Working Paper: NBER ID: w26598
Authors: Stephen Jarvis; Olivier Deschenes; Akshaya Jha
Abstract: Many countries have phased out nuclear electricity production in response to concerns about nuclear waste and the risk of nuclear accidents. This paper examines the impact of the shutdown of roughly half of the nuclear production capacity in Germany after the Fukushima accident in 2011. We use hourly data on power plant operations and a novel machine learning framework to estimate how plants would have operated differently if the phase-out had not occurred. We find that the lost nuclear electricity production due to the phase-out was replaced primarily by coal-fired production and net electricity imports. The social cost of this shift from nuclear to coal is approximately 12 billion dollars per year. Over 70% of this cost comes from the increased mortality risk associated with exposure to the local air pollution emitted when burning fossil fuels. Even the largest estimates of the reduction in the costs associated with nuclear accident risk and waste disposal due to the phase-out are far smaller than 12 billion dollars.
Keywords: nuclear phaseout; energy policy; air pollution; social costs; Germany
JEL Codes: C4; Q4; Q5
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| reduction in nuclear electricity production (L94) | increased coal-fired production (L94) |
| reduction in nuclear electricity production (L94) | increased net electricity imports (L94) |
| benefits of reduced nuclear accident risks (L94) | costs associated with phaseout (J32) |
| nuclear phaseout (L94) | reduction in nuclear electricity production (L94) |
| increased coal-fired production (L94) | increased mortality risk from local air pollution (Q53) |
| nuclear phaseout (L94) | increased public health risks (I14) |
| nuclear phaseout (L94) | increased electricity prices (L97) |
| nuclear phaseout (L94) | increased production costs (D24) |