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The Russian energy grid doesn't really have a reputation for being carbon neutral...



Don't they have more nuclear poweplants than most places in the west?


They have a sizeable nuclear electricity production, and in energy use overall they are behind USA, but still worse than many other places:

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EN.ATM.CO2E.PC?end=2018...


Russian nuclear is ~17% (compare US at 19%). Overall it is slightly less CO2-intensive than the US, as it uses less coal. They have almost as much hydroelectric power as the entire US renewable sector.


Might be more, but it's still a minority of their grid. Wikipedia has a graph for 2016: 18.1% nuclear, 47.9% natural gas, and 15.7% coal.[0]

"Energy Matters" says that EU energy production was 26% nuclear in 2015, but only 12% for consumption[1], so I'm not sure how to look at that comparison. Either way, that's probably mostly France (~80%[2]). US around 8-9%[1].

TL;DR: Yes, most western countries probably have less nuclear, but it's a low bar.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_Russia#M...

[1] http://euanmearns.com/primary-energy-in-the-european-union-a...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_France#M...




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