"Significant progress" has been made on the ongoing negotiations with Engie (the operator of Belgium's nuclear power plants) on the lifetime extension of the Doel 4 and Tihange 3 reactors, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo's spokesperson confirmed on Saturday.
Alongside Belgium's Energy Minister Tinne Van der Straeten, De Croo informed the Select Committee of Ministers (“Kern”) on Saturday about progress.
The Prime Minister, the Energy Minister and Engie met on Friday and significant progress has been made, according to De Croo’s cabinet: “The final details of an agreement with Engie must now be concreted, with the aim of completing in the next few days.”
Discussions have been ongoing to extend the use of the two reactors. Once the agreement has been fully negotiated by all parties it will be submitted to the council of ministers to give the go-ahead.
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The Federal Government and Engie already reached an agreement in principle last January to extend the two reactors. However, Engie wanted a cap to be placed on the cost of dismantling the nuclear power stations and disposing of nuclear waste. Details on this have not yet been released.
Engie also confirmed these significant advances, adding that discussions were continuing intensively with the intention of concluding an agreement soon.
