Romania, Among The First EU Members To Shut Down Coal-Fired Power Plants

Romania, Britain, Poland, Spain and France are on top of the list of E.U. Members forced to shut down coal-fired power plants by 2015 in order to comply with pollution thresholds, according to information published by the European Commission on Friday and quoted by Reuters. Seventeen of the 27 E.U. Members have chosen 205 coal-fired power plants to be shut-down, Reuters reported.

Romania has selected the largest number of plants to be shut-down - 41 - but most of them are small and were built in the communist period. Britain has selected 13, Poland 37 and Spain 10. According to NewsIn, talks on this kind of pollution have been clouded by negotiations on lower carbon dioxide emissions for several years. The subject is back on the agenda in 2009 and some countries could ask for an extension of the deadline set for closing coal-fired power plants. The E.U. in 2001 passed a law package designed to lower sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions from factories that burn fossil fuels. These chemical compounds have been found to cause various illnesses and increase the acidity of lake water and soil.

The law package was opposed by some of the Members, including Britain, who claimed that it could cause an electricity deficit through a 25% production cut in the following decade within the broader context of air quality standards and the decommissioning of several nuclear reactors at the end of their lifespan. The matter will be debated during the next meeting of Environment Ministers, scheduled for 2 March in Brussels.