A southern German nuclear reactor was taken offline on Sunday afternoon after 33 years in operation, the plant confirmed.

The Gundremmingen plant, located 120 kilometers (74.6 miles) northwest of Munich in the state of Bavaria, is the last double-reactor plant operating in Germany.

Read more: Germany's anti-nuclear movement: Still going strong after four decades of activism

Once the plant's Unit B reactor shuts down, only seven nuclear reactors will remain online in the country, including Gundremmingen's remaining one.

Unit B's closure has been planned for some time as part of Germany's plan to phase out nuclear power following the 2011 Fukushima disaster in Japan. The last reactor in Germany is due to be turned off in 2022.

Read more: Germany's nuclear phase-out explained

40 years of German anti-nuclear action A movement is born Germany’s anti nuclear movement got its start in the early 1970s, when protestors came out in force against plans for a nuclear power plant at Wyhl, close to the French border. Police were accused of using unnecessary force against the peaceful demonstrations. But the activists ultimately won, and plans for the Wyhl power station were scrapped in 1975.

40 years of German anti-nuclear action Civil disobedience Following the success of civil disobedience in Wyhl, similar protests were held in Brokdorf and Kalkar in the late 70s. Though they failed to prevent reactors being built, they proved that the anti-nuclear movement was a growing force.

40 years of German anti-nuclear action No to nuclear waste Gorleben has seen fierce protest against the nuclear industry ever since plans to store nuclear waste in a disused salt mine there were first announced in 1977. The site is a sparsely populated area close to the then-border with East Germany. Yet locals quickly showed they weren't going to accept radioactive material close to their homes without a fight.

40 years of German anti-nuclear action People power From the beginning, the German anti-nuclear movement brought together church organizations, farmers and concerned local residents - along with student activists, academics, and peace protestors who saw a link between nuclear power and the atom bomb. Being at the frontline of the Cold War meant the threat of nuclear war loomed large in many German minds.

40 years of German anti-nuclear action Breaking into mainstream politics In the late 70s, anti-nuclear activists joined with other environment and social justice campaigners to form the Green Party. Today, this is a major force in German politics and probably the most powerful Green Party in the world. They won their first seats in the German federal parliament in 1983.

40 years of German anti-nuclear action Worst fears realized In 1986, a reactor meltdown hundreds of miles away in Ukraine hardened public opinion against nuclear power in Germany. The Chernobyl disaster released radioactive fallout across Europe. In Germany, people were warned not to drink milk, eat fresh meat or let children play on playgrounds, where the sand might have been contaminated.

40 years of German anti-nuclear action End to nuclear becomes law In 1998, the Green Party came into German federal government, as the junior partner in a coalition with the Social Democrats. In 2002, the "red-green" government passed a law banning new nuclear power plants and limiting the lives of existing plants so that the last would be switched off in 2022.

40 years of German anti-nuclear action Keeping the pressure up Even with an end to nuclear power finally in sight, the anti-nuclear movement still had plenty to protest about. Many activists, including in the Green Party (with leaders Jürgen Tritten and Claudia Roth pictured above in Berlin in 2009) wanted nuclear power phased out far faster. Meanwhile, the German movement continued to join international calls for a global end to nuclear power.

40 years of German anti-nuclear action Stop that train Then there was still the question of what to do with nuclear waste. By 1995, containers of radioactive material were coming back from reprocessing abroad for storage at Gorleben. Over the years, transport of these "castors" has regularly been met with mass protests, including clashes with police.

40 years of German anti-nuclear action New lease of life for nuclear Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Party had always opposed the law limiting the life of Germany's nuclear power plants - so after the party came to power in 2009, it effectively scrapped it by prolonging the lives of power plants - a major setback for the anti-nuclear movement.

40 years of German anti-nuclear action Fukushima changes everything In 201,1 the meltdown of a Japanese nuclear reactor saw Merkel's government make a rapid about-face. Within days of the Fukushima disaster, it passed a law to shut down the last of Germany's nuclear power plants by 2022. The phase-out was back on, and eight reactors were shut down that same year.

40 years of German anti-nuclear action The fight goes on Since the grassroots action of the 70s, Germany's anti-nuclear movement has seen the country commit to ditching nuclear altogether. It's also helped push forward a shift to renewables, making Germany an international example in the fight against climate change. But the protests go on. This week, activists stopped the first boat carrying nuclear waste. Author: Ruby Russell



Plant is 'ticking time bomb'

The remaining reactor at Gundremmingen, Unit C, will run until 2021, although it also went online at the same time as its companion Unit B in 1984.

Activists planned to protest Unit C's continuation outside the front gates of the plant in the afternoon on Sunday.

Read more: Nuclear waste: Where to store it for eternity?

Germany's Green party and nuclear power opponents have raised concerns about the age of Unit C and the fact that it is the last boiling-water reactor to remain online in Germany.

"We are glad that by year's end at least one unit will be shut down in Gundremmingen with Reactor B," the Green party's energy spokesman for Bavaria, Martin Stümpfig, said in a statement in mid-December.

"Nevertheless, this nuclear power plant remains a ticking time bomb due to several technical defects — only now with half the explosive power," he said.

Read more: German issues in a nutshell: 'Energiewende'

Atomic power critics note that the Grundremmingen reactors are the same type as those involved in the Fukushima disaster.

The Grundremmingen plant is also the site of Germany's first fatal accident at a nuclear power plant. In 1975, two workers were killed by steam that escaped from a pipe that was being repaired in the plant's Unit A reactor.