Our nuclear power plants stand like landmarks on German river landscapes – they are constructional witnesses to a bitter social and political dispute about energy, the economy and the assessment of the consequences of technology. Today, in the middle of the energy crisis, this dispute is more pertinent than ever. After the nuclear disaster of Fukushima, Germany decided in 2011 to phase out nuclear power: but why should all power plants now be renaturalised to green fields? Because only around 3 percent of the grey energy that the gigantic building volumes harbour is actually radioactively contaminated. This book offers a factual approach to the history of nuclear power, the technologies sued, their renaturation, as well as monument protection aspects. A photo essay by the contemporary witness Günter Zint documents the protest culture associated with this. Seven possibilities for reusing these awkward monuments are also shown – an approach that for a long time was not considered possible.
