Some 800m below the town of Gorleben, northern Germany, salt glistens like ice underfoot.
The man in charge of the nation’s nuclear waste is walking through caverns carved into a huge salt formation that could one day entomb 17,000 tonnes of highly radioactive detritus.
Planned stress tests on European nuclear plants should focus on threats from natural disasters and exclude potential man-made catastrophes such as a terrorist attack, European atomic industry group Foratom said.
European nuclear officials are to decide today on parameters for the safety checks on atomic power plants in response to the Japanese nuclear crisis caused by a March 11 earthquake and tsunami. The meeting of the European Commission, the EU regulator, and 27 national nuclear safety authorities comes a day after Spain’s biggest earthquake in 57 years killed eight people.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel is anything but a left-wing greenie. The party she leads, the Christian Democratic Union, is the political equivalent of the Republicans in the US. Her coalition government is decidedly pro-business. Often described as Europe's most powerful politician, Merkel's top priority is job creation and economic growth.
Yet if the chancellor succeeds with her new energy policy, she will become the first leader to transform an industrialized nation from nuclear and fossil fuel energy to renewable power.
Europe is preparing new stress tests designed to put nuclear power stations through their paces. It's a response primarily to the problems at Japan's Fukushima plant. But will the tests be as rigorous as promised?
The European Commission is set to present a draft for its new nuclear stress tests next week. While the Fukushima power plant, ravaged by an earthquake and tsunami, teetered on the brink of meltdown in March, European leaders agreed to set the "highest standards" of nuclear safety, with a mandatory round of new stress tests key to achieving this goal.
BERLIN Feb 28 (Reuters) - Five states controlled by the opposition Social Democrats (SPD) will challenge in Germany's highest court on Monday the centre-right government's decision to extend the lifespan of nuclear power plants.
Contesting the decision to keep Germany's 17 nuclear plants running for about 12 years beyond their original shutdown date, the states will file a challenge to the Constitutional Court, citing improper legislative procedure.
Berlin - Germany's extension of the legal lifetimes of 17 nuclear power plants passed into law Wednesday, with President Christian Wulff assenting to the legislation in Berlin.
The 12-year deferment of the sunset date for nuclear power, a key policy plank of Chancellor Angela Merkel's government, still faces challenges by anti-nuclear opponents in the courts.
Bulgarian Parliament Chair Tsacheva has made promising hints about the fate of the Belene nuclear power plant. Photo by BGNES
Bulgarian will for sure build its second nuclear power plant at Belene, Parliament Chair Tsetska Tsacheva has declared.
The German opposition has reacted angrily over revelations that the government, as part of its decision to extend the life of nuclear power in Germany to the mid 2030s, struck a deal with the nuclear industry to shield it from unfavorable future political decisions.
Chancellor Angela Merkel had hoped that with a quick resolution, she could sidestep a national debate over nuclear energy. Many, though, see her new plan as a windfall for the country's power utilities. Opposition, both within her government and elsewhere, is on the rise.
Fresh from her controversial announcement that Germany aims to postpone abandoning nuclear energy, Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday threw Berlin's weight behind a planned four-nation plant in Lithuania.
"We'll do everything we can to ensure that this construction gets backing," Merkel told reporters during a visit to the Baltic state, saying German authorities could help bring potential investors on board.
