“The federal government is now responsible for handling the nuclear waste”

Nuclear plant operators removed the last hurdle to an agreement with the government over who will pay for storage and clean-up of nuclear waste after power plants are shut down in 2020, writes Manfred Schäfers in FAZ.net. Operators agreed to revoke most of their pending lawsuits regarding the nuclear waste cleanup, in exchange for the federal government taking over the building and financing of temporary and final storage facilities. All major political parties in the government and opposition have agreed to the deal, the newspaper writes. The main element of the deal is legal security for all involved, Schäfers says. The plant operators will pay 23.5 billion euros into a public fund for the cleanup. 

Read the article in German here.

For background read the CLEW article German utilities buy out of nuclear waste liability for 23.6 bln euros.