**Summary: Germany’s Phase-Out of Nuclear Power and its Consequences**

**Germany’s Nuclear Exit: Rationale and Controversies**
- Germany steadily phased out nuclear energy, closing its last three plants reportedly as part of a plan to end atomic power and move toward carbon neutrality (“green” transition).

- The German government’s public rationale included safety concerns, claims that nuclear isn’t truly ‘clean’ or ‘green,’ and nuclear’s high costs and alleged lack of safety standards.

However, critics, including some experts, have accused the government of misrepresenting facts (for example, about nuclear fuel and risk) and lying to the public to justify its anti-nuclear stance.

- While rejecting nuclear, Germany appears more willing to support natural gas as a “transition fuel,” even though fossil gas is also "far from green" by EU standards.

**Energy Market Adaptation and Challenges**
- The nuclear exit removed a significant, stable power source from the German grid.

This loss came amid efforts to rapidly expand renewables, but intermittency remains a problem (wind and sun are not always available).

- Increased reliance on Russian gas filled much of the gap, making Germany highly dependent on the Russian state for energy supplies—a vulnerability sharply exposed by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

- The energy crisis sparked by the war led to campaigns for conserving energy, rapid filling of gas storage, and government efforts to cap high costs for consumers.

There is widespread anxiety over potential blackouts or insufficient heating, especially in winter.

High energy prices and cost-of-living spikes have hit lower- and middle-income Germans particularly hard.

**Political and Social Responses**
- Although the nuclear phase-out was championed by the Greens, it was ultimately backed by all major parties—a broad political consensus.

- Public unrest has grown due to economic hardship, but so far, there has been no large-scale industrial action or mass movement calling to reverse the nuclear exit, though debates continue in the context of energy insecurity.

- Some sectors advocate for revisiting nuclear options as France and Japan move to expand or restart reactors.

In contrast, the German government remains oppositional, including opposing nuclear’s designation as sustainable at the EU level.

**Impact of the Ukraine War**
- Germany’s reliance on Russian imports became a strategic liability.

The war radically worsened energy insecurity and sparked calls for diversified supply—including LNG imports and expanded renewables—but also reignited debates over nuclear’s role.

- The contrast with countries like France (doubling down on nuclear) and Japan (restarting reactors) highlights Germany’s unique path, often criticized as ideological and inflexible by international observers.

**Conclusion**
Germany’s nuclear phase-out was driven by a multi-faceted mix of safety, environmental, and political arguments but has left the country heavily exposed to energy security risks and economic shocks, especially highlighted by the Russian-Ukrainian war.

While the government maintains renewables and natural gas are enough to fill the gap, ongoing strains on the energy system and living standards fuel debate about whether the anti-nuclear stance is sustainable or wise in the long term.

**Nuggets and Summary of Extracts on Germany’s Move Away from Nuclear Energy (2022-2023):**

- **Russia-Ukraine War & Energy Supply:**
  - Russia’s invasion of Ukraine prompted the EU, including Germany, to impose sanctions on Russia.

In retaliation, Russia curtailed gas deliveries to Europe, directly threatening German energy security and risking economic recession.

- **Coal’s Return (Temporarily):**
  - Germany has reactivated coal-fired power stations as a stopgap to build up gas reserves before winter and to compensate for the loss of Russian gas and shuttered nuclear plants.

Officials stress this is temporary and does not signal abandonment of the plan to phase out coal entirely by 2030.

- **Political and Social Tensions:**
  - The governing coalition is split.

Social Democrats (Scholz’s party) and Greens oppose nuclear power, remaining committed to its phaseout (Accelerated after the 2011 Fukushima disaster).

The Free Democrats and some regional leaders, e.g., Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder, have pushed for delaying nuclear closures or even reconsidering the phaseout.

- Public dissatisfaction is evident; segments of the population and some politicians question the timing and wisdom of abandoning nuclear amid energy security concerns.

- **Nuclear Power Facts:**
  - Germany shut down three of six nuclear plants in 2021, with the final closures scheduled for 2022–2023.

The nuclear plants in question now make up only a small part of Germany’s electricity mix.

- Initially, after the Ukraine invasion, the government briefly extended reactor operation for a few months to avert short-term shortages.

- **Economic and Environmental Considerations:**
  - Loss of domestic nuclear generation makes Germany more dependent on coal and imported gas—problematic both for climate goals and security (especially with Russian gas supplies at risk).

- Hard coal mining is expensive in Germany, making imported coal more attractive but with bigger environmental and financial costs.

- The long-term plan is a major expansion of renewables (wind, solar) to replace both nuclear and fossil sources.

- **EU Nuclear Dependencies:**
  - The EU, including Germany, still relies on Russian uranium for existing nuclear power plants—a vulnerability noted after the Ukraine conflict.

- **No Return to Nuclear (Official Position):**
  - Chancellor Scholz and core energy ministers reiterate that nuclear is not part of Germany’s future energy mix, despite energy strains and temporary coal resurgence.

- **Nuclear Waste Legacy:**
  - With nuclear phased out, dealing with nuclear waste remains a major unresolved issue.

**In Sum:**
Germany’s nuclear exit has exposed vulnerabilities to both climate and security, especially during the Russian-Ukrainian war, requiring temporary increases in coal reliance—contradictory to climate goals.

Political, social, and economic divisions have emerged over nuclear’s future, but the official stance remains committed to phaseout.

There’s grassroots and political pressure to reconsider, but policy inertia and opposition from key coalition members prevent reopening the debate.

The situation shows the complexity of balancing decarbonization, energy security, and geopolitical risks.

**Summary of the Key Points Regarding Germany’s Nuclear Phase-Out & Energy Crisis Response**

1.

**Background on Germany’s Nuclear Exit**:
    - Germany has officially shut down its last three nuclear reactors, ending over 60 years of nuclear energy use, with a targeted aim to generate power from renewable sources only by 2035.

- The exit is part of a broader policy response to environmental and safety concerns (especially post-Fukushima), rooted in Germany’s commitment to carbon neutrality.

- Nuclear energy had previously been a massive and reliable part of Germany’s energy mix.

**Immediate Energy and Political Impacts**:
    - The German government faced internal debate during the 2022-2023 energy crisis, with some cabinet members supporting temporary nuclear extensions, while the Green Party consistently opposed it.

- The chancellor had to personally intervene to decide on extending nuclear through the winter, indicating high-level controversy.

- States like Bavaria lobbied to keep their nuclear plants running, citing local energy needs (e.g., Isar II reactor), but were denied by the central government.

**Effects on Energy Supply and Market**:
    - The loss of nuclear reduces a steady, carbon-free electricity supply, at a time when natural gas (especially from Russia) was under pressure due to the Russian-Ukrainian war.

- Prior to the Ukraine conflict, Russian gas made up 55% of Germany’s consumption.

The war triggered major supply disruptions and price hikes, revealing vulnerabilities in Germany’s energy strategy.

- The government responded by rapidly filling storage reserves, accelerating renewable expansion, and arranging liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports from the US and other countries.

**Challenges in Replacing Nuclear Power**:
    - Technical barriers exist to quickly restarting nuclear or scaling up new plants: lack of fuel rods, specialized personnel, and regulatory hurdles.

- The coal phase-out is still scheduled for 2038, but in the interim, some coal power was brought back online, causing concern from climate activists like Greta Thunberg.

- Greta Thunberg and some energy experts argue that shutting down nuclear only to increase coal use is a setback for climate goals.

**Societal and Political Pushback**:
    - There is a vocal segment of the population, regional governments (like Bavaria), and international figures advocating for revisiting the nuclear decision to ensure energy security and climate progress.

- However, current Berlin policy is firmly in favor of the phase-out, despite calls for temporary extensions during crises.

**European Context**:
    - Many EU countries view nuclear as essential for a low-carbon future and energy security, with new plants planned in Poland and elsewhere.

- Germany’s choice is thus somewhat isolated in the EU context, where nuclear is regaining favor due to energy security concerns.

**Summary Nugget**:
Germany’s nuclear phase-out, amidst the Ukraine war and energy insecurity, has exposed significant vulnerabilities: higher reliance on fossil fuels in the short term, market volatility, and public and political divisions.

Yet, the central government remains committed to a renewables-focused approach despite calls to revisit nuclear, while Europe overall is reassessing nuclear’s role in the energy transition.

- The anti-nuclear movement gained significant political influence with the rise of the Green Party in the 1980s, making nuclear phase-out a core policy goal.

**Summary: Germany’s Phase-Out of Nuclear Power and its Consequences**

**Germany’s Nuclear Exit: Rationale and Controversies**
- Germany steadily phased out nuclear energy, closing its last three plants reportedly as part of a plan to end atomic power and move toward carbon neutrality (“green” transition).

Title:

Content: Three nuclear-fired power plants will be taken off the grid in Germany on Friday as part of the country's plan to end atomic power.

"The nuclear phaseout makes our country safer and helps to avoid radioactive waste," said Federal Environment and Nuclear Safety Minister Steffi Lemke.

"It is now essential to ... advance the search for a final repository for high-level radioactive waste as well as permanent solutions for low- and medium-level radioactive waste," the environment ministry said.

Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel speeded up the phaseout following the 2011 Fukushima accident in Japan.

Friday's shutdown affects power plants in Brokdorf in Schleswig-Holstein, Grohnde in Lower Saxony and Gundremmingen C in Bavaria.

Germany's remaining three nuclear plants — Emsland in Lower Saxony, Isar 2 in Bavaria and Neckarwestheim 2 in Baden-Württemberg — will be closed by the end of 2022 "at the latest," the environment ministry said.

"Since 2011, Germany has been drawing a line under a highly problematic technology in an orderly, reliable process," Lemke said.

Nuclear accounts for about 10 percent of Germany's electricity production. The shutdown has sparked criticism as Germany will have to dramatically ramp up renewable energy and has also increased its reliance on highly polluting coal-fired power.

"Security of supply in Germany continues to be guaranteed," said Robert Habeck, federal climate and economy minister. He added that reliable and "sustainably generated electricity" is a "central requirement for aligning our economy and industry toward climate neutrality."

That stance puts Berlin at loggerheads with France, where nuclear is the largest element of its energy mix (and also helps supply Germany).

EU Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton said in September that existing nuclear plants, which provide low-carbon electricity essential to the green transition, can be kept running "for two, five, 10 years," adding: "Why deprive ourselves of this production capacity?"

France is planning to scale down the share of nuclear in its electricity mix from 75 percent to 50 percent by 2035, but President Emmanuel Macron said in November that France "will restart the construction of nuclear reactors" while "continuing to develop renewable energies."

Macron also said France will invest €1 billion into research and development, notably into small modular reactors.

Belgium recently decided to shut down all its nuclear power plants by 2025, but plans to invest €100 million in new generation nuclear reactors and research.

More from ... Louise Guillot

- The German government’s public rationale included safety concerns, claims that nuclear isn’t truly ‘clean’ or ‘green,’ and nuclear’s high costs and alleged lack of safety standards.

Title:

Content: EU chaos! Macron and Scholz in furious bust-up over EU energy plans: ‘Risky and expensive'

FRENCH President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz are locked in a furious bust-up over EU energy policy plans as disagreements have sparked division in the bloc.

Link copied

Macron wields 'tools to set EU agenda'

While France has been pushing for nuclear to be included in the EU’s sustainable finance taxonomy, Germany is in the process of completely phasing out the energy source in the country. The EU’s taxonomy is intended to hand a green badge to companies and activities — or to withhold it — to “help shift investments where they are most needed". This is part of the bloc’s aim to direct funding towards energy sources with a low or zero carbon footprint.

But this has sparked fury as Germany does not view nuclear power as a form of clean energy.

Mr Macron wants gas and nuclear to be labelled as a “transitional” source under the taxonomy as he claims they are needed for the clean energy transition.

He says that this is because renewables are “intermittent, and thus not totally substitutable, even with our interconnections [in Europe], for non-intermittent sources of electricity production” like gas or nuclear power.

And these calls do not come as much of a surprise, given that 70 percent of French electricity is generated by nuclear power.

Mr Macron has pointed to the verdict from experts on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to back up his calls.

Macron and Scholz are in a furious energy bust-up (Image: Getty )

Emmanuel Macron is pushing for nuclear power to be included in the EU taxonomy (Image: Getty )

They claim that “nuclear power is one of the solutions to decarbonise our economies”.

And this seems to have convinced Brussels, as the EU Commission drew up a draft proposal, circulated on 31 December, for this to come into effect.

Subject to a consultation period until Friday (21 January), It gave EU members and others just three weeks to analyse the proposal and provide their own comments.

Germany is strongly opposed to the nuclear plans and has been phasing out nuclear power for over two decades.

It also plans to shut down its three remaining plants at the end of the year.

READ MORE: World holds breath as Ukraine to fire rocket amid Russia tension

Olaf Scholz's Government is opposed to the EU's proposal (Image: Getty )

But it is not Berlin who disapproves of the proposal.

The EU Platform on Sustainable Finance, a European Commission advisory body, has torn the proposal apart.

In an opinion piece, it argued that nuclear power is not an entirely clean energy source, and that fossil gas is “far from green”.

Under the EU’s draft proposal, gas-fired power plants would get a “transitional” investment label if they meet a certain criteria.

That is if they use “at least 30 percent of renewable or low-carbon gases as of 1 January 2026, and at least 55 percent of renewable or low-carbon gases as of 1 January 2030”.

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Germany argued nuclear is not a clean energy source (Image: Getty )

And as of January 1, 2036, the Commission said all gas-fired power plants would have to “switch to renewable or low-carbon gases” to qualify for the EU’s green investment label.

But under EU rules, no technology can be considered green if it causes “significant harm” to any of the taxonomy’s six environmental objectives.

Those are climate change mitigation and adaptation, water protection, the transition to a circular economy, pollution prevention, and biodiversity protection.

Germany has been kicking up a fuss over the proposals, calling them “risky and expensive” in a letter sent to Brussels.

Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck said in a joint statement with Environment Minister Steffi Lemke: “As the federal government, we have once again clearly expressed our rejection of the inclusion of nuclear energy. It is risky and expensive."

Germany has also claimed that there is a lack of safety requirements in the nuclear field.

Robert Habeck sent a letter to Brussels slamming the proposal (Image: Getty )

And it argued that the lengthy construction of new reactors "does not offer a short-term opportunity" to phase out carbon-intensive energy sources such as coal.

But while it has poured cold water over nuclear plans, Germany does not seem so opposed to the inclusion of gas.

In the letter sent to Brussels, it reads that gas used in "ultra-modern and efficient gas-fired power plants forms a bridge for a limited transitional period".

But the German Government did mention that the proposed fuel switch targets to low-carbon and renewable gases laid out by the taxonomy proposal are not realistic.

And Mr Macron is travelling to Berlin today to meet with Mr Scholz.

While the leaders’ meeting will focus on the Russia’s mounting pressure on Ukraine, the energy plans will no doubt be a topic of conversation too.

However, critics, including some experts, have accused the government of misrepresenting facts (for example, about nuclear fuel and risk) and lying to the public to justify its anti-nuclear stance.

Title:

Content: You are here
Home > News > Germany lied about nuclear energy: expert

Germany lied about nuclear energy: expert

The German government misled its citizens about the possible extension of nuclear power plants, Jakub Wiech, deputy Editor-in-Chief of Energetyka24.com, wrote on Saturday. According to him, all indications are that Berlin’s aim was to close the units regardless of the risks.

He cited Simon Wakter, a Swedish nuclear engineer, who presented a series of materials on his social media showing that Berlin’s narrative on the nuclear issue was getting the truth wrong. As the journalist pointed out, Mr Wakter “has collected statements by German politicians and energy scientists from recent months, juxtaposing them.”

“In his reasoning, Mr Wakter cites, among other things, the German government’s key argument regarding nuclear fuel. Berlin claimed that extending the operation of the nuclear power plants was impossible due to the lack of contracted fuel rod supplies. However, according to Die Welt, there was a confidential meeting between ruling coalition politicians and representatives of nuclear plant operators in March 2022,” Mr Wiech wrote.

As he continued, at the meeting the latter stated that they were able to organise deliveries within a “reasonable timeframe,” however, Berlin took no action in this regard, going further into the narrative of being unable to provide fuel input.

“On exactly 8 March, the German government published a report listing the reasons why nuclear power plants can no longer operate. However, at the same time, those in power met with representatives of nuclear industry operators, who indicated solutions to the allegations made by the report,” Mr Wakter was quoted as saying by the journalist.

“As additional evidence, he points to a statement by a spokesman for Preussen Elektra, who says that the Isar nuclear power plant, one of the last three units of its type in Germany, can continue to operate beyond 31 December 2022 – and without additional supplies of nuclear fuel. Berlin’s argument in this regard has been shown to be a simple lie,” Mr Wiech wrote.

As he added, according to an opinion poll from spring 2022, the majority of Germans (65 percent) see nuclear power as part of measures aimed at meeting EU climate targets.

“So, as it turns out, the German government’s key arguments for shutting down nuclear power (lack of fuel and public opposition) turned out to be lies. One may wonder why Berlin is pushing so desperately to extinguish these units – despite the energy crisis,” Mr Wiech concluded.

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- While rejecting nuclear, Germany appears more willing to support natural gas as a “transition fuel,” even though fossil gas is also "far from green" by EU standards.

**Energy Market Adaptation and Challenges**
- The nuclear exit removed a significant, stable power source from the German grid.

Title:

Content: Germany opposes the EU’s designation of nuclear energy as sustainable energy

Osório Wind Farm, in Rio Grande do Sul

In the letter to Brussels, the German government also cited the lack of safety requirements in relation to nuclear power plants.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s three-party coalition government expressed objection to the European Union’s draft plan to classify nuclear plants as sustainable energy sources in a formal letter sent to Brussels, ministers said on Saturday.

The EU taxonomy seeks to set standards for green investments, helping climate-friendly projects raise capital and eliminating “green laundering” whereby investors and companies exaggerate their green credentials.

“As a federal government, we must once again clearly express our rejection of the inclusion of nuclear energy. It’s risky and expensive,” Deputy Chancellor and Economy Minister Robert Habeck said in a joint statement with Environment Minister Steffi Lemke, both senior members of the Green Party.

In the letter to Brussels, published by the Ministry of Economy on its website, the German government also cited the lack of safety requirements in relation to nuclear power plants.

“Serious, high risk, cross-border, long-term accidents to humans and the environment cannot be excluded,” Berlin said in its letter, adding that the question of where to store radioactive waste in the long term remains unanswered. .

Habeck and Leme said that if the European Commission does not consider Germany’s objections and does not modify the draft, Berlin, in their view, should reject the plan.

However, German government sources told Reuters earlier this month that coalition parties wanted to avoid an escalation in the dispute with the EU and had agreed to closed-door talks between the coalition to abstain from any future votes.

EU rules have long been delayed, with countries divided over whether nuclear power and natural gas deserve the green badge. Austria has already said it will take legal action if the European Union proceeds with the draft it calls both sustainable investments.

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Energy and climate: Austria, Denmark, Spain and Luxembourg challenge European Commission taxonomy

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This loss came amid efforts to rapidly expand renewables, but intermittency remains a problem (wind and sun are not always available).

Title:

Content: Home / News / World /  Germany quits nuclear power; shuts final 3 plants
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Germany has shut its final three nuclear plants, marking the end of the country's end of nuclear era that has spanned more than 60 years.

Nuclear power has long been contentious in Germany.

The move has come as Germany's eyes achieve its green goal. Steffi Lemke, Germany’s Federal Minister for the Environment and Consumer Protection and a Green Party member, "The position of the German government is clear: nuclear power is not green. Nor is it sustainable".

Closure of three nuclear plant's history:

Germany shut three plants-- Emsland, Isar 2, and Neckarwestheim, representing the culmination of a plan set in motion more than 20 years ago.

During the 1970s, a strong anti-nuclear movement emerged in Germany. The movement gave birth to the green party, which is now part of governing coalition.

However, it was in the 2000s the German government pledged to phase out nuclear power and start shutting down plants.

But in 2009, a new government came to power and it seemed brief as if nuclear would get a reprieve as a bridging technology to help the country move to renewable energy.

Then Fukushima happened. In 2011, an earthquake and tsunami caused three reactors of the Fukushima Daiichi power plant to melt down.

Three days later then-Chancellor Angela Merkel who was previously pro-nuclear, announced Germany would accelerate a nuclear phase-out, with older plants shuttered immediately.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine provided another plot twist.

Germany isn’t the only country committed to walking away from nuclear — Italy gave up the technology in 1990, and Lithuania recently struck a deal to dismantle its Soviet-era reactors, which have sat idle for over a decade. But in many advanced economies, nuclear is experiencing a resurgence.

On Sunday, Finland will start regular power production at Europe’s newest and biggest reactor. The 1,600-megawatt Olkiluoto-3 unit that faced years of delays had been planned to enter commercial production on Monday. France is planning to build at least six new reactors by 2050 as well as experiment with smaller, modular ones. The UK has similar ambitions. And even in Japan, after a decade of paralysis following the nuclear accident in Fukushima, the public is warming up to the use of nuclear power. The Japanese government wants to restart reactors that have sat idle since the disaster and to extend the lifespan of existing units.

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- Increased reliance on Russian gas filled much of the gap, making Germany highly dependent on the Russian state for energy supplies—a vulnerability sharply exposed by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Title:

Content: How decades of complacency have left Germany facing a cold, dark winter

Betrayed by its own elite, the country is at risk of social unrest

Germany is facing its worst winter for 75 years. The impending catastrophe risks crippling its economy, sweeping away its government and bringing chaos to the heart of Europe.

In 1946-47, perhaps half a million Germans starved or froze to death in their ruined cities. Older Germans still shudder at the memory of the “Hunger Winter”. Some blamed the Nazis, others the Allied occupation. In fact, the British sent food, fuel and clothing they could ill afford to spare themselves.

Now Europe’s largest economy is heading for a winter of recession, rationing and possible blackouts. This time, though, there is nobody to blame except Germany’s complacent – and in some cases corrupt – political establishment.

As Vladimir Putin chokes off Russian gas supplies – already down to a fifth of their pre-war level – by closing the Nord Stream 1 pipeline for “maintenance” yet again next week, the lamps are going out for Olaf Scholz and his “traffic light” coalition of Social Democrats, Liberal and Greens.

'Autumn of rage'

The Bundesbank has been predicting a recession and the latest figures show that business activity is already contracting. Inflation, which hit 8.5 per cent last month, is expected to keep rising along with the rest of the eurozone, probably into double figures.

Yet for historical reasons Germans won’t just accept high inflation as a consequence of the war in Ukraine. The world remembers the hyperinflation that undermined the Weimar Republic a century ago; only older Germans recall the hyperinflation after the Second World War, which lasted longer. For three years Germany’s only stable currency was American cigarettes. No wonder Germans have been allergic to inflation ever since.

It is true that Germans are not yet demanding big pay rises or going on strike. But energy prices are already rising exponentially. The country's one-year ahead power price has skyrocketed to almost €1,000 per megawatt-hour, a jump of more than 720pc since the start of 2022. If Putin turns off the tap, bringing the mighty German economy to a juddering halt this winter, there is a real danger of civil unrest.

Intelligence officials are warning that extremist organisations, such as the neo-Nazis of Combat 18, are planning an “autumn of rage”. As a foretaste, in the old Prussian town of Neuruppin near Berlin, there were ugly scenes this month as Scholz was shouted down by far-Left and far-Right protesters.

But the panic and indignation now brewing go far beyond the ranks of the “unteachable” extremists.

Germans sense that unaccountable elites have ceded control of their country’s destiny to Putin. The more they are must pay him for Russian gas, the bigger his war chest with which to perpetrate genocide in Ukraine.

Forcing Germany to be complicit in a colossal crime against humanity is a diabolical twist in the vengeance that Putin is now exacting upon Europe for backing Ukraine. According to The Economist’s Christian Odendahl, at present prices Germany will need to spend 8.4 per cent of its GDP on gas. Hitherto it was just 1 per cent.

Already preparations are underway for central heating to be rationed or even switched off, forcing residents to seek shelter in schools or town halls.

The country is scrambling to reduce its reliance on gas with a campaign to make households cut back, and a massive national effort has brought gas storage levels up to 81 per cent full.

Food prices, meanwhile, rose at a rate of nearly 15 per cent in July. Those who fear being unable to afford to heat their homes or feed their families are prey to angst and anger.

Actions have consequences... or do they?

Few foresaw the Russian invasion of Ukraine, let alone its devastating consequences for Europe. But it is dawning on the German people that the seeds of the present crisis were sown over the quarter of a century from 1998 to 2022, under Angela Merkel and her predecessor, Gerhard Schröder.

These were the years of plenty for Germany, when Berlin dominated the European Union, ensuring that its export-led economy benefited from the single currency while loading the social costs on to its poorer neighbours. But Germany’s dirty secret was cheap Russian energy.

Under Schröder – who went on to become one of Putin’s “useful idiots” – German industry began to abandon its postwar reliance on coal and nuclear energy in favour of Russian gas and renewables.

In 2011, after the Fukushima accident, Mrs Merkel announced that all German nuclear power plants would be closed down. It was a pyrrhic victory for the Greens but backed by all the major parties. Public opinion had been turned against nuclear energy in the 1980s by the Soviet-funded “peace movement”. Now the Greens are the keystone of the Scholz coalition.

Even in the country’s present predicament, Robert Habeck, the Green Vice-Chancellor and Environment Minister, is refusing to reverse the exit from nuclear to alleviate the energy crisis, though it is still possible over time to reactivate a number of nuclear power stations.

Yet Berlin is demanding that 26 other EU member states make huge cuts in energy use this winter to help Germany – to the irritation of the Spanish and others, who don’t depend on Russian gas and recall lectures from Berlin during the eurozone crisis about actions having consequences.

For decades, the Kremlin acted as Germany’s geopolitical drug-dealer, tempting Berlin to become ever more addicted to the energy that fuelled its manufacturing, pharmaceutical and chemical factories. Now that the Germans are about to go cold turkey, they are discovering how cynically the national interest was betrayed by their politicians and captains of industry.

With Schröder as its salesman, a new Nord Stream 2 pipeline was built under the Baltic Sea — with the blessing of Mrs Merkel, who fended off Anglo-American pressure to cancel what was regarded as a threat to European energy security.

Last year, as Russian tanks massed on the Ukrainian border and Nato warned of imminent invasion, Gazprom redoubled its efforts to keep the flagship project on track.

The Russian energy giant poured €192 million (£163m) into an environmental foundation set up by Manuela Schwesig, the Social Democratic premier of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern — the state that hosted Nord Stream 2 and stood to gain most. She proceeded to denounce the US for opposing the pipeline, claiming that American sanctions were purely self-interested.

Putin’s stooges almost succeeded in persuading Scholz to defy his Nato allies. He dithered until the eve of February’s invasion before shelving Nord Stream 2.

Now, after six months of Europe’s worst war since 1945, some German politicians are once again calling for the pipeline to be opened “so that people do not have to freeze in winter and our industry does not suffer serious damage”, as Wolfgang Kubicki, Vice-President of the German Parliament, puts it.

Meanwhile Ms Schwesig has just been re-elected as leader of the Social Democrats in her state by a large majority. Schröder has yet to be expelled from the party, let alone sanctioned.

Germany’s Achilles’ heel

This is the measure of Germany’s abject reliance, not only on Russian energy, but on the Russian state. For Putin, gas and oil were only ever a means to an end. He has always wanted to reduce the Germans — towards whom Russians have traditionally had an inferiority complex — to a status of servility.

Stalin only succeeded in dividing Germany. Putin seeks to turn the entire Federal Republic into his client state — and thereby impose his will upon Europe.

With the unerring eye of the predator, Putin grasped that energy was Germany’s Achilles’ heel. A single plant of a single corporation, the headquarters of the chemical and pharmaceutical giant BASF at Ludwigshafen, uses as much energy as Denmark.

Over the last 25 years, Germany’s craving for cheap energy led it into an unequal relationship with Russia — what the philosopher Hegel called “the dialectic of master and slave”.

Putin saw that some German politicians could be bought (Schröder), others bamboozled (Merkel), and still others bullied (Scholz). Other EU countries followed the German example by relying heavily on Moscow for energy, influenced by the evasion and ambivalence that has characterised Berlin’s policy for decades.

Germany, whose economy is substantially larger than Britain’s, has given just £1 billion in military aid to Ukraine compared to the UK’s £3.5 billion. The United States has given ten times as much as the EU. Yet Ukraine is a European country under genocidal attack.

The reluctance to provoke Putin that still prevails in wide circles of the Federal Republic is rooted in exaggerated notions of Russian military power, economic importance and cultural pre-eminence.

German fatalism about Russia’s ability to absorb casualties and yet win ultimate victory reflects folk memories of the Eastern Front. But Putin, unlike Stalin, does not have a vast conscript army at his disposal, he does not enjoy technical superiority and he cannot afford the war of attrition that he has unleashed. Nor are the Russian people united against an invading force in defence of their homeland. Only in Berlin do they think this is another Stalingrad.

This historical myopia has much to do with the long-standing German habit of subsuming the other nations that made up the Soviet Union into Russia. To this day most Germans have no awareness of the fact that the Nazis killed millions of Ukrainian civilians and devastated their country.

Ironically, many artists, writers and musicians who have fled Ukraine have found refuge in Germany. One example is the composer Valentin Silvestrov, who fled to Berlin aged 84 with one suitcase, full of his manuscripts. Once there, he discovered that Ukrainian music was unknown in Germany. Now that Silvestrov’s works are being performed, including at the Proms in London, the Germans are slowly waking up to the presence of a greater living composer than any of their own.

Many ordinary Germans, like the British, instinctively warm to the Ukrainian cause. The difference is in leadership – or lack of it. Chancellor Olaf Scholz, unlike Boris Johnson or Liz Truss, has shown only lukewarm support for Kyiv and has been implicitly rebuked by President Zelensky.

Hamburger grilled

Although there is no suggestion that Scholz has been bribed to go easy on Russia, he himself has become embroiled in a corruption scandal. He is accused of helping M.M. Warburg & Co, Germany’s oldest and largest private bank, to avoid a €47 million fine in 2016, during his time as Finance Minister in the Merkel coalition.

The Hamburg-based bank is alleged to have made up to €300 million in a capital gains tax scam which came to light while Scholz was also mayor of the city state. Just as he finds himself facing an unexpectedly grim present and a positively terrifying future, his provincial past has returned to haunt him.

Last week the Chancellor was grilled by a committee of inquiry in Hamburg. The normally meticulous Scholz claimed not to remember any details about his meetings with Warburg’s former chief, Christian Olearius, who has now been charged with tax evasion. Germany’s safe pair of hands, whom millions had entrusted with the nation’s finances, is now accused of being cosy with tax-dodging bankers and being an unimpressive, even unreliable, witness.

In other ways, too, Scholz is failing to live up to the moral example set by the two great Social Democratic Chancellors of post-war Germany, Willy Brandt and Helmut Schmidt. At a joint press conference with Mahmoud Abbas in Berlin earlier this month, Scholz remained tight-lipped while the Palestinian leader delivered an anti-Semitic tirade, accusing Israel of committing “many Holocausts” against his people.

Schmidt, who concealed the fact he had a Jewish grandfather from the Nazis but as Chancellor was an outspoken philosemite, would not have been impressed by his fellow Hamburger Scholz. Nor would Brandt, who famously fell to his knees at the memorial to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

Not for decades has anti-Semitism been such a threat in Germany: in July, Berlin’s Holocaust Memorial was desecrated with swastikas. Now, as Putin’s myrmidons massacre and deport Ukrainians near the site of Nazi genocide, while a quarter of the Russian Jewish population has emigrated in anticipation of pogroms, Germany needs a leader who is not afraid to denounce anti-Semitism even at the cost of diplomatic niceties.

After less than a year in office, Scholz’s personal ratings are plumbing depths never seen during Mrs Merkel’s 16 years at the helm. As Germans brace themselves for unprecedented hardships in peacetime, they are led by a weak and indecisive Chancellor at the head of a fragile three-party coalition.

Post-heroic, post-patriotic

Wednesday’s visit to Kyiv by Boris Johnson – his third – to mark Ukraine’s Independence Day was hugely appreciated not only by Volodymyr Zelensky but by all Ukrainians. Yet it was a gesture of solidarity that did not occur – could not have occurred – to Olaf Scholz.

The German Chancellor’s only visit to the Ukrainian capital last June, accompanied by Emmanuel Macron and Mario Draghi, was an awkward, chilly affair that yielded little more than promises. This week, Scholz posted a short video message, concluding: “Our hearts are with you.” Ulrich Speck, a German foreign policy analyst, commented: “Hearts, yes. But not weapons.”

Johnson, by contrast, knows he is among friends in Kyiv – a friendship symbolised by Zelensky awarding him Ukraine’s highest honour, the Order of Liberty. It is impossible to imagine the lugubrious German Chancellor finding the Prime Minister’s pithy words: “While people [in the West] are paying energy bills, people in Ukraine are paying with blood.” Nor would Scholz echo him in declaring: “I believe Ukraine can and will win this war.”

For his part, Zelensky told his people that they had been “reborn” in the heat of war. “We used to say: ‘Peace’. Now we say: ‘Victory’,” he declared.

Highly educated Germans find it hard to empathise with such Churchillian sentiments. Jürgen Habermas, the eminence grise of German intellectuals, makes condescending comments about Ukraine as a primitive place, still captive to the nationalist illusions of the last century, unlike more sophisticated, “post-heroic” Germany. It doesn’t occur to the 93-year-old philosopher that without the heroism of its soldiers and civilians, Ukraine would by now have ceased to exist.

Prussian military prowess has long since given way to post-patriotic pusillanimity. Where Merkel and Scholz feared to tread and even Biden was hesitant, Johnson was the first to commit himself wholeheartedly to the cause and to visit war-torn Kyiv.

Many other nations – the Poles, the Baltic states, the Scandinavians and the Canadians among them – have been more supportive than the Germans, who owe Ukrainians the greatest moral debt.

Berlin boasts of handing out a handful of howitzers while dithering over clapped-out armoured vehicles. Meanwhile British arms and training, Turkish drones and American rocket artillery systems have proved decisive on the battlefield.

Sold down the Dnieper

Although the Scholz coalition officially sides with Ukraine, the unpalatable fact remains that Germany and its EU partners are financing Russian aggression by paying vast sums for Russian gas.

Will they stand up to Putin in Germany when the enormity of the ordeal ahead becomes clear to everybody? Will public opinion continue to back even the present feeble commitment, or will the voices calling for peace at the expense of Ukrainians prevail? It is all too believable that at some point, probably early next year when gas storage facilities are empty, Berlin – and Brussels – will open negotiations with the Kremlin, regardless of Kyiv’s wishes.

Yet it is then that the ghosts of the past may rise up to intervene in the present. The thought of Germans and Russians redrawing the map of Eastern Europe at the conference table sends shivers down the spines of every Pole, Lithuanian, Latvian, Estonian and, of course, Ukrainian. On August 23, 1940, exactly 82 years ago this week, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was signed, carving up Poland (which then included Lviv and other parts of present-day Ukraine) and the Baltic states between Russia and Germany. No German Chancellor wishes to be reminded of that precedent.

However, nor can Scholz risk presiding over an even deeper and more lasting recession than that caused by the Covid pandemic. Somehow he must steer a course between the Scylla of appeasing Putin and the Charybdis of economic ruin.

The tension between these positions is reflected in the tripartite coalition. Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock and the Greens are the hawks, Finance Minister Christian Lindner and his pro-business Free Democrats are the doves, while the Social Democrats are deeply divided. The party leadership leans towards Moscow, the rank and file towards Kyiv. This explains why Scholz never says that he wants Ukraine to win the war, merely that they must not lose it.

The opposition Christian Democrats are only slightly more united. They too have a large wing that privately favours a negotiated peace, represented by their pro-business leader Friedrich Merz, and a smaller but not insignificant group led by the foreign affairs expert Norbert Röntgen, who hope for a Ukrainian victory. Merz has papered over the cracks by focusing on a campaign to reverse his predecessor Mrs Merkel’s exit from nuclear energy.

Meanwhile, the “understanding Putin” lobby has the support of both the hard Left Die Linke and anti-immigration AfD parties. German public opinion has slowly tiptoed away from its initial admiration for Ukrainian resistance and towards a compromise peace.

That subtle shift could soon become an overwhelming tide, once Germans are required to make real sacrifices. Vladimir Putin, we may be sure, is counting on it.

From October, Scholz will impose a gas levy on consumers to compensate energy companies for the cost of replacing Russian gas supplies. Germany’s biggest energy company, Uniper, was bailed out in July to the tune of £12.5 billion; it is now claiming another £18.5 billion of levies.

This policy is bound to be unpopular, since it redistributes tens of billions from the poor to the rich — curious thinking for a government of the Left. But this is nothing compared to the prospect of protests sparked by a national shutdown caused, not by a deadly virus, but by Putin’s energy politics.

A change in the air?

Modern Germany has a volatile history of popular protest. It began with the revolution that toppled the Kaiser in 1918. The Nazis mobilised the masses to carry out their “national revolution” in 1933. A workers’ uprising in East Germany was crushed by Soviet tanks in 1953. Student protests brought about a cultural revolution in 1968. Uniquely bloodless and benign was the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. This was Germany’s finest hour.

The defiance that breached the Wall and sent the Soviet army home was a blessing, but the despair that Putin’s revenge may induce this winter will surely be a curse. Gas has given the Russian dictator coercive control over the German political class, which willingly acquiesced in its fate.

In Kyiv, Boris Johnson said: “I can tell you that we in the UK will not for one second give in to Putin’s blackmail.” Olaf Scholz is incapable of speaking like this — because he does not believe it. He has failed to frame the coming ordeal as a battle in which Germans must make sacrifices for their own liberty, not just Ukraine’s. People don’t mind his lack of charisma; they do mind facing a nightmarish winter with spineless hypocrisy at the helm.

Will it become so obvious by next spring that Scholz is unequal to the task that either he or his coalition are replaced? Can the centre of German politics hold — or are we about to see a terrible revolt of the masses against a discredited political establishment? It has happened before. It can happen again.

Daniel Johnson was the Telegraph’s correspondent in Germany and Eastern Europe in the late 1980s. He is now the editor of TheArticle.

- The energy crisis sparked by the war led to campaigns for conserving energy, rapid filling of gas storage, and government efforts to cap high costs for consumers.

There is widespread anxiety over potential blackouts or insufficient heating, especially in winter.

High energy prices and cost-of-living spikes have hit lower- and middle-income Germans particularly hard.

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The upper house of Germany's parliament signed off on a number of major legislative packages on Friday aimed at helping address inflation and soaring energy costsImage: Wolfgang Kumm/dpa/picture alliance
PoliticsGermany

Germany approves welfare reform, extends nuclear power

2 hours ago

Germany's upper house of parliament approved measures aimed at helping people hit hard by high energy prices and the high cost of living. The country's nuclear power extension will also take effect immediately.

https://p.dw.com/p/4K5HV

The upper house of Germany's parliament, the Bundesrat, approved extending the use of three nuclear power plants, overhauling unemployment benefits and other major legislation on Friday after heated debate among lawmakers.

After receiving approval from the Bundesrat, the measures will soon enter into law. DW breaks down what's set to change in 2023.

Nuclear power extension

The Bundesrat signed off on the extension of three nuclear power plants after the lower house, the Bundestag, approved the move earlier this month.

The nuclear plants — Isar 2, Neckarwestheim 2 and Emsland — will remain operational until April 2023 to provide enough power through the winter. The facilities had been slated to close at the end of this year under Germany's nuclear phaseout plans.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz decided to extend the life of the nuclear plants after Germany found itself facing a severe energy shortage. Russia turned off supplies of gas in response to the backlash over Moscow's invasion of Ukraine.

The extension was bitterly debated among Scholz's center-left Social Democrats (SPD), the environmentalist Greens and the pro-free market Free Democrats (FDP).

With Friday's approval from the upper house, the nuclear power plant extension will take effect immediately.

Germany set to keep nuclear plants running

Unemployment reform

Germany is set for a major welfare overhaul after the Bundesrat signed off on a compromise to reform unemployment benefits.

The changes will go into effect as of January 1, 2023, replacing the current and frequently criticized "Harz IV" unemployment benefits system that has been in place since 2005.

Under the new "Bürgergeld" system (which means "citizen's money"), those who are unemployed will get higher benefits and better vocational skills training.

The initial proposal by Scholz's government was rejected by conservative lawmakers in the Christian Democrats (CDU/CSU) bloc. Under the compromise, benefits could be cut during a six-month "trust period" if an unemployed person is deemed to not be looking hard enough for work.

According to the plans, those receiving benefits will also get more support in job training programs to prepare for permanent employment. The change also is an attempt to mitigate the shortage of skilled workers Germany is currently experiencing.

"This reform is a milestone of social policy in Germany," Scholz told the magazine Focus on Friday after the votes. "This reform put assistance for untrained people who belong to the long-term jobless front and center."

The measure must still be signed by German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, although nearly all measures approved by the Bundesrat are signed-off by the president.

More money for Germany's unemployed?

Tax relief, higher child benefits

With inflation hitting consumers hard, lawmakers approved measures aimed at softening the blow.

The upper house approved legislation that would help people who receive pay raises that adjust for inflation. The new measures would prevent people having to pay more taxes due to pay raises.

Starting in January 2023, child benefit payments will also be raised. Families will now receive €250 ($260) per month for each child in the household.

The change is a big jump from the current system, which saw parents receive €219 per month for their first and second child, €225 per month for a third child, and €250 for each additional child.

More support for renters

The upper house of parliament also greenlit a law that seeks to help renters deal with skyrocketing heating costs.

Starting from January 1, renters will no longer have to shoulder the costs of heating with oil and natural gas — landlords and property owners will have to chip-in as well.

For buildings that are not energy efficient and produce a high proportion of CO2 emissions, landlords will need to pay more — and not the renters.

In addition, more people in low-income households will receive a housing allowance from the government. The expansion to the law means 1.4 million households are eligible for the payments, as opposed to the current 600,000 households that qualify.

While you're here: Every Tuesday, DW editors round up what is happening in German politics and society. You can sign up here for the weekly email newsletter Berlin Briefing.

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**Political and Social Responses**
- Although the nuclear phase-out was championed by the Greens, it was ultimately backed by all major parties—a broad political consensus.

- Public unrest has grown due to economic hardship, but so far, there has been no large-scale industrial action or mass movement calling to reverse the nuclear exit, though debates continue in the context of energy insecurity.

Title:

Content: 'Sustainability challenges' What Big Oil, green movement conceal from us

The US funds its military aid to Ukraine with tax dollars and some of America’s allies fund Putin’s military with purchases of his oil and gas exports. And that’s the absurdity that has come to define the Russian invasion
Representative image

NEW YORK: It has long been said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. By that definition, we’re the ones detached from reality if we keep accepting what the oil industry and the green movement keep telling us over and over again and expecting a different result. The greens keep saying that because the price of wind and solar is now as cheap as, or cheaper than, fossil fuels, they’ve won the energy war. Game, set, match — welcome to the green planet.

The oil companies say — as they have in each previous energy crisis since 1973 — that the only answer to this energy crisis is the one they’ve offered for the past 49 years: drill, baby, drill. Welcome to reality. Well, they’re both wrong, and accepting the repetition of either of these tired shibboleths is hurting us economically, environmentally and geopolitically — especially, of late, geopolitically.

Because our continued addiction to fossil fuels is bolstering Vladimir Putin’s petrodictatorship and creating a situation where we in the West are — yes, say it with me now — funding both sides of the war. We fund our military aid to Ukraine with our tax dollars and some of America’s allies fund Putin’s military with purchases of his oil and gas exports.

And if that’s not the definition of insanity, then I don’t know what is. Have no illusion — these sins of the green movement and the oil industry are not equal. The greens are trying to fix a real, planet-threatening problem, even if their ambition exceeds their grasp. The oil and coal companies know that what they are doing is incompatible with a stable, healthy environment. Yes, they are right that without them there would be no global economy today. But unless they use their immense engineering talents to become energy companies, not just fossil fuel companies, there will be no livable economy tomorrow.

Let’s look at both. For too long, too many in the green movement have treated the necessary and urgent shift we need to make from fossil fuels to renewable energy as though it were like flipping a switch — just get off oil, get off gasoline, get off coal and get off nuclear — and do it NOW, without having put in place the kind of transition mechanisms, clean energy sources and market incentives required to make such a massive shift in our energy system.

It’s Germany in 2011, suddenly deciding after the Fukushima accident to phase out its 17 relatively clean and reliable nuclear reactors, which provided some 25 percent of the country’s electricity. This, even though Germany had nowhere near enough solar, wind, geothermal or hydro to replace that nuclear power. So now it’s burning more coal and gas.

A 2019 working paper for the U.S. National Bureau of Economic Research found that in Germany “the lost nuclear electricity production due to the phaseout was replaced primarily by coal-fired production and net electricity imports. The social cost of this shift from nuclear to coal is approximately $12 billion per year. Over 70 percent of this cost comes from the increased mortality risk associated with exposure to the local air pollution emitted when burning fossil fuels.”

Today, the European Union is drawing up a plan to break its addiction to Russian oil and gas by 2027, but, in the meantime, Putin is laughing all the way to the bank. As CNN reported in April, citing a report by the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air: “Russian revenues from fossil fuel exports to the European Union soared during the first two months of the Ukraine invasion” — to $46.3 billion. That was more than double the value of Russian energy imported by the E.U. during the same two-month period a year earlier.

That was not because the E.U.’s volume of imports doubled. Higher oil and gas prices accounted for most of that increase. In other words, Putin starts a war that creates instability, which drives up oil prices, so he makes twice as much money exporting roughly the same amount of oil.

While Germany jumped off nuclear before it had a safety net of sufficient clean alternatives, at least it has been on a serious, path-defining quest to get them. Indeed, the whole world owes Germany a huge debt for driving down the price of solar panels and wind turbines through the subsidies and tax incentives it created. In Germany, wind turbines, solar panels and other renewables covered 54 percent of power consumption this past January and February — which is AMAZING. In 2021, renewable energy sources accounted for only about 12 percent of total U.S. energy that was consumed.

Still, the most important delusion of the green movement today — of which I am a proud, if grouchy, member — is telling itself that because the price of wind and solar technology has fallen so low now that it can beat coal and natural gas in most markets, often even without subsidies, it’s “game over” for fossil fuels. I wish. Price is only half the story.

If you can’t install the transmission lines — to get that sun and wind power from the vast open spaces where it is generated to the big urban areas where it is needed — and if you cannot set aside more land to install the scale of solar and wind farms you need to replace coal, gas or nuclear, it doesn’t matter that your renewables are cheaper on a per-kilowatt-hour basis.

And today transmission is a huge problem in the U.S. and Europe, where many people don’t want wind farms, solar fields, electricity lines — or natural gas pipelines — in their backyard. I wish this were not the case, but there is no immaculate pathway from brown energy to green energy. The road is paved with cruel trade-offs. Pick your poison — but grow up. Meanwhile, ever since the 1973 Arab oil embargo, the big oil companies have basically said in each successive crisis: Sure, we need more clean energy, but you have to understand — it doesn’t scale. Right now, we’re in an emergency, so we just need to drill more. You hear the same refrain today, which is why we’re in danger of wasting yet another oil crisis and never breaking our fossil fuel addiction.

For those oil companies sitting on large natural gas deposits — which are needed in this transition because gas is cleaner than coal — it means tapping those deposits but doing so with zero methane leakage; otherwise gas becomes as bad as coal. But it also means thinking much more seriously about how fossil fuel companies truly make the transition to become “energy companies,” not just oil companies, so they can leverage their amazing pools of engineering talent to provide more energy solutions that save the planet, not warm it.

Friedman is an Opinion Columnist with NYT©2022

The New York Times

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- Some sectors advocate for revisiting nuclear options as France and Japan move to expand or restart reactors.

In contrast, the German government remains oppositional, including opposing nuclear’s designation as sustainable at the EU level.

**Impact of the Ukraine War**
- Germany’s reliance on Russian imports became a strategic liability.

The war radically worsened energy insecurity and sparked calls for diversified supply—including LNG imports and expanded renewables—but also reignited debates over nuclear’s role.

- The contrast with countries like France (doubling down on nuclear) and Japan (restarting reactors) highlights Germany’s unique path, often criticized as ideological and inflexible by international observers.

**Conclusion**
Germany’s nuclear phase-out was driven by a multi-faceted mix of safety, environmental, and political arguments but has left the country heavily exposed to energy security risks and economic shocks, especially highlighted by the Russian-Ukrainian war.

While the government maintains renewables and natural gas are enough to fill the gap, ongoing strains on the energy system and living standards fuel debate about whether the anti-nuclear stance is sustainable or wise in the long term.

**Nuggets and Summary of Extracts on Germany’s Move Away from Nuclear Energy (2022-2023):**

- **Russia-Ukraine War & Energy Supply:**
  - Russia’s invasion of Ukraine prompted the EU, including Germany, to impose sanctions on Russia.

Title:

Content: Chernobyl and the war: how the events in Ukraine prompted Germany to abandon nuclear energy
Greenpeace activist at a protest against nuclear power in Berlin, Germany.
Photo by REUTERS / Nadja Wohlleben
The end of the atomic age.
This weekend, Germany, as promised, shut down its last nuclear power plants.
On Sunday night, the Germans decommissioned three stations: Izar 2 in Bavaria, Necarwesteim-2 in Baden-Württemberg and Emsland in Lower Saxony.
Nuclear power plants, which have recently produced about 5% of the country ’ s electricity, have been shut down as part of the so-called “energy transition. ”
Its goal is to completely switch to green energy by 2035, that is, to produce electricity from renewable sources.
Read also:
The decision to finally abandon the peaceful atom was given to the German authorities not easy.
A week ago, in political Berlin, there were calls to postpone the closure of the reactors for at least a few months, so as not to jeopardize the security of energy supply in the country.
Moreover, the temporary continuation of the work of the nuclear power plant of Chancellor Olaf Scholz was requested by both the opposition Christian Democrats and the liberals included in the ruling coalition.
Most Germans did not support the closure of the nuclear power plant.
According to sociologists, about 60% of the country ’ s residents called the government ’ s decision to abandon the peaceful atom wrong.
The reason is obvious: people are afraid of further increases in electricity prices, which have literally exploded.
Farewell to the atom: the Ukrainian factor
In fact, the decision to close all German nuclear power plants was made in 2011 by the government of Angela Merkel after the accident at the Japanese nuclear power plant Fukushima.
But the discussion about the abandonment of nuclear power began much earlier — in 1986, after the disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.
The accident sparked widespread protests against the use of the peaceful atom, and after Chernobyl, the now ruling Social Democratic Party announced that it would support the closure of all German nuclear power plants and enshrined this position in its political program.
Events in Ukraine also affected the timing of the closure of the nuclear power plant.
Germany planned to shut down all its nuclear power plants by the end of 2022.
However, after a full-scale Russian attack on Ukraine, the operation of the reactors was decided to extend for several more months.
Germany, which took the course of abandoning all Russian energy resources, was afraid of problems with energy supply.
Bavarian exception: will one of the richest lands in Germany be allowed to restart nuclear power plants
In the final rejection of the peaceful atom, it seems, not all German politicians believe.
At least regional.
The prime minister of Bavaria - one of the richest German states - Markus Seder has already said that he will ask the federal government to reconsider its decision.
And this is a few hours after the closing of the last nuclear power plant!
Seder wants the Bavarians to make an exception – allowed them to continue to operate the nuclear power plant “Izar-2 ”, located on the territory of the earth.
Like, now, in times of energy crisis, to abandon nuclear energy is not only risky, but also stupid.
That can be done a little later.
"Bavaria demands that the federal government take responsibility for the continued operation of nuclear power.
Until the crisis is over and the country has switched to renewable energy, we must use all forms of energy before the end of the decade.
Anyone who, like the ruling coalition, hopes that the next winter will be as mild as the previous one, acts extremely naive and careless for an industrial country like Germany, ” said Seder.
And he promised that in the case of a positive decision from Berlin, Bavaria is ready to take responsibility for the operation of the nuclear power plant.
The Bavarian prime minister thought about other lands.
It requires the government to develop and submit a plan for the reactivation of disconnected nuclear power plants.
If necessary, nuclear power plants will be able to resume their work quickly.
Official Berlin has already responded to the calls of the Bavarian Prime Minister – the Minister for Environmental Protection advised Zeder not to engage in political populism.
Non-peaceful atom: Germany wants sanctions against Russian nuclear energy
On the day of the closure of their own nuclear power plants, the Germans also mentioned the nuclear energy of the aggressor country of Russia.
Vice-Chancellor and Minister of Economy of Germany Robert Gabeck proposed to impose sanctions against the nuclear industry of the Russian Federation.
At the EU level.
For example, to include penalties in the next, already eleventh, sanctions package, the development and coordination of which the Europeans will begin in the near future.
“We have seen that Russia purposefully uses dependence in the energy sector for pressure.
Therefore, the federal government called on the European Commission to impose sanctions on the civilian nuclear sector.
Nuclear technology is an extremely sensitive area, and Russia can no longer be perceived as a reliable partner here, ” Gabek said.
What sanctions are we talking about – the politician did not specify.
However, in early April, after a visit to Ukraine, he proposed to impose sanctions against states that buy uranium from Russia for their nuclear power plants.
Not immediately, but after the transition.
“It is important to start and not be afraid of decisive actions in this area, ” Gabek explained.
The EU ’ s dependence on Russia ’ s nuclear sector is really serious.
About 20% of the uranium for their nuclear power plants EU countries receive from Russia.
Bulgaria, Slovakia, Hungary and the Czech Republic are completely dependent on these supplies, that is, 100%.
On the sale of uranium in the European Union, Russia earns 450 million euros a year.
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In retaliation, Russia curtailed gas deliveries to Europe, directly threatening German energy security and risking economic recession.

Title:

Content: Russian President Vladimir Putin is playing hard with the European Union, cutting off gas supplies to some of his best buyers in a fit of rage over sanctions imposed after the start of the special operation in Ukraine, write Lorenz Gerke, Karl Matisen and Paola Tamma on June 20 in the European version of Politico.
Pierre Edouard Frere.
Furnace Melting (Fragment)
As a result, the authorities of these countries are under enormous political pressure, there is a risk that in the case of a cold winter, the inhabitants of European countries will simply freeze, and there is a danger of disrupting the climate goals of the bloc, whose states have to switch their energy from gas to coal.
Such a development could even lead to a recession on the continent.
Simone Tagliapietra, a specialist at the Bruegel think tank, calls Russia ’ s policy “energy blackmail. ”
Only 40% of the normal volume of gas passes through the Nord Stream pipeline from Russia to Germany, which affects supplies to France, Italy and Austria, as well as to Germany.
Russia ’ s gas monopoly, Gazprom, has already cut off all supplies to Poland, Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Finland and Denmark after energy companies in those countries refused to comply with the Kremlin ’ s demands to pay for supplies in rubles.
In response, some countries are planning to launch coal-fired power plants.
“It is necessary to recognize that Putin is gradually reducing gas supplies to Europe, including to increase gas prices, and we must take retaliatory measures, ” German Economy and Climate Minister Robert Habeck said in a television interview on June 19, adding that“ this is a tense, serious situation. ”
Austria plans to restart one of its coal-fired power plants, Poland seeks to subsidize coal mining for heating their homes, and the Netherlands on June 20 decided to abandon previously adopted plans to limit electricity generation at its four coal-fired power plants.
“If it weren ’ t for these special times, we would never have done it, ” Dutch climate and energy minister Rob Jetten said.
Compressor station "Portovaya"
Official website of PJSC Gazprom
Nord Stream gas pipeline
Official website of PJSC Gazprom
The Italian government is scheduled to hold a crisis meeting on June 21, while Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi has ordered two LNG regasification plants and is negotiating with countries including Qatar, Angola and Algeria to sign gas supply agreements from them in a desperate attempt to secure supplies in the event of a halt to imports from Russia.
Brussels, for its part, seeks to radiate confidence, but its anxiety is obvious.
“We take the current situation very seriously.
But we are ready, ” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said at a meeting with journalists on June 20.
Times are not getting easier. ”
Dirty Deals
Such a desire to start using coal again to provide energy is, in symbolic terms, inconvenient for the inhabitants of European countries, which are very concerned about the climate.
However, few believe that the EU or its member states will move far from their previous policy of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
In Germany, officials are adamant that the return of coal will be short-lived and will not jeopardize the country ’ s ambition to phase out its use by 2030.
Coal will act as a reserve for the energy sector, allowing the country to build up gas reserves before winter.
Meanwhile, the government plans to rapidly increase the production of clean energy.
Coal thermal power plant in Förde, Germany
Daniel Ullrich Threedots
According to Simon Muller, director of Agora Energiewende analytical center, political support for renewable energy sources has increased in Germany due to Russia ’ s special operation in Ukraine.
“This additional urgency factor that we now have in the face of this situation helps provide the political momentum that we need for some very important accelerations in the development of renewable energy, ” Mueller said.
The German parliament is considering 10 measures on energy efficiency and renewable energy, and as Müller noted, the three-party coalition as a whole adheres to the importance of removing barriers to green energy.
Green organizations are also optimistic.
“There is currently no plan in Germany that could call into question the timing of a coal phase-out, ” said Christoph Bals, political director of Germanwatch.
But the need to quickly change the approach to coal recycling is exacerbating political tensions.
In Berlin, the conservative opposition criticized Habeck for allowing more coal to be used, while excluding the further operation of Germany ’ s three remaining nuclear power plants after the end of this year.
“I do not understand why the climate minister of the Greens prefers to extend the operation of coal-fired power plants, rather than carbon-neutral nuclear power plants, ” Jens Spahn, deputy head of the Christian Democratic Party in parliament, told German television on June 20.
The policy of abandoning nuclear energy was adopted by the former leader of his party, Angela Merkel.
And this course is a source of tension within the ruling coalition.
“It is necessary that the three remaining nuclear power plants last longer, ” said Bijan Jir-Sarai, secretary general of the Liberal Free Democrats.
While acknowledging that the move was a “violation of the taboo, ” Habek said coal is still better than a revival of nuclear power, arguing that a change in nuclear policy would only have an impact at the end of next year — too late to prepare for this winter.
He was supported by Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who said in an interview published on June 20 that “nuclear energy will not help us now or in the next two years, and that is the main thing. ”
Political leaders are calling on their people to save energy and cut gas consumption, while governments are working to increase storage capacity to allow the continent to survive the winter shutdown of gas supplies to Russia.
At the very least, they are thinking about rationing the gas.
Cutting off gas supplies will almost certainly lead the bloc into recession.
The European Central Bank has warned that next year the eurozone economy will shrink by 1.7% if Russia completely closes the faucet.
“Power outages and small opportunities for immediate replacement of gas supplies from Russia are likely to require some rationing and redistribution of resources, which will lead to a reduction in production in the eurozone, in particular in energy-intensive sectors, ” the bank said in a statement, according to which, if this happens, the bloc ’ s economy will recover next year.
But the ECB also issued a warning to Russia.
“As for the Russian economy, the scenario assumes a serious recession with a contraction in production similar to the contraction that occurred during the collapse of the Soviet Union, ” the organization said.

- **Coal’s Return (Temporarily):**
  - Germany has reactivated coal-fired power stations as a stopgap to build up gas reserves before winter and to compensate for the loss of Russian gas and shuttered nuclear plants.

Officials stress this is temporary and does not signal abandonment of the plan to phase out coal entirely by 2030.

- **Political and Social Tensions:**
  - The governing coalition is split.

Social Democrats (Scholz’s party) and Greens oppose nuclear power, remaining committed to its phaseout (Accelerated after the 2011 Fukushima disaster).

Title:

Content: Scholz approved the extension of the life of nuclear power plants in Germany
Photo: Depositphotos
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has spoken out in support of extending the life of the country ’ s last nuclear power plants.
He said that this “makes sense ” because of the reduction of gas supplies from Russia, which increases the prospect of an energy crisis this winter.
According to Spiegel, the three stations, which are scheduled to close later this year, make up only a small part of Germany ’ s total electricity capacity.
They are watching now
“But it might still make sense to let them work longer, ” he said.
Scholz notes that the authorities will draw conclusions based on the stress test of the German electric power system, which is now underway, after which a decision will be made on further actions.
The Chancellor added that the German gas storage facilities are filled better than in previous years, and also said that the planned new liquefied gas terminals should be operational from the end of the year, which will significantly improve Germany ’ s ability to import gas regardless of Russia ’ s actions.
The issue of Germany ’ s continued operation of nuclear power plants became a bone of contention among the three parties of the ruling coalition.
So, the Free Democrats want nuclear power plants to work longer.
The Social Democrats of Scholz and the Greens opposed it.
However, the chancellor believes that the government has rethought what is happening.
According to him, some German states, for example, Bavaria, will probably have to allow their nuclear plants to work longer, because they are behind in the construction of wind farms and new electricity grids.
Germany is also reportedly exporting electricity to France, which has had to shut down several of its nuclear power plants for technical reasons.
In Germany, this is an important contribution to European solidarity.
Last year, Germany shut down three of its six nuclear power plants.
They were going to stop the work of the remaining stations by the end of this year - this decision was made under Angela Merkel, after the Japanese Fukushima accident in a powerful earthquake in 2011.
Source: Spiegel
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The Free Democrats and some regional leaders, e.g., Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder, have pushed for delaying nuclear closures or even reconsidering the phaseout.

Title:

Content: From the point of view of common sense, Germany needs to postpone the closure of the last nuclear power plants and, moreover, develop this type of energy.
This was announced to the correspondent of IA REGNUM on September 29 by the engineer-physicist of heat and power engineering, entrepreneur, chairman of the Murmansk regional branch of the “Party of Growth ” Nikolai Palchenko.
So he commented on the words of the Minister of economy of Germany Robert Habeck that Germany after 2022 will use two of its last three nuclear power plants.
AES
“European nuclear energy, especially German, at one time fell victim to the domestic political agenda – contrary to common sense, – he said. – Currently, no other type of energy, except nuclear and hydrocarbon, is suitable for providing electricity neither in the base nor in peak hours of loads.
Any kind of “green ” energy today can only be in the form of an“ application ” to the above traditional types of energy, but not completely replace them.
Fully atomic energy can only be replaced by hydrocarbon energy.
Nuclear is much more environmentally friendly.
Plus, Europe has problems with hydrocarbons today, so from the point of view of common sense, Germany needs to postpone the decommissioning of nuclear power plants, and it would be desirable to develop this type of energy. ”
According to him, the cost of nuclear energy does not depend on the stock market, and if Europeans need a stable source of energy at predictable prices, they can not find anything in nature better than nuclear power plants.
“The problem is that it is not easy and is not always possible to remove non-working nuclear power plants from conservation, and it is not a quick matter to build new ones.
So the current energy crisis nuclear energy will not solve, ” concluded the expert.
Recall, as reported by IA REGNUM, there is a forecast that Germany will have to postpone the date of abandonment of nuclear energy.
Read earlier in this story: Germany will not have to hurry with the rejection of the latest nuclear power plants – expert

- Public dissatisfaction is evident; segments of the population and some politicians question the timing and wisdom of abandoning nuclear amid energy security concerns.

Title:

Content: The people are not particularly happy with the government ’ s choice.
recommendations
Germany has completely abandoned nuclear power, turning off the last three power units located at the Emsland nuclear power plant (Lower Saxony), Necarwesteim-2 (Baden-Württemberg), Isar-2 (Bavaria).
Now the country has only to get rid of nuclear waste.
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The decision to phase out nuclear power came from then-Chancellor Angela Merkel after the disaster of 2011, when the accident at the Fukushima-1 nuclear power plant in Japan, which killed at least 15.9 thousand people.
Initially, it was planned to stop nuclear reactors on December 31, 2022, but due to rising energy prices, the German government delayed this until mid-April 2023.
The nuance is that in the near future, Germany will have to rely on coal and gas, which have a negative impact on the environment.
Of the advantages, only that you need to compensate a little - 6% of electricity generation, which was just those nuclear reactors.
recommendations
According to YouGov, two-thirds of Germans do not support the government ’ s decision to replace the cheap “peaceful atom ”.
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- **Nuclear Power Facts:**
  - Germany shut down three of six nuclear plants in 2021, with the final closures scheduled for 2022–2023.

The nuclear plants in question now make up only a small part of Germany’s electricity mix.

- Initially, after the Ukraine invasion, the government briefly extended reactor operation for a few months to avert short-term shortages.

- **Economic and Environmental Considerations:**
  - Loss of domestic nuclear generation makes Germany more dependent on coal and imported gas—problematic both for climate goals and security (especially with Russian gas supplies at risk).

- Hard coal mining is expensive in Germany, making imported coal more attractive but with bigger environmental and financial costs.

Title:

Content: Germany will reopen coal-fired power plants and offer incentives to companies to limit natural gas consumption, which should help reduce the country ’ s dependence on Russian energy resources.
This was stated by the Minister of economy of Germany Robert Habeck, writes The Wall Street Journal.
“Obviously, this is Putin ’ s strategy to outrage us, raise prices and divide us.
We're not gonna let that happen.
We will defend ourselves decisively, accurately and thoughtfully, ” Habek said, commenting on Russia ’ s restriction of gas supplies via Nord Stream 1.
The German government estimates that the country imports about 35% of its natural gas from Russia, up from 55% before Russia ’ s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and uses most of it for heating and industry.
Last year, electricity production using natural gas accounted for about 15% of total electricity production in Germany, Habek said, adding that the share of gas in electricity production this year has likely fallen.
Habek outlined a number of steps that should accelerate the reduction of the share of gas in the energy complex and create reserves for next winter.
In particular, he noted that the government will give companies the opportunity to expand the use of coal-fired power plants.
This will ensure that Germany will have an alternative energy source, although the move will lead to delays in meeting environmental targets to reduce carbon emissions.
"It's bitter.
But in this situation, it is necessary to reduce gas consumption.
By winter, the gas depots must be full.
This has the highest priority, ” Habek said, commenting on the need to use coal.
The Minister expects that the law on the use of coal will be adopted on July 8 in the Bundesrat, the upper house of parliament.
It will operate until March 31, 2024, by which time the government hopes to create a sustainable alternative to Russian gas.
Habek also added that the government will introduce an auction system that will encourage the industry to reduce gas consumption.
The government did not provide details on how the auction will work, but Habek said it will start this summer.
Germany aims to fill its gas storage facilities by 90% by December.
Now its gas storage is about 56% full, Habek said.
As UNIAN reported, in 2007, the Bundestag decided to phase out by 2018 the coal mining industry in Germany, which annually absorbed many billions of subsidized funds.
The reason for this decision was the lack of competitiveness of German coal, compared to much cheaper imported coal.
High safety standards and extremely deep levels of hard coal deposits in the Ruhr region have made it much more expensive to develop and mine than in other parts of the world.
In December 2018, the last coal mine in Germany closed.
President Frank-Walter Steinmeier noted that this stage marked the "end of the era."
"Without coal, the history of Germany would have developed differently," the German president said.
In 2019, the German government decided to abandon the use of coal for electricity generation by the end of 2038.
Coal-fired power plants in Germany have a total capacity of 45 gigawatts and produced about a third of the country ’ s electricity.
By 2022, it was planned to disconnect 12.5 gigawatts from the grid.
Germany has already decided to abandon nuclear power by 2022.
But in order for the country to meet national and international climate protection goals, Germany must accelerate the transition to clean electricity.
By 2050, the country's carbon dioxide emissions should be between 80 and 95 per cent of 1990 levels.
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- The long-term plan is a major expansion of renewables (wind, solar) to replace both nuclear and fossil sources.

Title:

Content: This content is not available in your region
Germany closes three nuclear power plants
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Lev Udolsky
Copyright AP Photo / Heribert Proepper
With the end of the year, the phase-out of nuclear energy in Germany is entering a new phase.
On December 31, three nuclear power plants will be disconnected from the grid, including the Brockdorf nuclear power plant, located in the north of the country.
Its construction, begun in the 1980s, already caused a lot of protests.
The management of the company regrets its closure.
“In recent days, the mood has been very sad, ” says Guido Nott, chairman of PreussenElektra.
We have been running this station for 35 years.
We monitored her condition, maintained at the highest technical level and always ensured the safety of her work.
Meanwhile, among opponents of the use of nuclear energy, the closure of the nuclear power plant does not cause any sadness:
“I feel a calm but constant joy that this facility is now closed, ” says Karsten Hinrichsen, an activist.
Some have asked if victory has been won.
I say no, because it took too much time.
The ban on the operation of nuclear power plants in Germany was adopted after the accident at the Japanese nuclear power plant Fukushima in 2011.
During the vote in the Bundestag, this initiative was supported by 513 out of 600 deputies.
The oldest reactors were shut down immediately, and the shutdown of the remaining nine was decided to proceed in stages.
Following three nuclear power plants located in Bavaria, Lower Saxony and Schleswig-Holstein, which will stop generating electricity this year, the remaining three will be shut down by the end of next year.
At the same time, the work related to the NPP shutdown will continue for several more years, since the dismantling of the stations is a very complex and lengthy procedure.
Meanwhile, the country plans to increasingly switch to renewable energy sources.
It is estimated that by 2030, 80% of electricity will be generated by wind turbines, solar panels or biogas plants.

- **EU Nuclear Dependencies:**
  - The EU, including Germany, still relies on Russian uranium for existing nuclear power plants—a vulnerability noted after the Ukraine conflict.

- **No Return to Nuclear (Official Position):**
  - Chancellor Scholz and core energy ministers reiterate that nuclear is not part of Germany’s future energy mix, despite energy strains and temporary coal resurgence.

Title:

Content: Germany will not resume the use of nuclear energy
Nuclear energy died in, turning into a “dead horse ” for the country ’ s economy.
will not build a nuclear power plant and relies only on solar and wind energy.
This was stated on Saturday by the Chancellor of Germany, reports AP.
In a Saturday radio interview with Deutschlandfunk, Scholz stated that nuclear power is "a dead horse" in Germany.
(This expression literally translates as “dead horse ”, and means something that has exhausted itself, a question that has lost its relevance; a question that is better to forget).
“Nuclear power is over.
The problem of nuclear energy in Germany has exhausted itself, it is a dead horse.
Anyone who wants to build a new nuclear power plant will need 15 years and will have to spend 15 – 20 billion euros (16.2 – 21.6 billion dollars) each, ” said Scholz.
According to him, any talk about the resumption of the use of nuclear energy will imply the construction of new nuclear power plants.
But this is not in the plans of the FRG.
Scholz stressed that Berlin intends to “expand the use of renewable sources, such as wind and solar energy ”
Earlier, the German Chancellor rejected the proposal of the junior partner in the power coalition that the country should leave open the possibility of using its closed nuclear power plants.
Rambler: top news

- **Nuclear Waste Legacy:**
  - With nuclear phased out, dealing with nuclear waste remains a major unresolved issue.

**In Sum:**
Germany’s nuclear exit has exposed vulnerabilities to both climate and security, especially during the Russian-Ukrainian war, requiring temporary increases in coal reliance—contradictory to climate goals.

Political, social, and economic divisions have emerged over nuclear’s future, but the official stance remains committed to phaseout.

Title:

Content: The people are not particularly happy with the government ’ s choice.
recommendations
Germany has completely abandoned nuclear power, turning off the last three power units located at the Emsland nuclear power plant (Lower Saxony), Necarwesteim-2 (Baden-Württemberg), Isar-2 (Bavaria).
Now the country has only to get rid of nuclear waste.
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The decision to phase out nuclear power came from then-Chancellor Angela Merkel after the disaster of 2011, when the accident at the Fukushima-1 nuclear power plant in Japan, which killed at least 15.9 thousand people.
Initially, it was planned to stop nuclear reactors on December 31, 2022, but due to rising energy prices, the German government delayed this until mid-April 2023.
The nuance is that in the near future, Germany will have to rely on coal and gas, which have a negative impact on the environment.
Of the advantages, only that you need to compensate a little - 6% of electricity generation, which was just those nuclear reactors.
recommendations
According to YouGov, two-thirds of Germans do not support the government ’ s decision to replace the cheap “peaceful atom ”.
For the post accrued remuneration
This material is written by a visitor to the site, and a reward is accrued for it.
2
Popular news

There’s grassroots and political pressure to reconsider, but policy inertia and opposition from key coalition members prevent reopening the debate.

The situation shows the complexity of balancing decarbonization, energy security, and geopolitical risks.

Title:

Content: The people are not particularly happy with the government ’ s choice.
recommendations
Germany has completely abandoned nuclear power, turning off the last three power units located at the Emsland nuclear power plant (Lower Saxony), Necarwesteim-2 (Baden-Württemberg), Isar-2 (Bavaria).
Now the country has only to get rid of nuclear waste.
advertising
The decision to phase out nuclear power came from then-Chancellor Angela Merkel after the disaster of 2011, when the accident at the Fukushima-1 nuclear power plant in Japan, which killed at least 15.9 thousand people.
Initially, it was planned to stop nuclear reactors on December 31, 2022, but due to rising energy prices, the German government delayed this until mid-April 2023.
The nuance is that in the near future, Germany will have to rely on coal and gas, which have a negative impact on the environment.
Of the advantages, only that you need to compensate a little - 6% of electricity generation, which was just those nuclear reactors.
recommendations
According to YouGov, two-thirds of Germans do not support the government ’ s decision to replace the cheap “peaceful atom ”.
For the post accrued remuneration
This material is written by a visitor to the site, and a reward is accrued for it.
2
Popular news

**Summary of the Key Points Regarding Germany’s Nuclear Phase-Out & Energy Crisis Response**

1.

Title:

Content: Despite his opponents...
Europe 'chooses' nuclear power to pass harsh winter
Europeans suffering from a severe energy crisis will set a date with a historic test this winter, with the first attack of the cold, in a way that cannot be trusted.
The old continent has experienced an unusual warmth in recent weeks, which slightly eased the pressure on its decision-makers, but it soon found itself faced with the consequences of a drought crisis like no other in Europe in 500 years.
The European Commission said in its latest report that it was the worst drought in five centuries, warning of the risks and major environmental losses caused by it.
The most prominent of these losses affected the production of nuclear energy, the strength of electricity in Europe today, and the alternative solution sought by some countries in light of the energy crisis with Russia.
Although European nuclear power has been the biggest sponsor of the rupture in German-French relations, it is now seen as a solution to the electricity crisis.
New countries are also seeking accreditation, such as Poland, which two days ago opted for a US offer to build its first nuclear power plant.
At the same time, the countries that possess this energy are seeking to increase and strengthen their reactors, undeterred by the opposition of peoples and voices calling for renewable energy.
Germany and the return to nuclear
In Germany, work has begun on two nuclear reactors that were due to be shut down by the end of this year, in line with the country ’ s plan to graduate from nuclear power.
The project will cost around 100 million euros and will be operational after December.
This comes at a time when the nuclear power plant "Isar 2" plans to carry out maintenance at a cost of about 50 million euros, and the preparatory work at the nuclear plant "Neckaroisthaim-2" will cost a similar amount.
The shutdown of nuclear power plants was one of the most prominent demands of the German people in recent demonstrations in Berlin, Düsseldorf, Hannover, Stuttgart, Dresden and Frankfurt, especially supporters of the Green Party and supporters of the transition to green energy.
Kenzbendit, 29, said: “We Greens have been fighting nuclear power in Germany for decades, in the streets and now in the government.
Kensbendit told Erm News: "We do not know how the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Environment was deceived and delayed for months in order to prevent the extension of German nuclear power plants."
The young man who participated in the recent demonstrations added that "energy policy is not really for politicians, because they think and work to implement their political agendas, but energy policy is always long-term, and granting the tasks of the Environmental Self-Awareness Squad to the Ministry of Economy is illogical.
"The extension of the work at the nuclear power plant is incredible, disregarding and insulting the demands of the people, and will make Germany" ridiculous "all over the world," he said.
Paris turns its back on the environment
France is the world ’ s largest producer of nuclear energy, generating 70 percent of its electricity from 56 nuclear reactors and exporting to neighboring countries.
Nuclear reactors in France have suffered and half of them have been shut down due to malfunctions or drought, causing electrical output to fall to its lowest level in 30 years, and exports to fall by almost half, according to the latest government reports.
This led the French administration to increase the power of nuclear reactors and change the plan to gradually abandon nuclear reactors in favor of renewable sources such as the sun and wind.
The French move, analysts predict, will meet public anger and opposition from countries around the world seeking to combat climate change and calling for nuclear power to be replaced by other sources, in addition to the heavy financial burden on the French government.
It is well known that nuclear power is not practical in the economic sense, otherwise France would not need to nationalize EDF to be able to operate the reactors with government support.
Drought disrupts nuclear power
The drought crisis will significantly limit this planned expansion, according to data from nuclear reactor operators, because nuclear plants use large amounts of fresh water from rivers and lakes for cooling, and reduced river flows as a result of drought will reduce electricity generation at nuclear power plants.
According to French energy advisor Bernard Labonch, nuclear power is not only about the best way to generate electricity, but it is a historical legacy in France that is inextricably linked to nationalism, and it is taboo for any French citizen to advocate against nuclear power.
"If you want to get a job as an engineer or researcher in France you have to be a proponent of nuclear energy, so there are very few who openly criticize it," he said.
Thus, all indications are that nuclear energy will remain in France for decades to come, despite widespread public opposition and environmental warnings about the dangers posed by the water that nuclear power plants dump into rivers after they have used it for cooling, and the dangers it poses to ecosystems, fish and aquatic plants.
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**Background on Germany’s Nuclear Exit**:
    - Germany has officially shut down its last three nuclear reactors, ending over 60 years of nuclear energy use, with a targeted aim to generate power from renewable sources only by 2035.

Title:

Content: German Environment Ministry Rejects Bavarian State ’ s Request to Return Nuclear Energy
Germany ’ s Environment Ministry on Sunday rejected Bavaria ’ s request to be allowed to continue operating nuclear power plants, saying the jurisdiction of these facilities lies with the federal government.
Germany shut down its last three nuclear power plants on Saturday, ending a six-decade program as Berlin implemented a plan to limit power generation to renewable sources by 2035.
The final steps of the shutdown, scheduled for the end of 2022, were postponed last summer to this year after Germany halted fossil fuel imports from Russia after its invasion of Ukraine, which also raised concerns about securing energy supplies.
Bavaria has a 1,400MW Isar II reactor that can supply the equivalent of a large city.
The Bild am Sonntag newspaper reported on Sunday that Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Zöder wanted to ask the federal government to change the law on ending reliance on nuclear power to allow the state to continue operating plants within its jurisdiction.
“Until the crisis is over, and the transition to renewables is successful, we must use all kinds of energy until the end of the decade. ”
Bavaria has a 1,400MW Isar II reactor that can supply the equivalent of a large city.
Environment Minister Steffi Lemke said the license for ESAR 2 had expired and that restarting the reactor would require a new license.
In a statement sent to Reuters, Lemke said: “It is important to accept the latest advances in science and technology and to respect the decision of the German Bundestag. ”
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- The exit is part of a broader policy response to environmental and safety concerns (especially post-Fukushima), rooted in Germany’s commitment to carbon neutrality.

- Nuclear energy had previously been a massive and reliable part of Germany’s energy mix.

Title:

Content: Global News
Germany is extending the life of its reactors.
The Winter Challenge is postponing future plans.
You are now following the news that Germany is extending the life of its reactors.
The winter challenge postpones future plans from the World News section and now we leave you with full details
Mohammed - Abu Dhabi on Tuesday 18 October 2022 08: 23 AM - German Chancellor Olaf Schulz ordered on Monday evening to extend the operation of the country's three remaining nuclear reactors until next April, to avoid the country's energy shortage crisis this winter.
Schulz, in a statement, asked the ministries of economy, environment and finance to establish the legal basis for the continuation of the nuclear plants in operation, adding that "the plants of Isar 2, Neckaroisheim 2 and Island, will be operated beyond the deadline of December 31, to become until April 15, 2023."
This is one of the most significant consequences of Ukraine ’ s war on Germany, which had previously planned to phase out nuclear power by the end of 2022, but a shortage of energy supplies after cutting imports from Russia caused a trend to extend it.
Hostility to nuclear power
In 1998, the Socialists' alliance with the Greens won the elections with an anti-nuclear program, and after talks with the electricity companies they agreed to set a shorter life span for nuclear reactors, which was limited to 32 years.
• Details included that this was based on the production of certain quantities of electricity and not according to the period of time, and not to build new reactors, but again set a date to stop the stations, which is the end of 2022, and the agreement was turned into a law in 2002.
The law resulted in the closure of Steed in 2003 and Obergheim in 2005.
• In 2009, the Christian Democratic Party led by Angela Merkel came to power, and the country had 17 nuclear plants, and the government decided to extend the operation of 7 plants in 8 years and the other 10 within 14 years.
After the Fukushima accident, the government suspended the 10-year extension and decided to suspend the reactors that had been extended for seven years.
• In 2011, it decided to close 8 reactors and close the remaining 9 by 2022, with the last plants closed at the end of 2021.
The challenge of survival
Ahmed Al-Qarout, senior analyst at the British consulting firm Spyline, believes that the German chancellor ’ s decision to extend the work of the remaining plants is part of Germany ’ s plan to diversify energy sources.
Al-Qarout pointed out in an interview with "Dot Al-Khaleej" that Germany has moved even to return to coal, despite its environmental impact in the future, but "there are priorities in life, foremost of which is the priority of survival, so the future cannot be secured without focusing on the present."
On whether it will take longer to use nuclear power, the economic analyst prefers to wait until the winter to clear the vision on the provision of alternatives, especially as Germany ’ s energy contracts with Qatar start in 2023.
He predicted that the Germans will cross the energy crisis by finding alternatives, but the crisis "lies in the rise in energy prices, because Germany gets energy from America three and four times the price, which reflects on the cost of living."
Extension Options
The economist, Anas Al-Hajji, sees in an article, that the decision to extend the reactors means that there are two ways:
The first is simple: what will remain of nuclear fuel at the end of the year will not be completely depleted, so the reactors can continue to operate until the end of the winter, which everyone fears.
- The second option, long-term, is that if the government decides to extend for years, it means stopping the reactors for months of maintenance, then adding new nuclear fuel, and then starting the reactors again, which is an expensive process, but may reduce the energy problem for years, especially if gas prices remain high.
We hope that we have succeeded in conveying the full details of the news of Germany extending the life of its reactors..
The Winter Challenge delays plans for the future.
In God ’ s care and protection.
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Content: Environmental activist Greta Thunberg calls Germany's use of coal instead of nuclear power a "bad idea"
© AFP 2022 / CRISTINA QUICLERSwedish schoolgirl and environmental activist, Greta Thunberg, December 11, 2019
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Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg has criticised Germany ’ s plan to shut down its remaining nuclear plants while increasing its coal-fired power.
Thunberg, 19, said in a television interview that turning off nuclear power plants was a “bad idea ” if it meant switching to coal, according to Politico.
Asked if nuclear power is the best for the climate, Greta Thunberg, 2019 Time magazine ’ s Person of the Year, replied: “It depends, if the nuclear already works for them I think it would be a mistake to shut it down and switch to coal. ”
Germany plans to close its remaining three nuclear plants by the end of 2022, under pressure from gas shortages and prolonged outages of French nuclear plants, which have caused supply shortages and soaring prices.
Germany is likely to extend the life of two of its nuclear reactors until April 2023.
Germany restarts first coal-fired power plant amid gas crisis
Berlin has revived its idle coal plants in order to cope with the current energy crisis and is paying operators of closed brown coal plants up to 450 million euros to equip them for emergency operation during the winter, but the German government still insists it will end coal use by 2030.
In August, Germany ’ s Uniper restarted a backup coal-fired power plant to secure power supplies, due to power shortages caused by sanctions on Russia.
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**Immediate Energy and Political Impacts**:
    - The German government faced internal debate during the 2022-2023 energy crisis, with some cabinet members supporting temporary nuclear extensions, while the Green Party consistently opposed it.

Title:

Content: Chairman of the Board of Directors and Editors
I'm sorry.
Mohamad Elbaz
Editor-in-Chief
Wael Lotfy
Chairman of the Board of Directors and Editors
I'm sorry.
Mohamad Elbaz
Editor-in-Chief
Wael Lotfy
Schulz expects swift decision on continued use of nuclear power in Germany
German Chancellor Olaf Schulz believes that a quick decision by the German government on the continued use of nuclear energy can be made due to the current energy crisis.
Speaking at a press conference in Berlin on Wednesday, the Social Democrat politician said: “Be assured that we will finish this soon. ”
Schulz stressed that it is not about working in any way so as not to resort to the extension of the use of nuclear energy, but rather about determining what conditions are necessary for this step and determining what exactly will be done and how quickly to do it.
The move is controversial within the ruling coalition between the Green Party and the Free Democratic Party, where Economy Minister Robert Habeck (from the Greens) is seeking to keep only two of the remaining three reactors operational until spring next year in anticipation of electricity supply bottlenecks.
The FDP is urging all three nuclear reactors to remain operational until 2024, and Finance Minister and party chairman Christian Lindner reiterated the demand on Monday.
As part of Germany ’ s renunciation of nuclear power, the last three German nuclear reactors were to be taken off the grid by the end of 2022.
Earlier, German Chancellor Olaf Schulz said he believed it was possible to achieve the ruling coalition ’ s goal of providing 400,000 new affordable housing units a year, despite the serious doubts raised by the housing sector about the possibility of achieving this goal.
Following consultations by the Affordable Housing Alliance, the Social Democrat politician said in Berlin on Wednesday: "We have to achieve this and we have to continue building this much for a long time and continuously, I think this will work."

- The chancellor had to personally intervene to decide on extending nuclear through the winter, indicating high-level controversy.

- States like Bavaria lobbied to keep their nuclear plants running, citing local energy needs (e.g., Isar II reactor), but were denied by the central government.

**Effects on Energy Supply and Market**:
    - The loss of nuclear reduces a steady, carbon-free electricity supply, at a time when natural gas (especially from Russia) was under pressure due to the Russian-Ukrainian war.

- Prior to the Ukraine conflict, Russian gas made up 55% of Germany’s consumption.

Title:

Content: General Supervision
Elham Aboul Fath
Editor-in-Chief
Thank you for your patience.
General Supervision
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Editor-in-Chief
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Europe ’ s largest economy: What has Germany done to cope with the energy crisis?
Germany ’ s gas storage facilities are filling faster than planned, Economy Minister Robert Habeck said, giving hope that Europe ’ s largest economy will be able to avoid a severe gas shortage this winter.
“Reservoirs are filling faster than set, ” Habeck was quoted by Der Spiegel as saying, adding that the government ’ s goal of achieving 85% of storage capacity by October could be reached at the beginning of September.
Germany is in the second phase of a three-phase contingency plan drafted after cutting gas flows from its main supplier, Russia.
Quoting data from the energy industry association BDEW, Spiegel reported that only 9.5% of Germany ’ s gas consumption in August came from Russia.
Last year, Russian gas accounted for about 55% of the country ’ s total consumption.
Industry data from European operators group GIE on Sunday showed that the government had targeted gas storage levels by 75% by September 1, but storage levels had already reached 82.2%.
“Companies will then be able to draw gas from storage facilities as planned during the winter to supply industry and homes as well, ” Habik said.
Liquefied natural gas (LNG) is also expected to flow to Germany via France after the two countries resolved regulatory and technical issues to facilitate supplies, Spiegel said, citing a document from the Ministry of Economy.
Largest gas storage facility in Western Europe
The largest gas storage facility in Western Europe is located 2 kilometers (1.25 miles) underground in the city of Reiden, in the northern state of Lower Saxony, the size of 910 football fields.
The facility plays a key role in securing supplies for Germany and Europe.
Astora is a subsidiary of Russian energy giant Gazprom, and owns more than a third of all German gas storage facilities.
Economic Affairs and Climate Action Minister Robert Habeck, of Germany ’ s Green Party, assumes that storage facilities were “systematically emptied ” on purpose in order to raise gas prices, but also to generate political pressure.
New law to guarantee gas reserves
About 55% of Germany ’ s gas imports come from Russia, plus about 50% from solid coal and 30% from oil.
Although the strategic oil reserve must last for 90 days in Germany, there is no such requirement for gas and coal.
It is now clear that this was a mistake, and the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Action intends to move forward with the legal changes as soon as possible.
The German parliament is preparing to introduce a law in time for it to come into force before crises.
At the same time, a decision has been made to phase out coal-fired power in Europe by 2038 at the latest.
But concerns about German energy security now call everything into question.
Economy ministers in 16 German states have already called for longer operating periods for both coal-fired and nuclear power plants to be examined.
Economic Affairs and Energy Minister Andreas Pinkwart of Germany ’ s most populous state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) said: “All options should be on the table. ”
Pinkwart is a member of the Liberal Democrats (FDP).
The phasing out of nuclear weapons has long been a thorn on the side of the FDP.
Happik said, “Everything is on the table. ”
As the Minister of Economic Affairs and Climate Action, he is in a very difficult position, his job as a government minister is to make securing energy supplies his top priority.
On the other hand, phasing out coal in the face of climate change is a core issue for his Green Ecological Party, and phasing out nuclear power has been part of the political identity of the party since its founding.
Habik said he would not resist any extension of nuclear power "for ideological reasons".
However, he said, preparations for the shutdown of nuclear power plants have already progressed so far, and continued operation is not possible for safety reasons.
According to the operators Eon, RWE and EnBW, it will be technically difficult to quickly buy suitable fuel rods, and there is a shortage of specialized personnel.
Even if nuclear power plants were to continue operating, it would take a year and a half before the reactors could generate electricity again, Pinkwart said.
For technical reasons, it still has to be closed at the end of the year and then restarted to operate again in the winter of 2023 / 2024 at the earliest.
Purchase of liquefied natural gas
To replace Russia ’ s energy supply in the short term, the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Action is considering buying more gas from other countries, including the Middle East.
In addition, liquefied natural gas (LNG) will be imported from the United States.
This is to be delivered by sea.
Germany wants to build two terminals on the North Sea coast, in Brunsbüttel and Wilhelmshaven, as soon as possible.
Habeck is in talks about buying liquefied natural gas in the United States, as well as about energy, security policy and the consequences of sanctions, but the current crisis is also an opportunity for environmentalists to push the expansion of green electricity dramatically.
"The most important key to our energy sovereignty is the global shift towards more renewable energies and greater energy efficiency," Habik said before leaving for the United States, adding, "Of course, we are discussing the issue of energy security in the transatlantic alliance."
But in Germany ’ s coalition government, even Finance Minister Christian Lindner of the FDP changed his tune, now calling renewable energies “freedom energies, ” and Chancellor Olaf Schulz called them“ crucial to the country ’ s security. ”
“The faster we push for the expansion of renewable energies, the better. ”

The war triggered major supply disruptions and price hikes, revealing vulnerabilities in Germany’s energy strategy.

- The government responded by rapidly filling storage reserves, accelerating renewable expansion, and arranging liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports from the US and other countries.

**Challenges in Replacing Nuclear Power**:
    - Technical barriers exist to quickly restarting nuclear or scaling up new plants: lack of fuel rods, specialized personnel, and regulatory hurdles.

- The coal phase-out is still scheduled for 2038, but in the interim, some coal power was brought back online, causing concern from climate activists like Greta Thunberg.

- Greta Thunberg and some energy experts argue that shutting down nuclear only to increase coal use is a setback for climate goals.

**Societal and Political Pushback**:
    - There is a vocal segment of the population, regional governments (like Bavaria), and international figures advocating for revisiting the nuclear decision to ensure energy security and climate progress.

- However, current Berlin policy is firmly in favor of the phase-out, despite calls for temporary extensions during crises.

**European Context**:
    - Many EU countries view nuclear as essential for a low-carbon future and energy security, with new plants planned in Poland and elsewhere.

- Germany’s choice is thus somewhat isolated in the EU context, where nuclear is regaining favor due to energy security concerns.

**Summary Nugget**:
Germany’s nuclear phase-out, amidst the Ukraine war and energy insecurity, has exposed significant vulnerabilities: higher reliance on fossil fuels in the short term, market volatility, and public and political divisions.

Yet, the central government remains committed to a renewables-focused approach despite calls to revisit nuclear, while Europe overall is reassessing nuclear’s role in the energy transition.

- The anti-nuclear movement gained significant political influence with the rise of the Green Party in the 1980s, making nuclear phase-out a core policy goal.

Title:

Content: Read the history of the moment: why is Germany so entangled in nuclear power? | German News | DW | 14.04.2023
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Read the history of the present: why is Germany so entangled in nuclear power?
Germany was proud of its nuclear power generation technology, but at the same time the technology has been so controversial that it has finally decided that April 15, 2023 is the date of withdrawal from nuclear power.
However, as the energy crisis caused by the Russian-Ukrainian war continues to intensify, the wisdom of the decision to say goodbye to nuclear energy has been widely discussed.
Germany ’ s nuclear policy is in dispute again
It all started with an "egg" - Germany's first nuclear reactor in Garching, near Munich, went into operation in October 1957.
Because the nuclear reactor, which belongs to the University of Munich, resembles an egg, it is nicknamed the "atomic egg".
It was a milestone in Germany's nuclear energy research and a symbol of Germany's resurgence after World War II.
The nuclear reactor, which was used for scientific purposes, remained in operation until 2000.
In 1957, Germany built its first nuclear reactor.
Three years later, in 1960, the first nuclear power plant for civilian use was built in the city of Kahl, on the banks of the Main River in Bavaria.
At that time, atomic energy was widely regarded as both safe and reliable. The 1973 oil crisis gave further impetus to the rapid development of nuclear energy in Germany.
The start of the anti-nuclear movement
Since it has been impossible to find a foolproof way to store nuclear waste, opponents have begun to question whether nuclear energy is really a clean energy source.
Thousands of protesters clashed with police during the construction of the Brockdorf nuclear power plant in the state of Shihe.
Since the 1970s, plans for the construction of the Brockdorf nuclear power plant have triggered numerous police and civil conflicts.
"Nuclear energy? No, thank you!" has become a rallying cry for environmentalists.
In the 1980s, a new political party, the Green Party, emerged in West Germany. Its members are mainly leftists, pacifists, environmentalists and anti-nuclear forces. In 1983, the Green Party entered the Bundestag.
In 1983, Green Party politicians Gert Bastian and Petra Kelly were elected to the Bundestag.
On March 28, 1979, a serious accident occurred at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania, United States. On April 26, 1986, a reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine, Soviet Union, exploded, causing the worst nuclear disaster in history.
Radiation clouds spread throughout Europe.
The accident also marked a turning point in discussions about nuclear technology in Germany.
At the time, Germany was still divided.
In East Germany under the Communist Party, the public received almost no information about the nuclear accident and its effects.
West Germany, on the other hand, was in a state of confusion and politicians were helpless.
People were unprepared for a nuclear leak, and the government was unable to provide guidelines and response strategies for the time being.
A hastily formed crisis management team was also disbanded shortly afterwards.
The Chernobyl nuclear accident has caused widespread concern in Germany.
People are buying iodine.
A large quantity of fruit, vegetables and milk in the supermarket was ordered to be removed from the shelves because of concerns about nuclear radiation.
Children were banned from playing in the sand pools and citizens were warned not to go out in the rain.
Although the health effects of radiation were not detected in Germany, the accident led to the introduction of nationwide radiation monitoring in Germany, which eventually led to the establishment of the Federal Ministry of the Environment.
Plans to build a nuclear waste treatment plant in the Bavarian town of Wackersdorf have sparked serious riots.
The clashes left several protesters and civil servants dead and hundreds injured.
The project was finally halted in 1989, the first major victory of the German environmental movement.
And...
In 2011, protesters handcuffed themselves to the tracks in an attempt to block trains carrying nuclear waste.
Meanwhile, in northern Germany, Gorleben in Lower Saxony became a symbol of the struggle against nuclear waste, and the town was designated to temporarily store nuclear waste until a permanent storage site was identified.
The first shipment of nuclear waste arrived in the town on 24 April 1995.
A long farewell to nuclear power - Germany's nuclear withdrawal process after many setbacks
In 2001, Schroeder's center-left coalition government of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the Green Party reached an agreement with major energy companies to phase out nuclear power.
All 19 nuclear power plants in Germany have been given operating timelines and the last one is required to be shut down by 2021.
In 2001, Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder announced that Germany would phase out nuclear power generation.
In 2010, the center-right government led by Chancellor Angela Merkel withdrew the nuclear withdrawal agreement.
It also decided to extend the operating time of nuclear power plants.
However, the third major nuclear accident in the world has caused a change in Germany's nuclear energy policy. On March 11, 2011, the accident at the Fukushima nuclear power plant in Japan caused by the earthquake and tsunami.
The impact of the accident on Germany is even greater than that of Japan.
As a veteran physicist, German Chancellor Angela Merkel unexpectedly changed her usual stance on nuclear energy policy.
Merkel suddenly announced that the era of nuclear power in Germany will end by the end of 2022. On July 30, 2011, the German Bundestag voted to approve the resolution.
After years of fierce fighting, the Brockdorf nuclear power plant in the state of Ishih will finally become history in 2021 after 35 years of operation.
In 2017, Germany decided to start a nationwide search for a safe place to store highly radioactive nuclear waste, with the mission to be completed by 2031.
At the end of 2021, anti-nuclear activists celebrated the closure of a nuclear power plant in North Germany.
Rethinking the nuclear policy.
The war in Ukraine has made Germany anxious to get rid of its energy dependence on Russia, which has also reignited the already ironclad policy of denuclearization.
The coalition leader has spearheaded a proposal to extend the operating time of nuclear power plants to replace natural gas from Russia with nuclear power.
In August 2022, CDU Chairman Meltz and CSU Chairman Soder both put forward the idea of extending the time limit for nuclear power operations.
Christian Lindner, finance minister of the business-oriented Liberal Democratic Party (FDP), immediately backed a return to nuclear power.
His party is junior partner in a centre-left coalition with the Social Democrats (SPD) and the Greens.
The latter will find it difficult to agree to an extension because opposition to nuclear power is one of their core issues.
But in the summer of 2022, no one in Germany completely ruled out that possibility.
LDP finance minister Lindner, who is focused on business interests, was also quick to join the pro-nuclear camp.
But for the Green Party, which is also part of the ruling coalition, the possibility of agreeing to extend the operating time of nuclear power plants is slim, because opposition to nuclear power is their basic principle.
Anything is possible in Germany in 2022.
Can nuclear power be a climate savior?
Editor: This article was originally published in August 2022
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