MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 14th October, 2021) Estonia has refused to join a statement by nine EU member states in support of the French president's initiative to label nuclear energy as green investment in the European Union's upcoming sustainable finance regulations, a senior official with the Estonian Ministry of the Environment said on Wednesday.
On Tuesday, nine European countries signed a joint statement backing French President Emmanuel Macron's push for including nuclear energy in the EU's list of energy sources with low carbon emissions, providing appropriate funding opportunities in the upcoming regulation on green investments.
"Since Estonia is still shaping its position, joining the statement would have been premature," the ministry's radiation adviser, Reelika Runnel, told the Estonian broadcasting service ERR.
Runnel added that Estonia does not use nuclear energy, but does not rule it out as a suitable solution to achieve climate goals.
In the coming months, the European Commission is expected to make a decision on whether to label nuclear energy as green investment in the new regulations regulations, aimed at redirecting private capital from economic activities causing pollution to those more environmentally friendly.
The statement, signed by Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Finland, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia, stresses the importance of nuclear energy to reduce Europe's dependence on energy sources from third countries, and states the need to add nuclear energy to the EU list of energy sources with low carbon emissions.
