Dr. Conca reports that recently, 4 municipal election candidates from the traditionally anti-nuclear Green Party in Finland published an opinion piece in which they stated that humanity no longer has the luxury of opposing nuclear power. As discussed by J. M. Korhonen, this is significant. Well over a 100 election candidates from all the major parties, these Greens included, signed a petition calling for feasibility studies for nuclear district heating to provide heat for Finnish cities. The Green Party was a major winner in these Finnish elections, taking over 12% of the total vote, the largest share in the Party history. The Green Party is now the largest party in Jyvkyla, a medium-sized university city, is almost tied for 2nd in Helsinki and Turku, and is 3rd in Tampere, 4 of the 7 largest cities in Finland. This was a complicated election with 8,000 seats in 311 municipalities.
The Green Party actually gained seats, and gained majorities in a few municipal councils of many smaller localities, another first for a party mostly supported by urban voters, making them a truly national political movement. Korhonen notes that the major issues motivating people to vote Green include education, strong urban policies, and opposition to the right-populist Finns party, not environmentalism. And the Green Party is still officially anti-nuclear. But the country has vowed to end the use of coal by 2030 and their wide use of biomass is controversial as it causes significant health effects in some indoor air situations. Finland is receiving the brunt of global warming, as temperatures across Finland are climbing faster than anywhere else in the world. And global warming is impossible to address in the next 20 years without expanding nuclear power.
Just ask every leading climate scientist in the world like James Hansen. Finland has 4 operating nuclear plants with about 2.7 GWe in capacity that supplies 22 billion kWhs per year, or 34% of the total electricity. Read on.
Original URL: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2017/04/17/finlands-green-party-and-nuclear-power-really/#550cd6b25ec4
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