Overview
- The BGE published new interactive maps that rule out the whole of Rhineland‑Palatinate and deem large parts of North Rhine‑Westphalia, Hesse and the Saarland unsuitable.
- Areas still in play include regions near Freiburg and south of Karlsruhe, zones by the Czech border in Bavaria and Saxony, and parts of Thuringia, Saxony‑Anhalt and Lower Saxony.
- Assessments remain desk‑based using existing geodata, applying criteria that favor salt, clay or crystalline rock with at least 300 meters of cover and 100 meters of host rock.
- Environment Minister Carsten Schneider will present a draft law in early 2026 to speed the process after 2027, when the BGE plans to propose five to ten regions for surface studies for a Bundestag decision.
- Germany seeks a site to isolate roughly 27,000 cubic meters of high‑level waste for up to a million years, and early local resistance is visible in places such as Oberlausitz and the Landkreis Zwickau.