Greta Thunberg who is a top Climate activist has on Tuesday made it clear that it was a clear “mistake” for Germany to manage to shut down some of its existing nuclear power plants while they have been ramping up some of the coal usage to tackle an energy crisis.
Germany has also been forced to make sure that they restart all their already mothballed coal plants after Russia had also curtailed its energy supplies to the country in the wake of its invasion of Ukraine.
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Its decision to extend the lifetime of two but not a third nuclear plant which had been beyond their planned shutdown at year’s end has also however led to a split within Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition and the Economy Minister Robert Habeck of the Greens has come under pressure over his nuclear policy, with some of the ecologists who have also been criticising him for failing to keep to the planned atomic phase-out.
At the same time, Finance Minister Christian Lindner of the liberal Free Democrats is leading the charge in pressing for the third nuclear plant to stay on the grid beyond the end of the year.
Asked about Habeck’s decision in an interview with ARD broadcaster, Thunberg said that “if we have (the nuclear plants) already running, I feel it’s a mistake to close them down” if coal was the alternative.
Lindner immediately took to Twitter to welcome Thunberg’s position.
“In this energy war, everything that creates electricity capacity must be kept on the grid,” he said.
Nuclear power is a hot-button topic in Germany’s political landscape.
Germany has been forced to restart mothballed coal plants after Russia curtailed its energy supplies to the country in the wake of its invasion of Ukraine.