Estonia clears nuclear power after grid exit

In February 2025, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania completed a break they had planned for more than a decade: they left the Russian-controlled BRELL electricity system and synchronised with continental Europe’s grid (ENTSO-E, Kleinman Center). Politically, that was the independence moment. Technically, it was only the start.

On 17 June 2026, Estonia’s parliament voted 63 to 10 for the Nuclear Energy and Safety Act, giving the country a legal basis for peaceful nuclear energy for the first time in its history (Riigikogu). The law does not approve a reactor, pick a site or bind the state to build one. It sets the rules: who regulates, how permits are granted, and who carries the cost of nuclear waste.

From cutting a cord to filling the gap

Electricity grids do not work like storage rooms. Power going in and power being used must match almost instantly, otherwise the system becomes unstable. Wind and solar are cheap when they produce, but they follow the weather. Batteries help over hours, not usually over weeks. Interconnectors allow a country to draw from neighbours, provided those neighbours have enough to spare.

After leaving BRELL, the Baltic states no longer rely on Moscow for frequency control, the constant balancing that keeps the system steady. But they also lost the physical support of Russia’s large generator fleet. Those huge spinning machines acted like a flywheel, absorbing sudden shifts in supply and demand.

That burden now sits with Baltic grids and their European partners. Lithuanian market data already shows the pressure: in one recent week, local generation fell while demand rose, and imports had to jump in response (LRT). Cross-border cables help, but they have limits. If capacity is kept aside for grid stability, less room remains for cheaper electricity to move between countries.

For a small EU state, this is not an abstract engineering problem. Malta knows the politics of energy dependence well: once security of supply depends on outside links, fuel chains or neighbours’ spare capacity, technical design becomes national policy.

Nuclear fits Estonia’s problem because it offers firm low-carbon power. It runs regardless of the weather and, through large spinning turbines, brings back some of the physical inertia the Baltics lost when they left BRELL. It does not remove the need for cables, batteries or demand management. It changes the balance of reliable supply inside the system.

A roadmap with many checkpoints

Estonia’s law creates a regulator inside the Consumer Protection and Technical Regulatory Authority, known as TTJA, which is due to begin operations on 1 January 2027. The permitting route is deliberately staged: preliminary assessment, construction licence, testing, operation and decommissioning (Riigikogu).

Parliament also kept a political lock on the process. Any construction decision will need approval from lawmakers themselves, as well as from the regulator and the government.

The company hoping to move through this framework is Fermi Energia. It wants to build two GE Hitachi BWRX-300 small modular reactors. That design is already under construction at Ontario’s Darlington site and is under regulatory review in the United States, so Estonia is not dealing only with a drawing-board concept (ANS). The target is first power by 2036 (ERR).

The estimated cost for roughly 600 MW of capacity is €4.5 billion. Estonia’s Ministry of Climate says dozens of implementing regulations are still needed. The government’s current line is that the state will not finance a nuclear plant, while Fermi says the project needs a state-backed price guarantee.

That is probably the real gate. A law can make nuclear possible. Investors will only commit billions if the revenue model is bankable.

The neighbours’ answer sheet

Estonia is not trying to solve the Baltic energy problem alone. Sweden’s Riksdag approved broader nuclear siting rules on 15 June 2026, and Vattenfall has selected Rolls-Royce SMR technology for three units near Ringhals (Riksdag, Rolls-Royce). Even there, Vattenfall’s chief executive places those reactors around 2040 (SVT).

Latvia is putting its money into interconnectors and battery storage rather than nuclear (TEGOS Legal). Lithuania has the cautionary memory. Dismantling its Soviet-era Ignalina reactors will continue until 2049, spent fuel will need storage for 50 years, and a geological repository will be required by 2090 (LRT English).

The EU framework has also moved. Nuclear now qualifies under the taxonomy’s climate rules, and the Net-Zero Industry Act treats small modular reactors as strategic technology (EUR-Lex, World Nuclear News). That can open doors for state support. It does not turn a decade-long path from law to electricity into a short one.

Estonia has approved the road, not the vehicle. The test of Baltic energy sovereignty will come through the 2030s and 2040s: regulators hired, cables built, contracts signed and reactors that actually produce power. Nuclear may become part of that system. Whether it does depends on questions no Act of Parliament can settle on its own: who pays, who builds, and whether Europe can turn small modular reactors from promising technology into proven infrastructure.