The first time I took part in a panel discussion – in Worms back in 1975 – it dealt with a nuclear power plant. We talked about the Biblis plant. And when the issue of nuclear waste was raised, the operator said: “We’ll deal with it.” And I answered: “It’s not that simple. I’m worried that we will need a clean-up operation in future.”
The future means today. Germany is now searching for a site that can accommodate 28,100 cubic metres of high-level radioactive waste – a site that offers the best possible safety and security for a period of one million years, in accordance with the law. No building, facility or technology created by human hand can possibly offer safe storage over such long time spans: the forces of nature are simply too strong. Only geological formations are stable enough to store the legacy of half a century of the nuclear industry. Using modern geoscientific…
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