Closing all the EU nuclear plants and managing the waste until 2050 would cost the member states about 253 billion euros, estimates the European Commission. Of this amount, 123 billion euros would be directed towards the decommissioning of the nuclear plants that reached the end of their life span and 130 billion euros would be needed for the waste management.

The European Commission estimates now exceed with 47% those issued in 2008 and the trend of the estimated costs is increasing as the operation of existing power plants and construction of new units to is still continued.

“Globally there is limited experience regarding decommissioning of nuclear plants. Until October 2015, in Europe 89 nuclear reactors were permanently closed, but only three reactors were decommissioned completely, all in Germany”, states the European Commission.

The European operators are not prepared financially to bear such expenses. Given the remaining life of the European nuclear plants, the operators have put aside just over half the funds required for this, although the Commission estimates that this share should be 64% by now.

Currently there are 129 nuclear reactors operating in 14 EU member states, with a production capacity of 120 GW and an average age of about 30 years.