Yes, this lady is for turning! For spinning, indeed. Last autumn, Angela Merkel's mistake-prone coalition government decided that Germany's nuclear power stations should continue to operate until 2035, which overrode a decision to quit nuclear energy by 2022 made by the government of Social Democrats and Greens in 2001. Seven months, a nuclear catastrophe in Japan and several regional losses by Merkel's Christian Democrats later, she's changed her mind again. On Monday night a historic decision was made, the government declared: Germany will be the first industrial country in the world that renounces nuclear power for good.
All power plants will by switched off by 2022. Sounds familiar? Germany is not only quitting nuclear power, but it's quitting for the second time. This shows you how much we Germans fear radiation. It's a fear that has become deeply embedded in the psyche of the country. Since Fukushima, one can see on walls, doors, backpacks, bikes and everywhere else the logo of the anti-nuclear movement from the 1970s. A smiling sun saying "Atomkraft? Nein danke" has returned. People have put up the logo on their Facebook profiles, thousands have marched on the streets and the Greens, who grew out of the original anti-nuclear movement, have become stronger than ever. They could even provide the next chancellor. Suddenly everybody is against nuclear power, and Merkel is leading the movement. She's no Iron Lady, but rather a chameleon. No wonder the Greens are angry she stole their clothes.
The decision to quit nuclear energy is politically correct, but is it economically sustainable and environmentally brave? Nobody is celebrating yet, because many questions remain.
Eight power plants were switched off immediately after Fukushima – without causing problems. (It makes you wonder why they were built in the first place.) Those old ones won't come back. The remaining nine plants can still go another 10 years on full power, until 2021. The last one, the newest, has to be switched off by the end of 2022. For many critics this is still much too long, too many years with possible dangers, terrorist attacks for example, ahead.
Will Germany face blackouts because of the closures? The earlier compromise of 2001 provided a less radical, gradual switch-off over several years. How to avoid such problems, especially in the winter time, is one of the open questions. One solution being debated is to keep one nuclear power station on stand-by. But the technology is so complicated, and you can't just switch a nuclear power plant on and off like a TV set. It would cost ¤50m per year to operate.
In order to bridge the gap, the government will support the building of new fossil-fuel plants, mainly gas and coal. It seems that Germans prefer honest, pure coal smoke than clean but invisible and eternally poisonous radiation. That emissions may go up seems a lesser concern. Let's just plant a few more trees and support fair-trade coffee growers in Brazil.
The hope is also that eventually the gap may be filled by wind energy or other eco-friendly energy sources. The government is set to spend more in order to raise the proportion of Ökostrom (green energy) by 2020 to 35%. It would be a massive incentive for the German wind and solar power industries.
That is a very ambitious project: at the moment Germany has 17%, already one of the highest percentages in Europe. It's not clear if it's feasible to increase further, because already there are Bürgerinitiativen, or "not in my backyard" groups, protesting against anything that is more intrusive than a candle: coal energy plants, windparks or overhead electricity cables.