Germany shuts down half of its 6 remaining nuclear plants

By FRANK JORDANS
Associated Press

BERLIN (AP) — Germany has shut down half of the six nuclear plants it still has in operation. It comes a year before the country draws the final curtain on its decades-long use of atomic power. The decision to phase out nuclear power and shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy was first taken by the center-left government of Gerhard Schroeder in 2002. The three reactors now being shuttered were first powered up in the mid-1980s. Together they provided electricity to millions of German households for almost four decades. The German government said this week that decommissioning all nuclear plants and phasing out the use of coal by 2030 won’t affect the country’s energy security or its goal of making Europe’s biggest economy ‘climate neutral’ by 2045.