The two colossal cooling towers at the decommissioned Grafenrheinfeld nuclear power plant in central Germany are set to be demolished in controlled blasts this coming Friday.
Standing 143 metres high with a base diameter of approximately 105 metres and a top diameter of about 64 metres, the two towers have been a fixture of the skyline south of the city of Schweinfurt.
If all goes according to plan, they will be flattened within seconds of each other by rapid implosions on August 16.
Spectators have been told they can watch the scene unfold from afar, with no ear protection or face masks necessary. Onlookers can position themselves along the Main river and in the fields and meadows outside of the blast exclusion zone.
Just before the demolition, there will be a bang to prevent birds still perched on the towers from being harmed.
“Thirty seconds – that’s how long the party lasts,” said the project manager at the Grafenrheinfeld plant, Matthias Aron.
The cost is just over €3 million ($3.3 million). More than two-thirds of the blown-up material can be reused, Aaron said.
It will be the second-ever demolition of cooling towers from a decommissioned German nuclear power plant.
The first demolition, in May 2020, involved two towers at the Philippsburg nuclear power plant. It took place without public attendance due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Nuclear phase-out after Fukushima
Grafenrheinfeld had been in service for 33 years until 2015, when it was taken offline. Dismantling operations began in 2018 and, according to project manager Aron, will probably take another 10 years.
Germany was so alarmed by the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan in March 2011 that then-chancellor Angela Merkel announced a phase-out of nuclear power in the country. Eight older nuclear power plants were permanently taken offline by the summer of 2011.
After six decades of nuclear energy in Germany, the last three nuclear plants were shut down in April 2023. The dismantling and clearing of the sites will take years.
