Germany’s search for final nuclear waste repository could drag on into 2070s - report

Germany’s ongoing hunt for a final repository for highly radioactive nuclear waste could last until the 2070s, a report has warned. However, the country’s environment ministry said the findings were outdated and that the search may be completed earlier. The report by the Institute for Applied Ecology (Öko-Institut), which was commissioned by the country’s Federal Office for the Safety of Nuclear Waste Management (BASE), said a decision on a location can be expected in 2074 at the earliest under ideal conditions, reports Zeit Online. This would be more than 40 years later than the original 2031 target, which the government already gave up almost two years ago. The environment ministry said the report did not take into consideration significant progress in efforts to shorten the search, for example by saving time on long exploration periods.

The ministry declared in November 2022 that the search won’t be completed in 2031, following a paper by the Federal Company for Radioactive Waste Disposal (BGE) that estimated the search could take until 2046 or, in another scenario, until 2068. The next step will be for the BGE to propose shortlisted siting regions at the end of 2027, the ministry said. “This is the right time to discuss and regulate further acceleration in a transparent manner. A great deal of time can be saved, particularly in the surface and underground exploration,” it added. But Journalist Bernward Janzing wrote in a commentary it was questionable how much the “scientifically well designed” process can be accelerated without compromising high safety standards.

Germany completed its nuclear phase-out last year and will now have to store 1,900 large containers, or around 28,100 cubic metres (m3), of high-level radioactive waste by 2080 (Figure 1), when all its nuclear power stations and many research facilities will have been finally decommissioned and the fuel elements treated at other facilities. Highly radioactive, heat-generating waste accounts for only five percent of Germany’s radioactive refuse, but is responsible for 99 percent of the radiation. It is currently held at temporary storage facilities near decommissioned nuclear power stations and in central interim repositories. Construction of a repository following a location decision is scheduled to take about 20 years, according to current plans. The process of transporting and storing thousands of casks in the final repository will then take decades more. Experts from a parliamentary storage commission said that loading and sealing the repository could be expected to last “well into the next century”.