Binational Fessenheim Society is to be dissolved

Created: 09/22/2022Updated: 09/22/2022, 18:31

View of the Fessenheim nuclear power plant in eastern France.

© Jean-Francois Badias/AP/dpa/archive image

Almost a year and a half after it was founded, the Franco-German company for the use of the area around the decommissioned Fessenheim nuclear power plant is to be dissolved.

The legal form and the composition of the company Novarhéna had turned out to be unsuitable, a spokesman for the Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald district office said on Thursday of the German Press Agency in Freiburg.

Freiburg/Fessenheim - The area only covers 55 hectares due to environmental protection requirements.

German shareholders are on board with a total of 14.5 percent of the company, which is organized under French law.

In April last year, 17 German and French partners got together to boost economic development in the region after the Alsatian nuclear power plant was closed.

The Fessenheim power plant was shut down in the summer of 2020 after 42 years of operation.

The joint development of a project for the subsequent use of the area around the Fessenheim nuclear power plant is one of the priorities agreed by Berlin and Paris in order to implement the Aachen Treaty for Franco-German cooperation.

The new contract was signed in January 2019 by French President Emmanuel Marcon and then Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU).

An exact date for the dissolution of Novarhéna has not yet been set, said the spokesman for the district office.

The eastern French daily newspaper "Les Dernières Nouvelles d'Alsace" had named the month of October.

The district of Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald brought 20,000 euros to Novarhéna, after its liquidation a loss of around 10,000 euros is possible, said the spokesman.

Details have not yet been determined.

There are other projects for cross-border cooperation for the development of the region.

dpa