Operating times and electricity volumes of German nuclear power plants

Emsland nuclear power plant

Operating times have ended

The remaining three nuclear power plants Isar 2, Emsland and Neckarwestheim 2 were shut down on 15 April 2023. Their licence to power operation, which had been scheduled to expire on 31 December 2022, had previously been extended until 15 April 2023 by the 19th amendment to the Atomic Energy Act of 4 December 2022, irrespective of the quantities of electricity generated or transferred up to that date.
The Federal Office for the Safety of Nuclear Waste Management (BASE) documents and publishes the electricity quantities. The annual report 2022 was published in the Federal Gazette (BAnz AT 17/04/2023 B4) on 17 April 2023.

Electricity volumes, operating times and shutdown dates

As early as June 2001, the federal government and the energy supply companies had agreed on a certain quantity of electricity that each nuclear power plant was still allowed to produce with a reference date of 1 January 2000 (so-called consensus agreement). This resulted in an operating time of approximately 32 years for each nuclear power plant. The agreement was laid down in the Atomic Energy Act in April 2002.

In 2010, the federal government decided to extend the operating lives of nuclear power plants that had begun power operation up to and including 1980 by 8 years, and the operating lives of the younger nuclear power plants by 14 years. The Atomic Energy Act, as amended in December 2010, accordingly allocated additional quantities of electricity to the individual nuclear power plants.

Due to the reactor accident in Fukushima Daiichi, Japan, on 11 March 2011, the German government decided to re-evaluate the use of nuclear energy for commercial electricity generation and, as a consequence, to end it as soon as possible. The Atomic Energy Act, subsequently amended in August 2011, as before contained only the electricity quantities for each individual nuclear power plant that had been stipulated in the earlier Atomic Energy Act of April 2002. The lifetime extension established in December 2010 was reversed, and the additional electricity quantities were cancelled. In addition, a specific shutdown date was set for each nuclear power plant.

Regardless of the specific shutdown date, each nuclear power plant was only allowed to generate an individually assigned electricity volume in accordance with the Atomic Energy Act. This amount of electricity was often referred to as the “residual electricity volume”. The licence for power operation expired with the production of the individual amount of electricity specified in column 2 of Annex 3 to Section 7 (1a) of the Atomic Energy Act. According to the Atomic Energy Act, it was possible to transfer electricity quantities from one nuclear power plant to another.

With the 19th amendment to the Atomic Energy Act (AtG) of 4 December 2022, the operating licence for the last three nuclear power plants Isar 2, Emsland and Neckarwestheim 2, which had been scheduled to expire on 31 December 2022, was extended until 15 April 2023. This extension was independent of the electricity quantities generated or transferred.

The last three German nuclear power plants were shut down for good on 15 April 2023.

Documentation and publication of electricity volumes

The Federal Office for the Safety of Nuclear Waste Management (BASE) is responsible for documenting and publishing the electricity quantities of nuclear power plants in the Federal Gazette.
The energy suppliers measured and then reported the quantities of electricity generated in German nuclear power plants to BASE on a monthly basis. Independent experts were commissioned by the energy suppliers to check the measuring devices. Auditors certified the correctness of the reported data.

Annual report

In accordance with the Atomic Energy Act, BASE will publish the annual quantities of electricity generated and transmitted, as well as the resulting remaining quantities of electricity per calendar year, in the Federal Gazette.

The annual report for 2022 is available for download (in German) here.