The Finnish nuclear power plant Olkiluoto.Photo: iStock
Nuclear energy is an important part of the energy transition in Finland. The new reactor Olkiluoto 3 supplies the country with so much electricity that Nordland now has a significant energy surplus – which brings with it completely new challenges.
April 2023 was a key month for Europe’s use of nuclear power. Germany has switched off its last nuclear power plant, Finland put its fifth into operation – the Olkiluoto 3 nuclear power plant. This European pressurized water reactor (EPR) represents the current state of the art. It is the technical successor to the so-called convoy power plants, which were recently shut down in this country . The reactor went into operation 14 years late.
Since the commissioning of this new reactor, Finland has had a different kind of electricity problem – an oversupply. Clean electricity is so plentiful that the price of energy slipped briefly into the red on May 17, a day after it went live „Business Insider“. In the hours that followed, the market price leveled off at 0.3 cents per kilowatt hour.
Saving electricity is no longer necessary
That means the average energy price for that day was “slightly” below zero, Jukka Ruusunen, chief executive of Finnish grid operator Fingrid, told Finnish public broadcaster Yle. Ruusunen also proclaimed to the Finns:
Now there is enough electricity and it is almost emission-free. So you can use electricity with a clear conscience.”
The managing director remembered the bottleneck in the months before the new nuclear power plant was commissioned. “Last winter the only thing we could talk about was where to get more electricity. Now we are thinking hard about how we can limit production. We went from one extreme to the other,” explained Ruusunen.
An oversupply of electricity harbors the risk that the energy prices on the market are too low and hardly bring any more profit for the energy suppliers. “Electricity production must also be profitable for nuclear power plants. If the price is particularly low, there can be situations in which production is restricted „WinFuture“ reported.
If the plants produce too much electricity, the large transmission system operators usually intervene by forcibly shutting down the easy-to-control generators.
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Electricity price falls by more than 75 percent
Only the Olkiluoto 3 NPP can be noisy „Blackout News“ cover up to 15 percent of the country’s electricity requirements. With its 1,600 megawatts, Olkiluoto 3 connects two other reactors, each with an output of 890 megawatts. The power plant is located in Eurajoki in western Finland.
Average spot electricity prices fell to 60.55 euros per megawatt hour in April. Significantly less than in December, when they were 245.98 euros per megawatt hour. That’s a decrease of 75.38 percent.
In December, Finland was still preparing for continuous power cuts due to the high energy demand for heating in winter. Due to the developments in the Ukraine war, the country bordering Russia decided to forgo electricity imports from the large neighboring state.
“In Finland, people appreciate everything that is carbon-free – and nuclear power is carbon-free. But then it’s up to these international discussions to make all these restrictions,” said Ruusunen.
expansion of wind energy
Despite the increasing share of nuclear energy, Fingrid expects wind power to be the largest source of energy by 2027 due to increasing investments.
However, the head of the Finnish grid operator also said that customers must be at the “centre” of an electricity system based on wind and solar energy. The energy level of the wind is constantly changing due to the fluctuating wind speed, Ruusunen said.
Currently, the five Finnish NPPs account for 40 percent of the total power supply. The wind turbines with an installed capacity of around 5,700 megawatts cover loudly „Electricitymaps“ 34 percent of the electricity requirement.
Due to the electricity surplus, the northern European country supplies parts of its neighboring countries Estonia and Sweden with energy.
Shares of power sources in Finland on May 31, 2023.Foto: mf/Epoch Times, Daten: Electricitymaps
Atom-Allianz
Since February, Finland has been participating with ten other EU countries in an alliance for “enhanced cooperation” in future research and use of nuclear energy. Germany does not participate in the alliance because it has opted out of this form of energy production. Epoch Times reported.
The states of the European nuclear alliance want to work more closely together on industrial projects and in the supply chains of the nuclear industry. In addition, they want to set “uniform safety regulations in accordance with best international practice”.
“Nuclear energy is one of the many instruments for achieving our climate goals, for the production of the electricity base load and for security of supply,” says the published declaration of the eleven EU countries.
