Advocating for Nuclear Energy as a Solution for Climate Change Mitigation
Africa is becoming more and more dependent on electricity, with demand steadily increasing as transport, domestic heating and industrial processes are increasingly electrified. Whilst electricity is clean at the point of use, its generation currently produces over 40% of all energy-related carbon emissions. Decarbonizing the electricity supply, whilst providing affordable and reliable electricity to a growing global population, must be central to any climate change strategy in Africa. Nuclear energy has shown that it has the potential to be the catalyst for delivering sustainable energy transitions, long before climate change was on the agenda. Africa can learn from France, which generates over 70% of its electricity from nuclear power, the largest nuclear share of any country globally and its electricity sector emissions are one-sixth of the European average. Nuclear power plants produce no greenhouse gas emissions during operation, and over the course of its life cycle, nuclear produces about the same amount of carbon dioxide-equivalent emissions per unit of electricity as wind, and one-third of the emissions per unit of electricity when compared with solar. In order to achieve the deep decarbonization required to keep the average rise in global temperatures to below 1.5°C, combating climate change would be much harder, without an increased role for nuclear for Africa. Because nuclear power is reliable and can be deployed on a large scale, it can directly replace fossil fuel plant, avoiding the combustion of fossil fuels for electricity generation. The use of nuclear energy today avoids emissions roughly equivalent to removing one-third of all cars from the world’s roads. The sessions will look at various advocacy groups in the Africa region and their solutions to climate change.