Last Thursday, near the town of Karlsruhe, in Germany, two cooling towers from the Philippsburg power plant were demolished. The exact date of the already planned demolition was kept in secret in order to prevent crowds in the site due to coronavirus concerns.

This demolition wasn´t a separated incident but a part of Germany´s plan to decommission all the country´s nuclear reactors. This plan was announced just two weeks after the Fukushima´s nuclear plant disaster in 2011, which lead to the contamination of an area of 30 to 50 Km around the site with radioactive substances. At the time, thousands protested in Germany against nuclear power and the government was quick to act in order to prevent similar disasters in the country. The German movements against nuclear power weren´t exactly new as they had started in the 80`s after a radioactive cloud from the Chernobyl’s nuclear disaster crossed the nation.

This plan expects to have all of Germany´s plants decommission by 2022, putting and end to the seventeen nuclear power plants that provided for 25% of the country´s electricity in 2011. That number has gone down to just 12% last year.

As the nuclear power shuts down, concerns arise over which sources of energy are being used to replace them. This might mean an increase in the use of fossil fuels as renewable sources of energy are still not ready to produce the amount of energy required. This increased in CO2 emissions is also accompanied by Germany´s plan to shut down its coal plants by 2038.

On the other hand, France which gets 75% of its electricity from nuclear power, with 58 reactors is taking a more gradual approach to denuclearisation. Their plan expects to reduce the contribution of their nuclear plants to around 50% of the country´s electricity by 2035. This strategy aims to avoid the burning of fossil fuels in alternative to nuclear power and a way to the increase renewable energy production.

Some look at France´s example and question if Germany´s plan is the best option to go with. Nevertheless, the road to denuclearisation in Germany is quickly being paved allowing for the concerns over nuclear energy safety to be put to rest.