Nuclear Policies in Europe

Nuclear Policies in Europe
Author: Bruno Tertrais
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 97
Release: 2013-09-13
Genre: History
ISBN: 1136060766

While international security has radically changed since 1989, nuclear weapons remain a subject of debate and contention. This paper provides an analytical framework for understanding post-Cold War Europe's strategic debates. It offers insights into Europe's national nuclear policies and perspectives. It examines the possible outcomes of current debates, and gives policy recommendations for managing the new nuclear debates faced by Europe, and by NATO.

The Technological and Economic Future of Nuclear Power

The Technological and Economic Future of Nuclear Power
Author: Reinhard Haas
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 385
Release: 2019-01-01
Genre: Agriculture (General)
ISBN: 3658259876

This open access book discusses the eroding economics of nuclear power for electricity generation as well as technical, legal, and political acceptance issues. The use of nuclear power for electricity generation is still a heavily disputed issue. Aside from technical risks, safety issues, and the unsolved problem of nuclear waste disposal, the economic performance is currently a major barrier. In recent years, the costs have skyrocketed especially in the European countries and North America. At the same time, the costs of alternatives such as photovoltaics and wind power have significantly decreased. Contents History and Current Status of the World Nuclear Industry The Dramatic Decrease of the Economics of Nuclear Power Nuclear Policy in the EU The Legacy of Csernobyl and Fukushima Nuclear Waste and Decommissioning of Nuclear Power Plants Alternatives: Heading Towards Sustainable Electricity Systems Target Groups Researchers and students in the fields of political, economic and technical sciences Energy (policy) experts, nuclear energy experts and practitioners, economists, engineers, consultants, civil society organizations The Editors Prof. Dr. Reinhard Haas is University Professor of energy economics at the Institute of Energy Systems and Electric Drives at Technische Universität Wien, Austria. PD Dr. Lutz Mez is Associate Professor at the Department for Political and Social Sciences of Freie Universität Berlin, Germany. PD Dr. Amela Ajanovic is a senior researcher and lecturer at the Institute of Energy Systems and Electrical Drives at Technische Universität Wien, Austria.--

Europe and Iran’s Nuclear Crisis

Europe and Iran’s Nuclear Crisis
Author: Riccardo Alcaro
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 296
Release: 2018-04-09
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 3319742981

This book investigates the European involvement in managing the nuclear dispute with Iran, shedding new light on EU foreign policy-making. The author focuses on the peculiar format through which the EU managed Iran’s nuclear issue: a ‘lead group’ consisting of France, Germany and the UK and the High Representative for EU foreign policy (E3/EU). The experience of the E3/EU lends credibility to the claim that lead groups give EU foreign policy direction and substance. The E3/EU set up a negotiating framework that worked as a de-escalating tool, a catalyst for Security Council unity and a forum for crisis management. They inflicted pain on Iran by adopting a comprehensive sanctions regime, but did so only having secured US commitment to a diplomatic solution. Once the deal was reached, they defended it vigorously. The E3/EU may have been supporting actors, but their achievements were real.

Politics and Nuclear Power

Politics and Nuclear Power
Author: Michael T. Hatch
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Total Pages: 230
Release: 2014-07-15
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0813163072

With the dramatic changes OPEC precipitated in the structure of world energy markets during the 1970s, energy became a central concern to policymakers throughout the industrialized West. This book ex-amines the responses of public officials in three leading European nations -- the Federal Republic of Germany, France, and the Netherlands -- to the energy crisis. As the study shows, the proposed energy programs in the three countries shared remarkable similarities; yet the policy outcomes were very different. To explain why, Michael T. Hatch goes beyond the specific content of government energy policy to include an analysis of the policymaking process itself. At the heart of the study is an exploration of the various dimensions of nuclear policy in West Germany. The political consensus on nuclear power that prevailed in the initial years following the energy crisis disintegrated as antinuclear "citizens' initiatives," the courts, and trade unions, as well as the traditional political parties, entered the policymaking process. Subsequent government efforts to resolve the political stalemate over nuclear power foundered in a morass of domestic electoral politics and an international debate over nuclear proliferation. Extending the analysis to comparisons with French and Dutch nuclear strategies, Hatch argues that the critical factor in determining nuclear policy was the manner in which the political system structured the nuclear debate. In contrast to West Germany, where the electoral and parliamentary systems enhanced the influence of the antinuclear "Greens," the electoral system and constellation of political parties in France served to dissipate the influence of the antinuclear forces. Thus in France the nuclear program en-countered few impediments. In the Netherlands, as in West Germany, government policy was paralyzed in the face of antinuclear sentiment across a broad spectrum of Dutch society. Hatch has provided here not only a useful examination of the development of energy policy in western Europe but also a case study of the close interplay between policy and politics.

Europe and Iran

Europe and Iran
Author: Cornelius Adebahr
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 201
Release: 2017-04-21
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1315513277

The EU’s approach to Iran has emerged as one of the few successes of European foreign policy. Still, its role in international negotiations from 2003, as much as its broader approach to Iran, are generally poorly appreciated by policy-makers in Europe, the United States, and around the world. This book aims to explain the specifics of the EU’s approach to Iran, taking into account both the complexity of European foreign policy, in particular within transatlantic relations, and Iran’s (aspired) place in the international order. It informs the reader about the special negotiation format that included a number of world powers as well as multilateral bodies such as the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the UN Security Council. Furthermore, it provides an outlook on European post-nuclear deal strategies and offers conclusions on the effectiveness of Europe’s multilateral approach to foreign policy. By looking at the EU’s diplomatic activities towards Iran over more than a decade, the book focuses on Europe’s actorness in international politics. This text will be of key interest to scholars, students and practitioners involved or interested in the European Union, Iran, U.S. foreign policy as well as Foreign and Security policy, including sanctions policy, and more broadly to European Politics, Middle East studies and international relations.

U.S.-European Nonproliferation Perspectives

U.S.-European Nonproliferation Perspectives
Author: Camille Grand
Publisher: CSIS
Total Pages: 60
Release: 2009
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780892065745

Since the fall of the Berlin wall, the two sides of the Atlantic have struggled to identify a new common project and create the tools and institutions needed to address common challenges. To their credit, they have transformed their militaries, integrated new members into Western institutions such as the European Union and NATO, deepened economic ties, developed new partnerships, and acquired new capabilities. But they have also had a number of ugly and public disputes over the nature and severity of the threats they face as well as the means necessary to combat such threats. Now, several years after the dark days of 2002 and 2003, the transatlantic partners are working toward renewal. Although Iraq remains a stain on their relationship, Europe and the United States have come to realize that, however vast their differences might be, they remain indispensible partners to each other. The question before the two partners today, particularly in light of the change in administration in Washington, is how to capitalize on their comparative strengths to address a long list of common challenges--one of the most pressing of which is nuclear proliferation. In an effort to shed light on the issues, CSIS commissioned a series of essays on European perspectives on nonproliferation. This new report offers a starting point for a new, shared understanding of the threat. It begins not with a look at the official positions of states with regard to nonproliferation initiatives, but instead aims to help experts and interested observers understand some of the underlying historical, political, and cultural bases on which national views in Europe on nuclear threats are founded. These papers help reveal a range of views on nuclear weapons and proliferation and shed light on some of the attitudes that underpin national policies on key issues.

Europe and Nuclear Disarmament

Europe and Nuclear Disarmament
Author: Harald Müller
Publisher: P.I.E-Peter Lang S.A., Editions Scientifiques Internationales
Total Pages: 318
Release: 1998
Genre: History
ISBN:

During the Cold War, Europe - at both sides of the Iron Curtain - was the area with the highest concentration of nuclear weapons in the world. These weapons were integrated into the security policies and military strategies of either side and would have probably used early in a military confrontation. The revolution of 1989/1991 has changed the parameters of European security completely. The huge conventional forces of the Warsaw Treaty Organization have disappeared, the Soviet Union dissolved, as did the WTO. The rationale for keeping thousands of tactical nuclear weapons in Western Europe did thus no longer exist, and NATO reduced the number of these deployed weapons drastically. Yet, nuclear weapons play still a role in Western as well as in Russian military strategy, and they have a major impact on the way NATO enlargement is viewed in Moscow in the ways Russia reacts to this process, even though NATO has declared not to station muclear arms in any of the new member states. This is the framework within which the authors of this book inquire the thinking in European countries about nuclear weapons, security, arms control and disarmament. Their findings point to a considerable inertia of thinking. While in the United States, a major debate is under way to question the utility of nuclear weapons altogether and to explore possible pathes towards complete nuclear disarmament, such a debate is not discernible in Europe. Political elites are rather cautious; while they support the disarmament process in principle, and have clear ideas what the next steps might be, they are the more cautious the more far-reaching measures are proposed, and display considerable skepticism towards the ultimate goal of a world free of nuclear arms.

Politics and Nuclear Power

Politics and Nuclear Power
Author: Michael T. Hatch
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Total Pages: 243
Release: 2021-12-15
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0813181968

With the dramatic changes OPEC precipitated in the structure of world energy markets during the 1970s, energy became a central concern to policymakers throughout the industrialized West. This book ex-amines the responses of public officials in three leading European nations—the Federal Republic of Germany, France, and the Netherlands—to the energy crisis. As the study shows, the proposed energy programs in the three countries shared remarkable similarities; yet the policy outcomes were very different. To explain why, Michael T. Hatch goes beyond the specific content of government energy policy to include an analysis of the policymaking process itself. At the heart of the study is an exploration of the various dimensions of nuclear policy in West Germany. The political consensus on nuclear power that prevailed in the initial years following the energy crisis disintegrated as antinuclear "citizens' initiatives," the courts, and trade unions, as well as the traditional political parties, entered the policymaking process. Subsequent government efforts to resolve the political stalemate over nuclear power foundered in a morass of domestic electoral politics and an international debate over nuclear proliferation. Extending the analysis to comparisons with French and Dutch nuclear strategies, Hatch argues that the critical factor in determining nuclear policy was the manner in which the political system structured the nuclear debate. In contrast to West Germany, where the electoral and parliamentary systems enhanced the influence of the antinuclear "Greens," the electoral system and constellation of political parties in France served to dissipate the influence of the antinuclear forces. Thus in France the nuclear program en-countered few impediments. In the Netherlands, as in West Germany, government policy was paralyzed in the face of antinuclear sentiment across a broad spectrum of Dutch society. Hatch has provided here not only a useful examination of the development of energy policy in western Europe but also a case study of the close interplay between policy and politics.