(cont. from § 3) Energy policy (cont. NU19)

Rickard Nordin (C)

Mr. Speaker! Electricity prices have over the past year fallen back to more normal or actually quite low levels. And even though electricity prices vary, the average price, which is relevant for those who do not have a bill where they pay the hourly price, is quite low. In southern Sweden, it is down to 58 öre, I believe. That is welcome. No one wants the previous prices back, whether they are paid directly on the electricity bill or with subsidies on the tax return.

Instead of cementing the electricity price areas, which the government's business agency proposes – contrary to what we heard from the rostrum here earlier and actually what the government does through its own policy – we in the Center Party would like to see a policy that allows them to be abolished because they are no longer needed. Then, significantly more production is needed in southern Sweden. Skåne's effects commission has done an excellent job in developing proposals for how Skåne could become more independent. But those proposals are not being implemented, neither by the government nor by the Tidö parties in Skåne.

We need to have competitive prices on energy, whether it concerns electricity, fuels or heating. The previous speaker has basically spoken only about electricity, even though this is an energy debate. And we need to ensure that the energy is green, for the sake of the climate but also for the sake of competitiveness.

The government has put all its eggs in the same energy basket, but the Center Party sees a broad whole. We speak of the energy system when the government speaks of the electricity system. It is harmful that the government has set an energy policy goal that is not an energy policy goal but an electricity policy goal, which, moreover, has already been achieved in practice. Why should one then set such a goal? We should speak of the energy system. That is what is to become fossil-free. But it is quite telling of the government's ambitions. They want to do as little as possible.

When it comes to the energy system, we can start with the fuels. There, it is impossible to avoid talking about biogas. It took several years to get back the tax exemption that previously existed for biogas. During that time, it was 5 spänn more expensive at the pump. If it had concerned gasoline or diesel, there would have been a roar of outcry from the government. The commitment to pump prices during the election campaign obviously only concerned the fossil fuels.

Apparently, the Russian oil is more important to defend than the Swedish biogas. Something is not right here. We heard earlier that the solution to get more biogas was not more biogas and getting rid of the Russian gas, but rather more nuclear power. That is a dangerous message to the industry on the Swedish west coast. We need to seize the potential that exists in more digestion and – above all – in all the pyrolysis that exists.

Biogas vehicles need to receive the same support as electric cars. Goals for biogas production need to be set, and a conversion support to convert vehicles to, for example, biogas should be included in the green deduction. We in Centerpartiet also want to give households more freedom to choose more for themselves and decide what they think is best for their own finances. That is why we implemented the proposal on the green deduction. The person who installs solar cells, sets up a charging station, or installs battery storage should be able to decide a bit more themselves. Everyone should be able to participate in the transition together.

Now it is time to take this further. The green check we have proposed helps people with high electricity bills to be able to lower them by increasing efficiency and by being able to replace a battery storage located in a basement or an attic with a battery storage that happens to have four rubber wheels and is called an electric car. This would strengthen the Swedish energy system and help those people who are having it a bit tougher with the electricity bills.

At the same time, emissions are decreasing and we become less vulnerable, because it is much, much harder to shut down a million energy-producing units than ten. That is something the sitting government should consider in its eagerness for centralization. If we can also release the potential that exists in energy efficiency, where it is therefore profitable today to do things more efficiently – without sacrificing comfort or reducing the industry's needs – we can release as much electricity as would be needed to power the entire Swedish passenger car fleet. That is a pretty good thing. What does the government do then? Well, they scrap the goal that existed regarding energy efficiency.

If one does not have their own roof to put solar cells on and perhaps wants to join forces with neighbors to produce energy a bit more efficiently, it is important to have good conditions. Energy communities are something that occurs on an exceptional basis in Sweden. The Swedish Tax Agency's rules put a spoke in the wheel of being able to join together and solve the problems. At the same time, the solar tax means that one cannot build as large as one wants.

Here in Sweden, we are used to coming together and solving problems. We have road associations, fiber associations, and fisheries management associations. Now we have the opportunity to get energy associations as well. Let everyone who wants to take the chance to contribute.

The new project Energy Net in Lund creates many exciting new opportunities. If we had also been able to share the electricity virtually in the grids so that we could have avoided building parallel grids, it would have been even better.

More freedom and protection against natural monopolies are needed. When electricity grid companies and district heating companies can raise prices so significantly that they are even expelled from their own industry organizations, there is obviously a lack of transparency and governance. In that case, something is seriously wrong with the system.

Consumer protection must be strengthened. The Energy Markets Inspectorate must put an end to the processes that have been occurring, where one only loses and prices are raised. There should be a truce that ensures consumers get it better. The large companies – and the politics – need to take responsibility for transparency and pricing. We cannot have a grid regulation that makes it most profitable to carry out the most expensive measures by expanding the grid rather than by improving efficiency.

We also see a need for large-scale storage, hydropower dams, pumped storage, solar energy storage, hydrogen infrastructure, batteries and much more. The solutions to manage the energy that we have in abundance in Sweden exist. However, more strategic work is needed.

When Volvo has launched electric cars that can support the electricity system, it makes an enormous difference, but the regulations are not in place. Politics has not done its part, even though this could radically lower the costs for the electricity system as a whole.

The green transition is an opportunity for Sweden. The government seems to believe that it is about green varnish and that we should do as little as possible, but it is precisely the opposite. It is clear that it is the Center Party that is driving the bourgeois agenda in Swedish politics, because when the business sector pushes for the transition, we respond. When their customers want green products, we solve it.

The business community is not sentimental about Sweden. If we do not support them and lead the way, they will move. This has already begun to happen. We see how green projects leave Sweden or shut down. The latest example is the development of electric aviation, which is not getting the right conditions here. Then they move to the USA. This is the government's responsibility. This also increases emissions and unemployment. We should do exactly the opposite.

A report was recently released from Västra Götalandsregionen showing that 25,000 jobs are threatened if we do not solve the electricity supply by 2030. Still, Ebba Busch has the nerve to say that offshore wind power does not help. Nor does onshore wind power, solar energy, or anything else help – and above all, not flexibility and storage.

But how are we going to get new nuclear power started by 2030? Svenska kraftnät, Energimyndigheten, Svenskt Näringsliv, Volvo, SCA, Holmen, Vattenfall – in short, everyone – says that we can solve this with the technology we have at our disposal. Even the politicians in Skåne say it. But the government blames the laws of physics.

Obviously, there are different physical laws at the Government Offices than in the rest of society. They seem to view things that have been solved perfectly well in many other countries as impossible. The government's focus is far away. They do not care about meeting the needs in the near term. It is the year 2045 we are to focus on. However, that is too distant for the industry to invest.

We see the same reasoning regarding the climate goals, and it is not so strange. The needs we have are in the short term, but the government's solutions are only in the long term. One chooses to ignore the here and now, even though it leads to increased emissions and increased unemployment and is deeply harmful for Sweden.

One sometimes wonders if the government wants to delay, postpone, and make things more expensive. How else are we to interpret the current policy? The only solution is spelled nuclear power. We in Centerpartiet do not rule this out, but it is difficult to make biogas out of electrons.

We do not intend to let the taxpayers foot the bill. Furthermore, this was also the Moderaternas position before the election. Kristersson said then that the state should not co-finance new nuclear power. Earlier in the chamber, we heard that the Moderaterna have had the same energy policy for the last 50 years. I wonder what happened. Suddenly, we are to subsidize nuclear power with hundreds – perhaps thousands – of billions. How is it that we are not to co-finance new nuclear power?

The government's calculations in the bill being presented are, moreover, "best-case" calculations. They calculate faster construction times than anyone else has done in modern European history. They calculate a higher electricity price than in some other assessments in Sweden. They provide more generous conditions than anyone else, and they calculate less impact on other investments than anyone else. Still, it becomes expensive.

More realistic assessments are about the fact that it is thousands of billions that the taxpayers will have to bear, even though there are solutions that can be implemented cheaper and faster. Then, when do the bourgeois parties deal with planned economy?

It is spoken nicely about not choosing power strokes but focusing on capabilities. Why then does the government not do that? It was spoken of earlier that we can investigate more alternatives. Why then do we not do that? The government says one thing and does something completely different. If one had let go of the political prestige and focused on which solutions we have at our disposal, it would have become cheaper, faster, and better. We would also have solved the problems in a completely different way.

Investors are queuing to build these solutions. Let them do it! The pile regarding offshore wind power is growing again on the government's desk. There are once again projects that have waited quite a long time to receive a decision. Give them a decision! The number of solar parks waiting for the county administrative board's decision is enormous – 20 terawatt-hours are waiting for a decision. That is as much as two entire nuclear reactors.

Most recently yesterday, a debate article in Ny Teknik showed how long it takes to build. It was said to take one to one and a half years. Furthermore, it was said that this would make the grid more efficient in existing lines – contrary to what was said earlier here in the debate.

The defense must, of course, also be part of the solution. Just as in our neighboring countries, they should be an ally instead of an opponent. When it comes to this, the government needs to be clear in its instructions.

It also helps with the local will to actually compensate those who are affected and not just the landowners. This applies to both electricity production and the grid, and it does not only apply to wind power. It applies to all types of power.

The debacle with the hydropower pause is a chapter in itself. Soon the pause will expire. The referred proposal solves neither the problems with declining grayling stocks in the north nor the destroyed mill dams in the south. It makes the problems worse if possible. It is an achievement to make it worse than it already is!

Hydroelectric power owners who now do not know what applies, environmental organizations that see how biodiversity suffers, and the commission which at any moment may strike down on Sweden with heavy fines, that is nothing we want. Therefore, I move for approval of reservation 15 in the report.

There was a small glimmer of hope, I think, when I listened to the government representatives earlier in the debate. The Christian Democrats chose to speak about what unites rather than what divides. Then it is about time that we sit down for real and solve it. We maybe cannot solve 100 percent, but I believe we would all be very satisfied if we reached 80 percent. The energy industry would have received long-term conditions, the business community would have known what applies, and the emissions to the atmosphere could have decreased.

Let us therefore really focus on capabilities and not on technologies and prove it by making the support that the government soon proposes for nuclear power technology-neutral instead. I am convinced that we can solve this together – for the households, for the companies, for the climate and for Sweden's best.

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Birger Lahti (V)

Mr. Speaker! I want first to praise the Liberals, who are the only party in the Tidögänget that remains. That shows respect for a debate!

I could sign off on everything that MP Rickard Nordin said. I want to assert that he is one of the best spokespersons on energy policy.

I still want to ask one thing. The member mentioned the average price in southern Sweden. I have no reason to doubt what the member says. In my statement, I pointed out that there are pensioners in price area 1, where we have very low prices, who just over two years ago had a price of 34 öre per kilowatt-hour.

Different companies have calculated. In the best case, it was 94 öre per kilowatt-hour, in the worst case 120 öre. The pensioner signs. But his neighbor, who has not signed any agreement, gets an average price of 29 öre. The pensioner feels cheated and goes to the company and says that he wants to cancel the agreement. Yes, that works perfectly – pay 5,000 kronor!

He gets blown away in this system! We have a system where some earn heaps of money, and the consumers pay. What does the Center Party say? What could we do to solve this?

As I mentioned, I could sign off on everything, because I think we in many ways have a common view on what works and what does not. But how are we going to deal with a system where people are bullied and deceived, in addition to other problems that we have nurtured?

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Rickard Nordin (C)

Mr. Speaker! I also want to begin by praising the Liberals who remain. I can also praise Birger Lahti from the Left Party who also remains, even though he has already delivered his speech.

The Chairman raises an important issue regarding consumers who are deceived into unreasonable terms. Even the Consumer Agency has stated that these contractual terms, which result in one having to pay hefty fines to get out of a contract, are unreasonable. That type of agreement is therefore not valid to begin with, and as a consumer, it is good to know that it is not allowed to be that way.

The second thing is that this type of trickery should be punished severely, and I do not think one should rule out significantly tougher penalties for the criminal elements that it actually concerns. One should not be able to profit from deceiving and cheating people in this way. I have nothing left for them.

When it comes to the pricing itself, it is difficult to argue that everyone should be forced to have a variable electricity contract when it happens to be better for the moment. Whether it is a fixed contract or not is a choice that one must make in the same way as one negotiates their interest rate with the bank. But completely unreasonable contractual terms, as it has been in this case, should not be allowed.

Therefore, it is good that the Consumer Agency has taken its responsibility and pointed out the unreasonable practices. I assume that the courts will also take their responsibility and then rule accordingly.

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Birger Lahti (V)

Mr. Speaker! Thank you, Rickard Nordin, for the answer!

I agree that it is a path, but it is about the system itself. It is a socially important function.

It is not just about electricity, as the member mentions, but if we stick to electricity and distribution, I want to argue that an attempt has been made to create a market of very questionable systems. Then, the marginal pricing means that especially those in price area 4 are sometimes affected by unreasonable prices.

We have tried to look at that, and the Social Democrats have a different model regarding the folkhemmet. I am sure that it will be resolved in a few years. It will fall into place, and other countries on the continent are doing their homework. But doesn't the Center Party see that something should be done regarding these absurdities? It is not reasonable that it can fluctuate so that the price in the worst case can be 8 kronor in Skåne while I in Norrbotten, if I have a variable price, can get electricity for 14 öre.

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Rickard Nordin (C)

Mr. Speaker! First, it is probably worth remembering that prices will differ depending on where things are produced. A chocolate bar will be cheaper just outside Cloetta's factory in Linköping than it is on a mountain peak in Åre, because the supply looks a bit different and thus also the price picture.

It is, however, not reasonable as it has been in Sweden with the different electricity price areas, and there are two things that are the absolute best one can do to reduce the price differences.

The first thing is to ensure that Germany is divided into electricity price areas. Here, I think the government has been far too lax. The Danes sued Sweden, which resulted in us getting electricity price areas. Now, the Germans seem to be digging in their heels regarding the proposals on electricity price areas that have just arrived. In that case, Sweden will have to sue Germany! We have to be a bit more upright in Sweden and not so meek.

The second thing is, of course, to expand production. That is what Birger Lahtis' friends in the north have done. That has not been done in the south, and there, above all, the government parties are saying no to all new electricity production. When the 13 offshore wind farms were rejected, you practically told them in Skåne: Deal with it yourselves! You can continue to have high prices.

I hope that the people of Skåne take this with them and ensure that the government pays for it in the end.

This is the most important thing one can do. Then there are various bureaucratic parts and technical details that we can certainly discuss whether they are possible or not. But the fact remains that the best way to lower electricity prices in Skåne would have been to increase electricity production in Skåne, and that possibility is great if one says yes to it. It is Birger Lahti's party that is significantly better at doing that than the government parties are.

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Linus Lakso (MP)

Mr. Speaker! I shall spend a few minutes addressing the most shameless and flagrant lies that we have heard here in the chamber. I know of almost no other political area where what is said here in the chamber is so far from truth, facts, and the laws of physics as when we have energy debates.

It is a bit like Birger Lahti observed: If the nose grew for every lie, we would have to duck here in the chamber when Mats Green turns around in the speaker's chair.

I can start by saying that with Mats Green's policy, it would be total black in Sweden – zero kilowatts, zero kilowatt-hours. Mats Green wants, in fact, only energy types that deliver 100 percent of the time, around the clock, all hours of the year. That was what he said from the rostrum. Unfortunately, there is no such type of power, so already there we have a complete failure. I can mention that over the last ten years we have had over a hundred rapid shutdowns of nuclear power, Mats Green's favorite energy type.

Then we have the historiography that is totally detached from reality. In itself, it fits well into a right-wing nationalist historiography that everything was better before – Make America Great Again and so on. It is probably from that perspective that one should view the shameless lies we hear about history.

It is as follows, which I also mentioned in an exchange of remarks, that when we took over government power, we had Sweden's largest surplus of electricity. We had Europe's lowest electricity prices, and our energy system had been designated as the world's best by international organizations.

However, we had an energy crisis, and what was that due to, Mr. Speaker?

We saw that prices began to rise when Russia started choking off the gas taps to Europe in the autumn of 2021, and it escalated with Russia's full-scale invasion.

What conclusions can be drawn from that? That it perhaps wasn't very smart to be dependent on Russian fossil energy. But has anyone in the Tidö parties taken that lesson to heart? No, on the contrary, one has increased the dependence on fossil energy and likely also a very large share of Russian fossil energy – by significantly increasing fossil fuel use, especially in the transport sector.

Even in the electricity sector, we are witnessing a complete failure of the Tidö parties. When we handed over government power, we had reached a historically high expansion rate in terms of the electricity system. It was about over three gigawatts per year. We even need to maintain a higher rate than that to meet the demand that will come if we are to manage the green transition, reach our climate goals, and ensure Sweden's competitiveness.

But what is happening in reality? The expansion rate is collapsing. Since the Tidö parties took over, it has fallen by approximately 50 percent, and the forecast is that it will decrease even more by next year. With the Tidö parties' policy, it will therefore result in energy shortages and very high energy prices. This does not only apply to the next 20 years. I do not believe, in fact, that there will be any new nuclear power at all.

What is the reason for this then? It is naturally the exact opposite of what the majority of representatives for the Tidö parties are standing here and claiming. A full-scale war is being waged against renewable energy. Sweden lacks a goal for 2030 and 2035. We would need that to increase the expansion rate. What can be built here and now, and what can be built cheaply, is being strongly opposed. When it comes to wind power, the Tidö parties say no in between 70 and 100 percent of the cases.

We from Miljöpartiet have pushed for compensation to the municipalities for over ten years. It is actually good that a majority of parties in the Riksdag have changed their minds on that, but it is still dragging on. This should have been established already this year, but so far no municipality has received any money at all. The fact is that many municipal politicians, not least among the Tidö parties, have already promised their voters to say no to all wind power during this mandate period.

When it comes to solar energy, the conditions have significantly worsened. The green deduction is being lowered despite the fact that we have an unemployment crisis, including within the solar industry. We could reduce Sweden's unemployment by stepping in and temporarily increasing the support. Instead of renovated kitchens with an increased rotavdrag, we can expand Sweden's electricity supply. Miljöpartiet proposes that we should increase the green deduction to 25 percent, at least temporarily.

Energy efficiency is the absolute fastest, cheapest, and best way to make more cheap energy available. We have a potential that corresponds to two to three nuclear reactors. It is, therefore, profitable potential. But here, the Tidö parties have removed all policy for energy efficiency and the goal for energy efficiency. It is completely incomprehensible.

A 1 percent increase in energy efficiency can also lower the electricity price by approximately 5 percent. One also obtains a system effect to take into account.

When it comes to offshore wind, a dead hand has been placed over the entire Baltic Sea. One is also stopping the rest of the expansion by removing the support for building out power cables. Why should the state not be able to build a backbone grid out at sea when, for the same money, one can build a power line 100 miles through the whole of Sweden and build wind power in northern Sweden? Then one transports this through the whole of Sweden on land. But one cannot then build a significantly shorter line out at sea off the coast of Skåne and get cheaper electricity straight into SE4, something that would actually lower electricity prices in SE4 in a significantly shorter timeframe.

Like an onion on the salmon, one further slows down the investment willingness by moving forward with massive subsidies to a single type of power, which one has chosen to favor for ideological reasons. It obviously slows down the investment willingness when it comes to everything else. It is not possible to compete with hundreds or perhaps thousands of billions in subsidies to a selected favorite type of power.

Madam Speaker! Furthermore, the Tidö parties completely lack a policy for efficiency. There is a lot of talk about efficiency, about stabilizing the electricity system, and about our need for complements to renewables. Miljöpartiet has long proposed such a policy, and we have proposed a quantified target that is in line with what several experts and assessors have pointed out. But the Tidö parties say no to that.

We therefore have the opportunity already today to get more effect, among other things, from combined heat and power, which could perhaps contribute the equivalent of a nuclear reactor. There, we have proposed several reforms. Remove the electricity tax on converting electricity into district heating! Provide an investment subsidy so that the capacity can be increased! Provide an investment subsidy for gas turbines! They can be standalone or in so-called gas combined heat and power plants, where traditional district heating is combined with gas turbines.

It is in itself a number of the Tidö parties that are now pretending as if they have always been for this and who have started talking about more impact in the short term. But the problem is that they would like to drive this with Russian fossil gas. They have, in any case, no solution when it comes to actually producing more biogas in Sweden. It is, therefore, zero and nothing from the Tidö parties to get that production started. It is very strange.

We can get more power from hydropower, completely without additional environmental impact. We can simultaneously take measures that increase biodiversity. We can install more turbines in the power plants we already have to increase the regulation capacity in the power system and thereby enable significantly more solar and wind in the system.

But here, the Tidö parties want to do exactly the opposite: put all their eggs in one basket and only subsidize nuclear power – and it will not arrive within 20 years and likely not thereafter either.

Then we haven't even talked about what the costs are. There are a number of independent institutions of various kinds that have calculated this. It is therefore about thousands of billions in additional costs. If you break it down per household in Sweden, it amounts to approximately 1,000 kronor a month for 40 years – in additional costs for the Tidö parties' failed energy policy. I think that is something one should keep in mind when going to the ballot box next time, Madam Speaker.

We should probably remember the fundamental reason why we agree that we need more fossil-free electricity, namely that we need an energy and climate transition. Even here, the Tidö parties fail fundamentally.

We see no functioning policy for the green transition. We see that investments end up in other countries, and that undermines the entire idea of expanding the electricity system. It is, therefore, a failure on all fronts.

Last but not least, we can talk about the objectives for the energy system. Looking at the entire energy system, we are still heavily dependent on fossil energy. Therefore, it should be reasonable to set a goal of having a fossil-free energy system, but the Tidö Government has set a goal of having a fossil-free electricity system. That may sound good, but that goal was practically achieved already when it was set.

Therefore, Madam Speaker, I move for approval of reservation 5 regarding a target for a fossil-free energy system by 2035. It is something that is required for us to reach our climate goals.

We naturally stand behind all our other proposals in the report.

The deliberation was hereby concluded.

(A decision was to be taken on 14 May.)

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