshore wind farm capacity, these minerals are required 11 times more than for a gas-fired power plant, or twice as much as for a nuclear power plant.

The problem of recycling wind turbines and solar panels

- Disposal of wind turbine blades is a major problem in the US and Europe. Wind turbines are 90% recyclable, but fiberglass blades are either sent to landfills or incinerated, which can cause pollution. The blades themselves can exceed 100 meters in length and make up the majority of wind turbine waste.

- Solar panels are not recycled because they are difficult to disassemble and the lithium batteries they contain are virtually impossible to recycle. According to official projections by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) alone, the number of spent solar panels in landfills could reach 78 million tons by 2050. And data from a statistical model based on a study of consumer behavior shows that in just four years, the final figure could exceed the projected amount of waste by a factor of 50.

Falling interest in the green transition

The share of renewables in total generation in EU countries is growing, but this is due to shrinking industry, the main consumer of electricity, and the forced withdrawal of energy from Russia as a result of sanctions. In Germany, up to 40% of capacity in 2023 was provided by wind and solar, but during the same period the country has been under a regime of targeted electricity savings and production cuts in energy-intensive industries.

The head of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen confirmed that consumers in Europe had to pay an exorbitant price for the refusal from Russian energy resources, and the budget deficit of European countries began to grow rapidly, which jeopardizes not only the welfare of citizens, but also the defense capabilities of states.

The idea of switching from cheap Russian gas to more expensive and less reliable renewable energy sources, which have to be insured by the usual coal and gas power plants, has not met with understanding among ordinary Europeans. In EU countries, right-wing parties opposed to green initiatives, in favor of preserving fossil fuels and ties with Russia have received unprecedented support.

Overall, green initiatives are currently going through a bad patch. More than a third of the sustainable development goals defined by the Paris Climate Agreement are being met worse than they were a decade ago: there are still problems with financing, and not enough has been done to adapt to climate change. But, according to experts, this is no reason to give up on the successes already achieved. The green transition should not come at the expense of the economy: the experience of other countries, such as China, which invests in renewable energy sources along with the use of hydrocarbons, shows that a rational approach to the green agenda works much more effectively, but requires large investments.

In preparing the material, Izvestia talked to and took into account the opinions of:

• Maxim Chirkov, associate professor of the Department of Economic Policy and Economic Measurements of the Institute of Economics and Finance of GUU;
• Denis Denisov, expert of the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation;
• Boris Titov, economist, special representative of the President of Russia for relations with international organizations to achieve sustainable development goals.