The debate on effective climate protection is heating up in Germany and the rest of the world. Nuclear energy is being touted as 'clean' energy. Given the circumstances, the present study analyzed the historical, current, and future costs and risks of nuclear energy. The findings show that...

Amidst other national and global climate protection initiatives, the new EU Commission under the leadership of Ursula von der Leyen is facing the challenge of concretely following through on previous announcements regarding an ambitious climate policy. Specifically, action must be taken to raise...

The European Green Deal, initiated by the EU Commission, is a package of measures aimed at decarbonization and sustainable economic development with the goal of making the European Union climate neutral by 2050. To achieve this goal, the emission reductions target must be increased from 40...

The catastrophic accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant on March 11, 2011, revealed unexpected safety risks of nuclear energy once again. It also accelerated the decline of nuclear energy in the international energy sector: Nuclear energy's share of global electricity generation...

Due to ambitious climate change targets and other energy and industrial policy goals such as the nuclear phase-out, the energy transition in Germany is heading toward a completely renewable energy system. This Weekly Report is the first to describe scenarios for 100 percent renewable energy...

With the closure of the final six nuclear power plants, the commercial use of nuclear energy for electricity generation in Germany will come to an end in 2022. Due to the German power system's sufficient capacities-in 2020, the sector exported 20 terawatt hours (TWh), or about four percent of...

The effects of the climate crisis are worsening water shortages, not only in the Global South but also in Europe, for example in the Berlin-Brandenburg region. Due to inadequate pricing of surface and groundwater abstraction and a lack of regulatory instruments, water overuse is occurring in...

In mid-April 2023, the final three nuclear power plants in Germany will be taken offline permanently. At the same time, the energy crisis resulting from the Russian invasion of Ukraine has fueled calls for the construction of new nuclear reactors in Germany. A similar debate is taking place in...

Most climate and energy scenarios created by international organizations and researchers include a considerable expansion of nuclear energy. In the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report, for example, nuclear energy increases from a current 3,000 terawatt hours on average to over 6,000 terawatt hours in...

For many years now, nitrate concentrations have exceeded the trigger value of 50 milligrams per liter at nearly one-fifth of the groundwater sampling sites in Germany. Apart from impairing the ecosystem by, for example, causing eutrophication of water bodies, nitrate-polluted drinking water also...