The 2016 Energy Agreement and the Greens' Acceptance of New Reactors
In June 2016 the Greens signed a cross-bloc energy agreement that let new reactors be built on existing sites, capped at ten, and left the nuclear phase-out law off the books. In return the parties set a target of 100% renewable electricity by 2040.
- Betrayal Energy MP In 2016 the Greens, a party born from the anti-nuclear movement, signed a cross-bloc energy deal that allowed new reactors to be built on existing sites (capped at ten) and kept the phase-out law off the books, in exchange for a 2040 target of 100% renewable electricity.
Why this verdict?
MP was founded from the anti-nuclear movement; opposition to new reactors had been a core party identity for decades. The 2016 cross-bloc energy deal was negotiated by the government and accepted by MP leadership without a prior congress mandate to allow new reactors on existing sites. No member vote preceded it. Betrayal.
The Greens came out of Sweden’s anti-nuclear movement, and opposition to nuclear power had been part of the party’s identity from the start. Once they were in government, the Greens were still the party people tied most closely to the demand to shut the country’s reactors down. Coverage from 2014 already pointed out that the party was having to give ground here now that it was governing rather than campaigning.
On 10 June 2016 the party put its name to a cross-bloc energy agreement that reached across the usual government-opposition divide. The deal let new reactors be built on existing nuclear sites, set a ceiling of ten reactors, and left the phase-out law gone instead of restoring it. For a party that had argued for closing reactors, that was a sharp turn.
In exchange the Greens won a clause in the same agreement: a target of 100 percent renewable electricity by 2040. They accepted that new reactors could be built, and the other signatories committed to the renewable goal alongside them. Nobody dressed up the swap as anything else.
The party had carried the anti-nuclear cause for decades, and here it moved from opposing reactors to tolerating new ones inside a negotiated deal. For how we read shifts like this against a party’s earlier line, see how we read a value shift.
Related entities
On the values timeline
- 2008EU · In autumn 2008 the Greens dropped their long-standing demand that Sweden leave the EU, after a member vote split 55-45 in favour of accepting membership.
- 2015Migration · In government, the Greens carried an asylum tightening they had long opposed.
- you are here2016Energy · In 2016 the Greens, a party born from the anti-nuclear movement, signed a cross-bloc energy deal that allowed new reactors to be built on existing sites (capped at ten) and kept the phase-out law off the books, in exchange for a 2040 target of 100% renewable electricity.
- 2019Economy · To stay in government after the 2018 deadlock, the Greens signed the 73-point January Agreement in 2019 and accepted market-liberal reforms they had earlier resisted, including inquiries into market rents and looser labour rules.
- C2009Once Sweden's defining anti-nuclear party, the Centre Party under Maud Olofsson accepted the February 2009 Alliance energy deal to lift the ban on building new reactors.
- KD2009Once a champion of phasing out nuclear power, the Christian Democrats joined the 2009 Alliance government deal to scrap the ban on building new reactors.