The Situation is reminiscent of a security check at the airport. The bag on the belt, and squeezing through one of these control arcs. All right, the beeping remains. Then you stand there in the nuclear power plant Mühleberg. What can happen in such a colossus, is well known. The bad and the good of Hollywood movies have been filmed about it, books written. Fiction mostly, but from time to time catches up with the reality of us. Fukushima, Chernobyl, and Yes, even a little mill mountain self – witness of it.
His place in the history books has secured the village of mill mountain, has become a Synonym for the power plant. It is inevitably associated with the Swiss the nuclear age. How Goesgen, Beznau, Leibstadt. But also dig and Kaiseraugst. There, previously rather unknown places, raged once the big fights against the power plants: whit marches, loud slogans, tear gas.
Some of the protests ended for opponents of NUCLEAR power plants successfully: Kaiseraugst and Graben were never built. Four nuclear power plants are still in operation today, the political struggle, however, it became quieter. The plant in Mühleberg is not Gösgen visible from afar, such as the NPP. A giant cooling tower is missing. This is also why the building is hardly noticeable.
The serious incident of 1972
this work is an extraordinary place, at the latest, then clear, if you are in your underwear in a locker room. There is white and because they are so thin – a little see-through fabric overalls. The Wearing is compulsory to own clothes stay in the closet. Later, white gloves and a green helmet are still to come. Cell phones, wallet, everything remains. To elaborate the proof of decontamination would be in accordance with the tour through the factory. A nondescript box, the Dosimeter is hung around the neck. It is the radiation that you are exposed to measures. Not far off, and you stand there, where for decades nuclear power is produced.
In the controlled Zone passes just who was going through the locks, two further safety. Now the visitors are ready, the core of the plant to penetrate. A pressure airlock, to prevent unfiltered Leakage of air from the interior. The inside is pleasantly warm. Only a few meters away, only separated by a thick wall, of the reactor.
in 1972, was taken from mill mountain in operation, and even before the opening there was a serious incident. A fire in a turbine group, the “expanding on some of the cables”, as the NZZ at the time, resulted in negative headlines. At that time, the operator BKW assured that the Brand is “standing in connection with the generation of electricity from nuclear energy”. But a process that is typical “for Oil – or coal-fired power plants”.
was How explosive the fire at the time, in fact, had the former NUCLEAR power plant Director Hans-Rudolf Lutz’s later compared to the “observer” by sight. Today, Lutz, would ensure the Brand well during the days headlines in the world press.
the construction site of The nuclear power plant Mühleberg in September 1968. Photo: Keystone
47 years later, painted, round walls limit in the immediate vicinity of the origin of the fire yellow of the room. Nothing lies around here, nothing seems to be superfluous. It is clean, calm, but not sterile like an operating room. Green large pipes run in seemingly wild confusion. A Lift takes visitors to the height, closer to the upper end of the reactor housing.
Cut, processed and taken away
There, the same sober Tidiness reigns as below. At first glance, unspectacular: Nowhere, something flashes, no beeps. A blue glow lights up the basin of water. There fuel rods cool over the years, before they are placed in an intermediate storage.
A few meters from the pool away there is a rescue depends on the ring, if someone should fall into the cooling pond. Across the circular room, a yellow crane is stretched. With him the heavy blocks, you can lift the shield for the reactor. As it is every year, there is a large Revision in the summer. Only this Time, the blocks will not be used again, but cut up, processed and taken away.
What is today sealed off hermetically, was already more permeable. In 1986, only a few months after the disaster in Chernobyl, were in mill’s mountain of radioactive substances in the environment. What followed was a storm of indignation. Because of the Public of the incident to urge, first, as a member of staff informed the press. And weeks after the actual accident.
The “Sunday view”, double, with its own measurements according to the “view” delivered days new messages to the accident. A title: “it Was pure sloppiness to blame, and that radio leaking active cloud?”. Stories about contaminated milk in the vicinity of the plant made the rounds. Limit values were not exceeded according to the Federal government at the time, however.
Since mint is painted green, the Swiss machine industry gathered: Brown Boveri, Sulzer – name from another time.
In contrast to the controlled sobriety in the immediate vicinity of the reactor is in the machine room much more operation. It creaks, rumbles and roars. Since mint is painted green, the Swiss machine industry gathered: Brown Boveri, Sulzer – name from another time. And so it looks also. The facilities are reminiscent of command Central of the old James Bond villains.
staff in protective suits during a Revision of the power plant in August 2018. Photo: Peter Klaunzer (Keystone)
In the immediate vicinity of the first signs of demolition are visible. At the bottom of the insulation lying around in the crumbs of the yellow. A former tool warehouse will be demolished, to make room for contaminated Material to be processed in the machine room.
the so-called core-coat will be removed. There, quite close to the actual fuel rods, have formed cracks in the welding seams. The cracks are known since 1990, since then there has been greater and there is always criticism of mill mountain. Even the decommissioning of the nuclear power plant was challenged because of it. The core-mantle is there, the water flows inside the reactor pressure vessel in the right direction. To keep the radioactivity in the bridle, which, however, is the task of the Core shroud.
First-2034 the nightmare is over
Back at the Entrance gate, the Tour is over. Two locks and an all-clear later – the dose of radioactivity was exposed to, is negligibly small, can be moved out of the white jumpsuit again. The protective garments have been used, like many other things in mill hill, soon out. 20. December, after 47 years, after thousands of hours, it means: to cease operations.
Thus, the complicated Dismantling begins. First, by 2030, all radioactive Material is to be taken away. 2034 – 15 years after the Start – will be vacated the Area completely. Mill mountain will be demolished piece by piece, until a few kilometers from the city of nothing is removed.
Nothing except a Meadow, the small village of mill mountain and the memory of the atomic age in Switzerland.
Created: 26.11.2019, 06:20 PM
