Dark clouds hang over Swedish nuclear town torpedoed by renewable energy

Stockholm

IN an eerily quiet nuclear reactor hall in southern Sweden, new copper and steel machinery stretching 50 metres and weighing hundreds of tonnes is just sitting idle.

Bought from France and Germany as part of a US$450 million upgrade at the now defunct Oskarshamn-2 facility, the turbines, steam pipes and feed-water pumps were supposed to help supply cheap electricity to the Nordic market for decades to come. Instead, they will probably be sold as scrap metal. The junk pile may grow even bigger as another reactor at the site will produce its last megawatt by the end of June.