Brokdorf, Schutzanzüge, protection suit, 16.-18.12.2007 Brunsbüttel, Abklingbecken, spent fuel pool, 19.-21.1.2009 Brunsbüttel, Sanitätsstation, Wiederbelebungstraining, ambulance station, reanimation training, 19.-21.1.2009 Grafenrheinfeld, Warte, control room,30.11.-2.12.2009 Grafenrheinfeld, Pokale, trophies, 30.11.-2.12.2009 Gundremmingen B and C, Gundremmingen municipality Isar 1 and 2, Warte, control room, 26.-27.11.2008 Isar 1 and 2, Warte, control room, 26.-27.11.2008 Isar 1 and 2, Personenmonitor, personnel radiation monitoring, 26.-27.11.2008 Isar 1 and 2, Labor zur Wasseranalyse, laboratory for water analysis, 26.-27.11.2008 Isar 1 and 2, Dampfwolke des Nasskühlturms, Fog clouds by wet cooling tower 26.-27.11.2008 Unterweser, Folie zur Absorption mit alphastrahlung kontaminierter Geräte, 14.-16.12.2008 Gorleben 9-15-1979 Photo by Günter Zint Brokdorf 02-28-1981 Photo by Günter Zint Brokdorf Demo 07-10-1981 Photo by Günter Zint Brokdorf Photo by Günter Zint

Germany has agreed to close all of their nuclear power plants by 2022, but before that happens, German photographer Michael Danner wanted to get in and photograph them. Between 2007 and 2011 he visited 17 nuclear power plants and in August he’s releasing a book of his work called Critical Mass.

“I wanted to document these sites because to a lot of people they are just a name or an idea,” he says.

The sites have in some ways been mythologized thanks to the squabbles they’ve caused. In the '70s and '80s when nuclear power was on the rise in Germany, hundreds of thousands of protestors clashed with police to try and prevent construction. Today, Germany continues to use nuclear power, but it's still so hotly contested, which is why the facilities are scheduled for closure.

It was actually easier than Danner expected to get access. Most of the plants have a full PR team that gives regular tours. But unlike normal visitors, he was allowed into the farthest reaches of the plants and photographed things like the pools where spent nuclear fuel is cooled and stored.

“You can’t get any closer than I was,” he says.

The photos act as a sort of visual hand-held tour. They move from outside the facilities, showing them in the context of the countryside (they're usually built in rural areas), to inside, taking on an artistic and documentary-like feel. Danner wanted to show the human side of the plants, which are often just thought of as hulking, potentially menacing structures.

“My friends were surprised that there are people who have worked at the plants for 20 or years and that they’re alive and happy,” Danner says.

Danner says he’s tried to take an objective stance with his photos. Instead of making a statement he instead wants to remove a veil. This doesn’t mean he shies away from controversy – at the beginning of the book he shows a number of historical photos made by Günter Zint, a photographer who documented the protests back in the 1970s and '80s. At the end of the book there are several police photos from the protest era that he pulled from the government’s archives. Those photos show the damage done to police vehicles and any number of confiscated items that the police removed from protestors.

“I wanted my point of view to be a distant one, I’m just an observer,” Danner says. “What I am hoping is that the viewer has space to think and come up with their own opinion.”