Although very rich, Switzerland fears power shortages this winter

Although very rich, Switzerland fears power shortages this winter if French nuclear reactors remain out of service and if Berlin, because of the war in Ukraine, limits exports of gas-fired electricity.

In the summer, Switzerland, the water reservoir of Europe thanks to its hundreds of hydroelectric plants, exports electricity, but in the winter the opposite happens.

Usually, there is no problem. But, since the outbreak of war in Ukraine, Russian natural gas has not flowed profusely to Europe.

As a result, Switzerland, which has no natural gas reservoirs on its territory, imports in the winter electricity produced in Germany, which this year is facing a dramatic decrease in Russian gas exports.

“The other problem is that on the French side, half of the nuclear reactors are out of order” due to infrastructure deterioration problems, Stéphane Genoud, professor of Energy Management at the Haute Ecole Spécialisée de Suisse occidentale (HES-SO), explained to AFP.

This coincidence of negative factors creates fears of electricity shortages.

Experts and non-governmental organizations are talking about Switzerland’s delay in the energy transition, at a time when the country has decided to phase out nuclear power after the Fukushima disaster in 2011.

In 2020, Switzerland only had about forty wind installations.

According to Boris Salak, an expert at the Institut fédéral de recherches sur la forêt, la neige et le paysage (Federal Research Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape), 750 wind energy units and solar panels on a third of the roofs would be enough to meet the government’s 2050 energy strategy targets.

At the end of 2021, even before the war in Ukraine, the Swiss Commission for Electrification in the event of a crisis warned of the “increased” risk of electricity shortages in the country.

In recent days, the government has asked not to dramatize the situation, while assuring that it is preparing for power shortages.

The chairman of the Federal Electric Power Commission is warning of the possibility of long power outages this winter.

The Swiss are turning to generators and solar panels for the balcony, while left-wing parties are calling for swift action.

Experts expect mild measures to be taken to encourage people to reduce electricity consumption.

Stéphane Genoud considers it likely that Bern will introduce restrictive measures, such as “quotas for large consumers” of electricity, such as large businesses, or blackouts.

But he hopes that “if the French can get the reactors back up and running, if Putin doesn’t get his hands on it, we’ll avoid shortages or blackouts.”

Source: RES-MPE