The dry summer has reduced hydropower in Norway

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  • August 18, 2022

The dry summer has reduced hydropower in Norway

ASERAL, Norway — In a Nordic land famous for its steep fjords, where water is very nearly a way of life, Sverre Eikeland scaled down the boulders that form the walls of one of Norway’s chief reservoirs, past the driftwood that protruded like something caught in the dam’s teeth, and stood on dry land that should have been deeply submerged.

“You see the band where the vegetation stops,” said Mr. Eikeland, 43, the chief operating officer of Agder Energi, pointing at a stark, arid line 50 feet above the Skjerkevatn reservoir’s surface. “That’s where the water level should be.”

“We are not familiar with drought,” he added with a shrug. “We need water.”

It has been a summer of heat and drought across Europe, affecting nearly every part of the economy and even its normally cool regions, a phenomenon aggravated by human-caused climate change. France has been scarred by vast wildfires, and its Loire Valley is so dry the river can be crossed in places on foot. The Rhine in Germany is inches deep in parts, paralyzing essential commerce and stranding riverboat cruises. Italy is drier than at any time since 1800, and the growers of its iconic rice used for risotto now risk losing their harvest.

The shrinking waters of the Rhine in Bingen, Germany, on Sunday. Normally the island at right can be reached only by boat.
Credit…Ingmar Nolting for The New York Times
The shrinking waters of the Rhine in Bingen, Germany, on Sunday. Normally the island at right can be reached only by boat.

 

But perhaps the drought’s most surprising impact can be found in Norway’s usually drenched south, where sheep have gotten stuck in exposed mud banks and salmon have lacked enough water to migrate upriver. Hydropower reservoir supplies — responsible for 90 percent of Norway’s electricity as well as electricity exports to several of its neighbors — have sunk to the lowest point in 25 years, causing shortages that have driven up both prices and political tensions.

The summer’s extreme heat and devastating drought, coming on top of Russia’s weaponization of natural gas exports — in response to European Union sanctions for its war in Ukraine — have all combined to expose the vulnerabilities of Europe’s energy system in unexpected places and unanticipated ways.
In France, the warmed rivers have complicated the flushing of nuclear reactors, threatening their use. In Germany, the Rhine is too low to transport the coal to which the country is resorting in order to make up for lost Russian gas. And in Britain, the driest July in almost 90 years ignited wildfires around London and left thousands of northern homes without electricity.
“We call it a perfect storm,” said Steffen Syvertsen, the chief executive of Agder Energi, who was in nearby Arendal, where the country’s political and industry leaders gathered to debate whether the “Energy Crisis,” as the local media now call it, required a revisiting of electricity export deals with the European Union and Britain, or new subsidies for Norwegians to alleviate skyrocketing prices.
Firefighters spraying remnants of a wildfire near Belin-Beliet, in southwestern France, last Saturday.
Credit…Thibaud Moritz/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Firefighters spraying remnants of a wildfire near Belin-Beliet, in southwestern France, last Saturday.

 

In addition to the Russian gas cuts, a spike in demand as the economy emerges from the pandemic, a failure to add other renewables like wind to its energy portfolio, and the worst drought in years have sent Norway’s electricity prices to record levels, especially in the more heavily populated south.

While Norway is eager to integrate into the European market, the resource-rich country, which is a major exporter of gas and oil, is under pressure to keep more of its energy for itself. “The best way to solve this crisis and get energy security is to as fast as possible be independent from Russian gas,” said Mr. Syvertsen. “But that is a big task.”

On Tuesday, Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store told the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, during a visit to Oslo that while Norway would keep its commitments for delivery of electricity to the E.U. market, it could not spare any extra exports of gas.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/18/world/europe/drought-heat-energy.html

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