Belgium to exit nuclear power by 2025

Unpublished
Belgium's political parties have reached a conditional agreement to shut down the country's two remaining nuclear power stations, owned by GDF Suez unit Electrabel, according to a government spokeswoman.

The plan for a shutdown of the three oldest reactors by 2015 and a complete exit by 2025 is conditional on finding enough energy from alternative sources to prevent any shortages.

"If it turns out we won't face shortages and prices would not skyrocket, we intend to stick to the nuclear exit law of 2003," a spokeswoman for Belgium's energy and climate ministry said.

Belgium, which has seven nuclear reactors at two plants, had passed a law in 2003 outlining the planned shutdowns.

Belgium, which is in the throes of agreeing a new government, has long considered the prospect of a complete exit from nuclear. In 2009, atomic energy provided 55 per cent of the country's electricity generation, the latest available data from the International Energy Agency showed.

Belgium will now negotiate with investors to see how it can find new capacity to replace the 5860 MW that will be lost if the two nuclear sites at Doel and Tihange are shut.

Public hostility in Belgium has grown since Japan's nuclear catastrophe earlier this year.

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