Costs rise in Vattenfall lawsuit over German government鈥檚 nuclear phase-out
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Costs are mounting for the German government鈥檚 legal defence in a six-billion-euro lawsuit initiated by Swedish utility Vattenfall over Germany's nuclear phase-out agreed in 2011. In a question by the Left Party in federal parliament, the government writes that around 21.7 million euros have been spent on lawyers, expert witnesses and court fees.
Vattenfall was operating two nuclear power plants in Germany when the government decided to phase out nuclear power. 聽In 2012 the company filed a lawsuit with聽the聽聽(ICSID) for compensation due to a loss of income from the closed power stations. The ICSID is part of and funded by the World Bank Group. The content of the action, the course of the proceedings and the arbitral award have not been made public. Germany鈥檚 attempts to have the arbitrators exchanged on claims of bias and lack of independence have failed, the government writes. The government argues that intra-EU arbitration cases are prohibited and that this also applies to the signatories of the , on which the Swedish utility has based its legal action. Nevertheless, the government writes that it remains optimistic that it will win the arbitration case due to 鈥減rocedural and substantive reasons鈥, although it didn't know when a ruling could be expected.
Utilities operating nuclear power plants in Germany reacted to the phase-out decision with lawsuits in the billions of euros, most of which were decided in German courts. The Federal Constitutional Court ruled in 2016 that a certain compensation was due. The amount will be 聽and聽is expected to be around聽.