Germany narrows nuclear waste repository search to under 5% of its land area

Less than five percent of Germany’s land area remains under consideration to serve as a permanent nuclear waste repository, according to an update report by the Federal Company for Radioactive Waste Disposal (BGE). 

Germany shut down its last nuclear power plants in 2023, but must still safely dispose of decades of accumulated radioactive waste. Around 1,900 large containers of high-level radioactive waste, totalling about 28,100 cubic metres, are currently held at temporary storage facilities near the nuclear power stations and in central interim repositories. Germany must now find a location that can be considered secure for hundreds of thousands of years.

“We are on track to reach the first major milestone in the search for a final repository for nuclear waste,” said environment minister Carsten Schneider, who is also in charge of nuclear safety. The original aim was to complete the search by 2031. However, a 2024 report commissioned by the Federal Office for the Safety of Nuclear Waste Management (BASE) found that the search could drag on into the 2070s.

This is the BGE’s final report before it recommends potential site regions for surface exploration at the end of 2027. Initially, only geological safety is analysed. The states of Rhineland-Palatinate, Hesse, Berlin, Saxony and Saarland are no longer part of the ongoing search. Following a review by scientists and BASE, Germany’s lawmakers will then decide on where to proceed in the next phase. 

“It is now important for the affected districts and local authorities to engage in a technical assessment of their own suitability as potential host regions,” said Florian Krob, nuclear researcher at the think tank Öko-Institut. 

As of the BGE’s 2025 update, around 25 percent of Germany’s land was still under consideration for a permanent nuclear waste repository. Last week, Finland became the first country to grant a licence to operate a permanent nuclear waste repository.