Changing energy mix

摘要

At present, nuclear accounts for approximately 33% of power generation in the Czech Republic. However, this is set to increase to as much as 52% by 2040, with nuclear new-build replacing a number of thermal stations that are currently running on low-quality brown coal (lignite). 'Our country does not have any large supplies [domestic reserves] of gas or oil, while the climatic and geographic conditions for renewable sources are not very favourable either, so nuclear plants are the logical solution,' Tomas Patak, a spokesman for the Czech Ministry of Industry and Trade, told Petroleum Review. Milan Spatenka, an energy expert at the Prague office of Deloitte, agrees: 'The Czech Republic is at present very much dependent on its supplies of lignite, but in the next two decades they will be substantially depleted.'