In April 2023 it will be over. Then the federal government pulled the plug on the three remaining German reactors. Also for security reasons. In Temelin near the German border, on the other hand, they can look forward to a bright future – thanks to mini-nuclear power plants.
Olaf Heinrich is what you would call a seasoned mayor – despite being only 43 years old. Since 2008, the doctor of geography has been the mayor of Freyung, a municipality with 7,000 inhabitants in the Bavarian Forest. In addition, as the President of the District Council, he directs the fortunes of Lower Bavaria. In his party, the CSU, his voice carries weight, precisely because he never comes across as blustering or beer tent-like.
Heinrich has been there for a long time. He came to politics through his engagement against Temelin over 20 years ago. The town, around 80 kilometers behind the German-Czech border, has acquired a reputation since the commissioning of the two nuclear power plant blocks at the beginning of the noughties, which regularly triggers panic attacks in the neighboring countries of Austria and Germany.
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In the past, reports of major and minor breakdowns have repeatedly made the rounds. The reactors were repeatedly shut down and later started up again. Confidence-building measures look different.
It is precisely in this Temelin that the Czech government wants to build a nuclear park. Olaf Heinrich, Freyung’s mayor, was present live at the announcement – albeit rather involuntarily. He was invited to the “Forum of Partner Regions of the Region of South Bohemia” at Hluboká Castle. Not for the first time, but this time everything turned out differently than expected.
After the Lower Bavarian delegation had taken their seats, Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala, who had traveled specially from Prague, signed the “South Bohemian Nuclear Pact” to the astonishment of the guests from the neighboring country. What then followed was a “three-hour promotional event for nuclear power,” Heinrich recalls.
Tenor: In contrast to Germany, the Czech Republic relies entirely on nuclear energy, which is why the expansion plans for Temelin were praised in the roadshow of Czech politics and business. In addition to the existing reactors, the core of the future “nuclear park” will be several mini nuclear power plants. So-called Small Modular Reactors (SMR). “The reason for this was: We have changed the Atomic Energy Act to make it easier to build new nuclear power plants,” reports Heinrich FOCUS online and adds: “I find that worrying.”
According to Olaf Heinrich, the mini-nuclear power plants did not require hundreds of thousands of tons of reinforced concrete. “They can be built quickly and cheaply.” Confidence building looks different once again. “The most shocking thing about the event was that not a single word was said about safety and risks in three hours,” emphasizes Heinrich. “The topic was not on the agenda.”
Small Modular Reactors go back to developments in the 1950s. The approach was to use nuclear power as a propulsion technology for military submarines. A wide variety of concepts and developments exist worldwide today. Not more. Nevertheless, the Czech operator is optimistic that it will be ready to go by the beginning of the next decade at the latest.
“The model reactors looked like a discount store building,” says Heinrich. Like a prefabricated house, they are prefabricated in the factory and then quickly erected. “I can’t understand building a site in Temelin of all places to test new technologies.” But dialogue was expressly not desired at the dialogue event. “Quite absurd,” says Heinrich.
While the search for a nuclear waste repository for Germany continued in the Bavarian Forest in the region around Freyung, Heinrich made it clear to FOCUS online: “What moves people on both sides of the border, and nothing was said about that either, is the question: Where to put it the nuclear waste? For us in Lower Bavaria, the topic of the atom is therefore also highly emotional.”
For the experts from the Federal Office for the Safety of Nuclear Waste Management, in short: BASE, in Berlin, the topic is part of the job. It was only last year that the office presented an expert opinion on the SMR, which according to a spokeswoman is still up to date. The Freiburg Öko-Institut commissioned to do this examined a total of 31 SMR concepts. Conclusion: immature, entail enormous risks.
Wolfram König, President of the Berlin authority, took this opportunity to add: “We have to state that none of the technologies discussed is currently available on the market. It is also not foreseeable whether they will be so in the future. At the same time, they are associated with promises that are often very similar to those already made with the first generation of reactors in the 1950s and 1960s of the last century.”
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So everything is just an air number in the Czech Republic? Not at all! The South Bohemian Region website states: The European energy crisis is accelerating the project of small modular reactors in the Czech Republic. The joint venture “South Bohemia Nuclear Park” wants to make the construction of the first pilot project much easier. The area in the existing nuclear power plant Temelín represents a protected, researched area, the presence of specialist personnel ensures a synergy effect in planning, construction and operation.
“It’s the best possible space for a pilot project,” adds Daniel Beneš, Chairman and CEO of ČEZ, the responsible operating company, which is 70 percent state-owned. “At the same time, preparations are underway for the construction of two more standard units.” The CEO is convinced: “We are doing our best to maintain and strengthen our country’s energy security.”
Translated this means: While Germany has been struggling for months to phase out nuclear power and ultimately decided on a tired stretching operation until April, our neighboring country is leading the way and expanding nuclear power.
But do these mini nuclear power plants really ignite as hoped? The BASE experts are skeptical about this. According to their report, between one thousand and ten thousand SMR systems would have to be built in order to provide the electrical power currently required worldwide. Questions about safety, transport, dismantling and interim and final storage are also unresolved.
It also states that new SMR-specific national and international security standards would be necessary if SMR were to be rolled out worldwide. According to the expert opinion, SMRs could have potential safety advantages over large nuclear power plants. But the large number of reactors required would in turn significantly increase the associated risks, according to BASE.
A spokeswoman for the Society for Plant and Reactor Safety (GRS) in Cologne also took a closer look at the economics for FOCUS online. She calculates that a certain amount of uranium has to be split to produce a certain amount of electricity. “So if you want to produce 1,000 megawatts of electricity, you can do that in one reactor at 1,000 megawatts or in ten reactors at 100 megawatts (SMR).”
But: “Since many things are also necessary for small reactors, it is currently assumed that the costs of generating electricity in small reactors are higher than in large reactors.” , lower approval requirements and reduced financial risk.
“However, the decentralized application of SMR advertised by the manufacturers would also mean that radioactive material can be located in significantly more places than if it were a single large facility,” the GRS spokeswoman continued. “In relation to the respective location, the quantity would of course be lower.”
Apart from that: Basically, these are just concepts at the moment. “Or, to put it bluntly, paper reactors,” as the spokeswoman notes. “We are still a long way from pilot plants or even from being ready for the market.”
That may be cold consolation for the people of Lower Bavaria. After all, the future of the Czech Republic just a few kilometers behind the border should definitely be bright. Who can blame them in the current energy crisis?
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