Austria's last coal nuclear power plant closes down

• Austrian power supplier Verbund has actually closed down its coal-fired area home heating plant in the state of Styria as prepared. This indicates that coal power generation in Austria is currently background, leading the way for a button to a 100% sustainable power supply by 2030.

Nonetheless, Photovoltaic Austria highlights that Austria requires a well-considered prepare for tidy power, as a quarter of the country's power is still created from nonrenewable fuel sources.

Austrian biggest power supplier, Verbund, closed down the Mellach area home heating plant in the Austrian state of Styria on Friday. The closure noted completion coal-fired power generation in Austria, due to the fact that the area home heating plant was the last functional coal-fired device in the nation. For 34 years, the nuclear power plant generated greater than 30 billion kWh of power as well as 20 billion kWh of area home heating. In the future, it will certainly be maintained prepared for back-up, according to Verbund.

" The closure of the last coal-fired nuclear power plant is a historical action: Austria is lastly leaving coal power supply as well as is taking one more action in the direction of terminating nonrenewable fuel sources," stated Austrian Minister for Climate Protection Leonore Gewessler, keeping in mind that the federal government intends to change a 100% power supply based upon renewable resources by 2030. "This additionally offers us financial freedom: We are presently investing EUR10 billion on imports of coal, gas and also oil."

Declarations from the Ministry of the Environment are comparable. "Austria is relocating a little more in the direction of environment nonpartisanship," stated State Secretary Magnus Brunner.

With this action, the nation might come to be a design for various other European nations. "The conversion of the place right into a development website is a fine example of just how the course from the fossil power globe to a eco-friendly and also cutting-edge future can be taken," included Brunner.

"On the method from old to brand-new economic climate, Mellach stays a crucial place for us, which supplies perfect problems for the growth of future modern technologies," stated Verbund CEO Wolfgang Anzengruber.

Verbund will certainly currently establish Mellach right into a development center. A pilot plant for high-temperature electrolysis and also gas cell procedure for hydrogen manufacturing has actually currently been established. Massive battery storage space systems are likewise being evaluated for usage as barrier storage space, as an example in ultrafast billing terminals for electro-mobility at the website, Verbund stressed.

According to Austrian PV organization Photovoltaic Austria, the nation still has "an extremely extensive roadway" to take a trip. "Because Austria still creates a quarter of the electrical power from nonrenewable fuel sources. For a lasting power supply, natural deposits need to be utilized a lot more," Managing Director Vera Immitzer informed pv magazine.

The nation's mounted PV capability have to be raised significantly over the following 10 years in order to accomplish 100% eco-friendly power target by 2030. According to "Europe Beyond Coal" studies, 15 European nations have actually currently determined to eliminate coal-based power generation, as well as 14 of them intend to leave coal by 2030.