Dealing with nuclear power plants remains a hot topic.
Environmentalists are now calling for the immediate end of the nuclear power plant in the green ruled Baden-Württemberg - because of safety concerns.
Neckarwestheim / Stuttgart - Chernobyl, Fukushima, Three Mile Island - these are the names of the biggest nuclear disasters of the past decades.
After the nuclear disaster in Japan in 2011, the black and yellow government under Chancellor Angela Merkel decided to phase out nuclear power.
All nuclear power plants in the Federal Republic are to go offline by the end of 2022.
This is also the case with the Neckarwestheim II nuclear power plant, the last of its kind in Baden-Württemberg.
But environmentalists are calling for an immediate shutdown.
They warn of serious security risks.
An explosive situation especially for the green-run Baden-Württemberg Ministry of the Environment.
Nuclear power opponents have now submitted an urgent application - parallel to the ongoing lawsuit at the Mannheim Administrative Court.
Your goal is to prohibit the operation of the reactor until further notice.
"For years, the Baden-Württemberg Ministry of the Environment has denied the risk of pipe bursts arising from the corrosive conditions in the Neckarwestheim-2 nuclear power station," complain Armin Simon from "Radiated" and Franz Wagner from the "Bund der Bürgerinitiativen Mitteler Neckar".
Because during the revision in 2018, numerous cracks in the steam generator heating pipes of the nuclear power plant, through which radioactive water flows, were found.
Neckarwestheim II nuclear power plant in Baden-Württemberg: Expert opinion sees safety risks
They see themselves confirmed by a report by the graduate engineer and former head of the “Safety of Nuclear Facilities” department in the Federal Environment Ministry, Dieter Majer.
In the openly accessible report of February 19, 2021, Majer warns that the safety of the nuclear power plant cannot be guaranteed.
There are safety deficiencies that could lead to an accident.
Majer argues in his report that the further development of the cracks poses an incalculable risk - for example a pipe burst.
He writes: "If the conditions in the steam generators that promote stress corrosion cracking cannot be verifiably eliminated, the system must not continue to be operated like this." Various media, for example the BWR, reported on this in March.
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Steam comes from the cooling tower of Block 2 of the Neckarwestheim nuclear power plant, next to Block 1 (l) and Block 2 (r) of the nuclear power plant can be seen.
© Marijan Murat / dpa
The state ministry, led by the Greens, sees the situation differently from Majer. At the request of
Merkur.de
, the department stated that they had dealt with the report just like the Society for Plant and Reactor Safety (GRS) - but there were also counter-reports. The documents are available to
Merkur.de
. The answer goes on to say: "The reports and the audit by the Society for Reactor Safety on behalf of the BMU confirm that the nuclear supervisory authority in Baden-Württemberg has proceeded and acted in a safety-oriented manner in accordance with the nuclear regulations - the power plant can therefore be operated safely." In the upcoming revision, all heating pipes would be checked again - as in the previous year.
Green Ministry of the Environment rejects worries - the nuclear power plant can be operated safely
On the homepage of the Ministry of the Environment in Stuttgart it is written: “The problem of the defective steam generator heating pipes has been known since 2018 and has been thoroughly investigated by several independent experts and the Reactor Safety Commission.
The GKN II facility can therefore be operated safely on the basis of the nuclear regulations and the state of science and technology.
There are no new findings on the matter. "
But the small party ÖDP is also critical of the matter. “These types of cracks, as they also occurred in Neckarwestheim, cannot be controlled in principle. They were discovered in the past in several nuclear power plants that have since been shut down. Wherever they occur, you can never be sure whether a pipe will suddenly tear off in which water at temperatures above 300 ° C is under enormous pressure. The consequences would be catastrophic: A core meltdown would be possible ”, says the physicist Klaus Buchner, member of the federal board of the ÖDP.
The subject is now before the Mannheim Constitutional Court. The nuclear opponents may also place hopes in the new Green Environment Minister Thekla Walker hope. One thing is clear: In 2021, in times of the climate crisis and ten years after Fukushima, the future of nuclear power plants will continue to heat up people.
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