Between 2027 and 2035. This is the period, which the Government and the electricity companies agreed upon in 2019, in which the closure of the seven nuclear power plants that are still in operation in Spain will take place. It is a staggered roadmap in which Almaraz, in Cáceres, would be the first to be dismantled in 2027. A year later Almaraz II would do so. The closure of Ascó I (Tarragona) and Cofrentes is scheduled for 2030. Ascó II would close in 2032, while Trillo and Valdellós II would be the last in 2035.
As in the rest of Europe, the energy crisis has put on the agenda a debate that was thought to be over. Political parties such as the PP and Vox have asked to extend the life of nuclear power, taking into account the supply problems caused by the war.
However, the National Security Council, the body in charge of addressing the dismantlement, has confirmed that the plan is still in place, without any changes.
But beyond the political postulates, which everything indicates that they will have their space in the national election campaign, the idea of ​​delaying the closure has more and more defenders. Not so much because of the traditional nuclear yes or no debate. Its continuity is beginning to be defended due to the lack of storage capacity for renewable energy.
The leaders of the proprietary electricity companies, Ignacio Sánchez Galán from Iberdrola and José Bogas from Endesa, have already pointed out that technically there is no problem in extending the terms of the nuclear companies, but that they will not extend it if they are not assured of a profitability that they now say they do not have. The Government prefers to bet on green hydrogen as an alternative. The problem is that time is running out.
Closing a nuclear power plant is a long and complicated process that must be decided in advance. The decision must be made, at the latest, in 2024. Also that year, the location of the future deep and definitive geographical storage for waste must begin, although its completion is not expected until 2060.
Meanwhile, the waste will be stored in warehouses located in each of the already existing nuclear plants after the construction of a central temporary storage facility was definitively ruled out, for whose location the Castilian town of Villar de Cañas had been considered.
