Klaus Deuse reports that shutting down the German nuclear power plants is going to be atrociously expensive. Experts also doubt the funds set aside will be enough to cover the costs of scrapping the plants and their radioactive waste. The decision to move away from nuclear energy is a done deal in Germany, where all nuclear power plants are intended to be offline by 2022. It was a political decision that will cost billions of euros, while the expansion of renewable energy is already pushing up electricity rates. It also remains unclear exactly how much it will cost to dismantle the power plants after they have been mothballed. Experts are certain that the 34 billion euros set aside by plant operators for this purpose will not be enough to do the job.
The government officially lists 9 nuclear plants as providing electricity for the German power grid. Eight additional reactors were already switched off in the wake of the Fukushima incident in Japan, which, by the way, had little to do with the nuclear power plants. There are also 16 power stations currently undergoing the long shut-down process. In total, there are at least 33 facilities that will need to be dismantled and whose contaminated scrap will have to be disposed of. Aside from the costs involved, there is also the question of where to store the spent nuclear fuel. The federal government calculated in April 2013 that the selection of a site for this purpose over the next 15 years would cost two billion euros.
We wonder if Mr. Deuse is beginning to ask how long it will take for Germany to reverse course and avoid the costly mistake of shutting down their fleet of nuclear power plants when: 1) the impact of the potential loss of the natural gas from the east, 2) the actual cost of renewable energy sources, and 3) the unacceptability of burning their brown coal (lignite)becomes obvious, once again, to German politicians. The Germans should lead the way in nuclear power development, not cave in.
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