LONDON (Reuters) – Half of Poland’s electricity generation will come from coal by 2040 though coal production should remain at current levels as energy demand is expected to increase, a senior government official said on Tuesday.
Poland and Germany are jointly responsible for over half of the EU’s carbon dioxide emissions from coal. Currently, around 80 percent of Poland’s power production is provided by coal-fired plant generation. It aims to cut that to half by 2040, with renewables and nuclear providing much of the rest and gas-fired generation providing back-up.
Earlier this year, Poland said it planned to lower the share of coal in its energy production to 60 percent in 2030 and around 50 percent in 2050.
“We would like to keep the level of hard coal production at the level it is today. Some mines will be decommissioned but demand for energy will grow. All transition in the sector will be in cooperation with the European Commission,” Piotr Naimski, who is responsible for strategic energy infrastructure, told Reuters at the Bloomberg NEF future of energy summit.
Under a long-term plan to restructure the coal industry, some of the oldest and most polluting coal-fired power units could be decommissioned and replaced with bigger, cleaner and more efficient units, he said.
For the rest of this article: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-poland-energy/polands-power-from-coal-seen-down-at-50-percent-by-2040-government-official-idUSKCN1MC2FM