The decision of Chancellor Angela Merkel-led coalition to shut down all nuclear power plants by 2022 pushes Germany closer to becoming the biggest nation to exit nuclear power. Germany has 17 nuclear power reactors in operation, with a gross capacity of 21,517 MW. The decision is a reversion to Merkel?s 2009 re-election promise to extend the life of nuclear reactors. It comes in the wake of the nuclear meltdown in Japan and the gains made by the anti-nuclear Green Party at the polls.

According to current plans, the seven oldest reactors that have been placed under a moratorium and the Kruemmel nuclear power plant won?t go back online. A second group of six nuclear power plants (NPP) will go offline at the end of 2021 at the latest and the three most modern power plants will go offline 2022 at the latest, said environment minister Norbert Roettgen after the coalition talks.

This is a complete reversal of the 2009 coalition contract of the current federal government whose energy policy?as decided by the federal cabinet in September 2010 and approved by the German federal parliament in October 2010?planned to extent the operation time of the German nuclear power plants by granting further electricity production rights, grossly equalling additional 12 years on an average. Seven NPPs whose commercial commissioning was in 1980 or earlier were to be granted eight years while the operation time of the younger NPPs was to be extended by 14 years even while tightening the existing regulations regarding the safety requirements of nuclear power plants.

However, soon after the nuclear accident at Fukushima-Daichii last March in Japan, the German government ordered the shut down of seven older NPPs that had started commercial operations before 1981 and initiated a safety review against severe accident scenarios by the reactor safety commission. In its review report on May 17, 2011, the commission indicated weaknesses in protection against some identified natural hazards as well as from airplane crashes.

This has brought about a sea-change in Germany’s liberal nuclear policy which had granted five licences for the 17 German NPPs in operation in the last one-and-a-half years. But the current decision is no great surprise given the German policy of closing down nuclear power plants that have outlived their use. So far 19 NPPs and prototype reactors have been permanently shut down. Three of them were completely dismantled and the sites were restored to ?green-field conditions? and released from nuclear regulatory control. Two NPPs are in safe enclosure. For the other 14 NPPs dismantling is in progress, with restoring the green-field conditions being the target.

While businesses and utilities opposed Merkel?s move, warning of increased costs and less reliable power sources, Germany?s renewable energy federation said its members were prepared to spend as much as 200 billion euros ($286 billion) by 2020 to develop wind and solar power. To support non-renewable energy Merkel now wants to present five or six Bills to the Cabinet on June 6, including a revamp of feed-in-tariffs for solar, wind and biomass power, new building insulation targets and plans to build new ?smart? power grids.

Nuclear supplied some 22% of German power in 2010, while renewable sources provided 17%. Germany is Europe?s largest power market, followed by France. Germany last year was a net exporter of power to France, sending 16.1 terawatt hours to the country compared with imports of 9.4 terawatt hours.

The German plans to exit nuclear power has to be seen in the context of the larger moves worldwide where nuclear power development has failed to keep pace with the growth of renewable energy. According to estimates made in the US, the share of renewables in new capacity additions soared up from 2% in 2004 to 55% in 2009. In 2010, for the first time, the worldwide cumulative installed capacity of wind turbines (193 GW), biomass and waste-to-energy plants (65 GW), and solar power (43 GW) reached 381 GW, outpacing the installed nuclear capacity of 375 GW. Total investment in renewable energy technologies has been estimated at $243 billion in 2010.

Perceptions about the safety of nuclear power in Europe seems to be widening. France and the UK plan to set up more reactors even as Germany joined Switzerland in setting an exit date for nuclear power and Italy extended a moratorium on plans to re-enter atomic energy.

Despite all this, nuclear energy will continue to contribute a significant share of the new power capacities being built in emerging markets. Most recent estimates show that currently 14 countries are building NPPs. As of April 1, 2011, the IAEA listed 64 reactors as ?under construction,? nine more than at the end of 2009. The total capacity of units now under construction is about 62.5 GW, with an average unit size of around 980 MW. Close to three-quarters of the units under construction are located in just four countries: China, India, Russia, and South Korea. In fact, the nine units that were started between 2009 and April 2011 were in Asia and Eastern Europe.

The interest in nuclear energy will only increase as oil prices continue to soar. In 2010 the IAEA announced that as many as 65 countries have either expressed an interest in nuclear power or were considering or actively planning for nuclear power, many more than the 51 countries which evinced such intentions in 2008. Of the 65 countries, as 21 each were in Asia Pacific and Africa, 12 were around Easter Europe and 11 in Latin America. So the prospects of nuclear power are not as bleak as it seems despite the setback in Germany.