“The big profits have long been apportioned”

With the German parliament’s decision to transfer responsibility for the country’s nuclear waste storage to the state, arguably the most expensive project in the history of German energy policy, has been legally phased-out with a broad political consensus, Petra Pinzler writes in an opinion piece for weekly newspaper Die Zeit. “But it has not been paid for yet. And that’s just the problem,” she says. Profits made with nuclear energy have long been apportioned among the plant operators rather than being used to ensure financial provisions in a foresighted manner - and now the state will have to help out, Pinzler writes. Germany’s nuclear exit could have been a model for the world, but the costs associated with its belated organisation “will deter a lot of governments from doing it”, she argues.

For information on the legal status of phasing out nuclear power, see the CLEW article Germany's constitutional court backs speedy nuclear exit.