Energy - nuclear
Sunday, July 12, 2026 @ 3:39 PM
At a moment when energy security has never mattered more, Spain is preparing to close one of its most reliable sources of clean power.
The Almaraz Nuclear Power Plant has quietly powered Spain for over four decades. Construction began in the 1970s; Unit I entered commercial service in 1983, Unit II in 1984. Notably, 81% of the plant’s construction was carried out by Spanish companies, making it a point of national industrial pride from the start. Today, Almaraz supplies more than 7% of the electricity consumed in Spain. This is the equivalent of powering 4 million homes, around the clock, every day of the year, regardless of weather.
That outsized contribution isn’t unique to Almaraz. Nationally, nuclear power plants made up just 5.28% of Spain’s installed generation capacity in 2025, yet they produced 19.06% of the electricity generated that year. Few other sources deliver that much output from that small a footprint, a clear indicator of nuclear’s high capacity factor and its value as always-on baseload power.
Despite that record, Spain has scheduled Almaraz for closure in 2027 (Unit 1) and 2028 (Unit 2), part of a full nuclear phaseout across the country by 2035.