Last nuclear waste shipment from Sellafield reaches interim storage facility Brokdorf

On Tuesday morning, the first Castor container with high-level radioactive waste was transferred from the ship onto a special truck using a special crane. A second crane was used, according to an NDR reporter on site, to move material the crew needed for the transfer.

Police-escorted convoy to Brokdorf

Already on Tuesday evening around 9:00 p.m., the trucks with the Castor containers rolled on the road from Brunsbüttel toward Brokdorf. Police secured the convoy and had positioned several emergency vehicles to block access roads to the port since the morning. The route leads from the Dithmarschen district through Schleswig-Holstein to Brokdorf in the Steinburg district.

The shipment is considered the expected last delivery of nuclear waste from England to Germany. The return of nuclear waste from the French reprocessing plant La Hague had already been completed in 2024. This brings an end to a decades-long process of returning radioactive waste from abroad.

Background: Obligation to take back under international law

The nuclear waste consists of remnants of fuel elements from German nuclear power plants that were reprocessed in England. The fuel elements had been transported from German nuclear power plants to Sellafield before 2005. Germany has committed itself under international law to take back this waste, which was generated during the reprocessing of German fuel elements in Sellafield.

Frank Matthiesen told NDR Schleswig-Holstein that the preparation had taken several months. "Die Polizei passt auf, dass alles vernünftig über die Bühne geht", Matthiesen of the Itzehoe police explained. In principle, one could say that Castor shipments in Germany have a certain protest potential, Matthiesen continued.

Safety precautions at the interim storage facility

According to GNS, the containers receive an additional safety level for interim storage after their arrival in Brokdorf, so that leaks can be detected. The cavity between the two lids of the containers is filled with helium, which makes sealing defects detectable in the event of pressure loss.

The Gesellschaft für Zwischenlagerung mbH (BGZ), which operates the interim storage facility, announced that specialist personnel carry out final safety precautions on the containers after arrival. The corresponding processing of all seven containers is expected to take several weeks, the company said in response to an NDR inquiry.

Capacity and whereabouts of the containers

In the Brokdorf interim storage facility, located on the site of the nuclear power plant of the same name, which is now decommissioned, 76 nuclear containers with fuel elements from the Brokdorf nuclear power plant are currently stored. With the seven new containers, the number rises to a total of 83 containers. The interim storage facility offers 100 storage positions for containers, according to a spokesperson for the responsible federally owned BGZ Gesellschaft für Zwischenlagerung.

This means 83 of the 100 available storage positions are occupied. The then total of 83 containers will remain there until they are transferred to a final repository. According to BGZ, the containers could remain at the site for several decades until a final repository for high-level radioactive waste is found in Germany. The waste is to be stored there temporarily until there is a location for the final disposal of high-level radioactive waste in Germany.

Protests and vigils

The largest part of the nuclear waste from Sellafield is already housed in other interim storage facilities in Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, Hesse, and Lower Saxony. With the acceptance of the seven containers, the storage operation at the Brokdorf site ends. The cargo of the "Pacific Grebe," which arrived on Tuesday, is the last Castor shipment from Great Britain to Germany and at the same time the last radioactive waste to arrive in Brokdorf.

On Tuesday evening, around ten people had gathered at the Brokdorf nuclear power plant for a vigil. The initiative "Castor stoppen!" had announced the rally in advance. Vigils along the possible route from Brunsbüttel toward Brokdorf are also planned for the following day, according to an activist. At the Elbe port in Brunsbüttel, according to police, only a few demonstrators had turned up who, by their own account, wanted to set a sign against nuclear power worldwide.

End of an era of reprocessing

Police say they are prepared for protests along the further transport route and are monitoring possible calls on the internet. "Voraussichtlich letzter Atommüll-Transport aus England", NDR had already classified the operation before the arrival in Brokdorf. The news was broadcast on 18.06.2026 on the Deutschlandfunk program.

The entire operation – from the arrival of the ship to the transfer in Brunsbüttel to the arrival of the containers at the Brokdorf interim storage facility – marks the conclusion of an era of nuclear disposal between Germany and Great Britain. With the end of the storage operation, the Brokdorf site enters a phase of pure interim storage, with no further shipments of material from reprocessing expected.