The Lay(wo)men Who Govern Us

Contrary to his son, Red Baron has little knowledge of financial matters. So I was shocked when I opened the Badische Zeitung today and read an article: Finanzkonzept mit Fragezeichen (Financial concept, question marked).

A salt mine at 500-meter depth as a "permanent" repository below Morsleben (©dpa)

Although the "permanent" disposal of highly radioactive waste is not yet solved in Germany, I had so far at least assumed that its financing was assured by the provision of money nuclear power plant operators (PPO) must set aside according to our Atomic Law. However, these provisions - so far 38 billion euros - are on shaky grounds. I learned that provisions (Rückstellungen) must not be confused with reserve allocations (Rücklagen). Provisions are costs the PPOs are placing into their balance sheets. These costs generally involve no cash but money on paper, and, e.g., they may be covered by power plants that still have to earn their money. 

The biggest PPO, the RWE, alone must provide 10 billion euros for nuclear dismantling and disposal, although the company's stock market value is only slightly higher. Since there are hints that the present provisions will not be sufficient to finance the "permanent" disposal of radioactive waste from nuclear power reactors, it will again be taxpayer's money to fill the financial gap and future generations to pay for it.

Who made that law about the disposal of radioactive waste? Did the PPOs bamboozle the lay(wo)men of our government whose experts apparently did not know the difference between provisions and reserve allocations? 

Now, our Federal Government hastily tries to iron out the blunder. In the future, the PPOs shall pay their radioactive waste money cash into a fund, a solution successfully practiced in Switzerland since the beginning of their nuclear age.

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