German Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel has not yet made a final decision about a request from utility EnBW Energie Baden-Wuerttemberg AG's (EBK.XE) to transfer power generating capacity from the Neckarwestheim 2 nuclear reactor to Neckarwestheim 1, a ministry spokesman said Friday.
"The procedures are ongoing, there is no final decision yet," spokesman Tobias Dunoew told Dow Jones Newswires. He declined to give a timeframe for the decision.
The comments come after Die Welt newspaper said Friday Gabriel has rejected the request despite appeals in two letters by Chancellor Angela Merkel and Economics Minister Michael Glos to expand the lifespan of the plant by around eight years.
Gabriel has decided to ignore the appeals and will request the plant go off-line in 2009 because safety standards at Neckarwestheim 1 aren't good enough to justify it staying online beyond 2009, the newspaper said, without disclosing its sources.
A rejection would be no surprise because Gabriel has made similar decisions in the past.
Nuclear power is a hot issue within the ruling grand coalition government. In its coalition treaty for the legislative term ending autumn 2009, the conservative parties and Social Democrats agreed to stick to the current nuclear phase-out plan, which foresees the gradual shut down of all of its 17 nuclear reactors by around 2021.
But Merkel's conservative parties want to keep nuclear energy while Gabriel's Social Democrats insist on a phase-out.