Hungarian PM and MVM confirm Paks nuclear plant to resume full 2 GW output week of 2026-08-24
Back-to-back confirmations from Hungary's prime minister and state energy company MVM signal operators have enough confidence in Danube recovery to commit to a concrete restart timeline.
Hungary's prime minister Peter Magyar confirmed on Thursday (2026-08-20) that the country's 2 GW Paks nuclear plant will return to full output during the week of 2026-08-24, as Danube water levels recover from drought-driven lows that have constrained the facility since late July, Montel reported.6
State energy company MVM had made the same call on Wednesday (2026-08-19), also reported by Montel. Two confirmations within 24 hours represent a meaningful shift from weeks of hedged official statements, suggesting operators now have sufficient confidence in recovering river conditions to commit to a specific window rather than a conditional forecast.5
Paks is Hungary's only nuclear plant and provides close to half of the country's total electricity generation. Its summer-long partial outage became the dominant supply concern for the Central European grid, severe enough to draw European institutions into the response. Hungarian officials warned of a potential energy emergency, and the European Commission signalled readiness to convene an extraordinary session of its Electricity Coordination Group, according to Euronews.3
The drought threat was not confined to Hungary. Southeast European power market participants said on Friday (2026-07-31) they were braced for further nuclear disruptions during the week of 2026-08-03 as an intensifying heatwave and Danube levels at record lows threatened additional generating capacity across the region, Montel reported.1
Paks was generating just 0.5 GW on Sunday (2026-08-16), a quarter of its nameplate capacity. Magyar warned that same day of more possible cuts, even as he cited rain forecast for the week of 2026-08-17 as a likely easing factor, Montel reported.4 The plant had already staged a partial restart by Monday (2026-08-10), when one turbine was switched back on following some improvement in Danube water levels, according to oilprice.com.2
The pattern since late July has been consistent: output falls when the river runs shallow, recovers partially when conditions ease, then comes under renewed threat. Magyar's Sunday (2026-08-16) message captured it precisely — possible additional cuts flagged on the same day he pointed to forecast rain as relief.4
ICE Endex TTF front-month was trading at 63.41 euros per megawatt-hour as of the European morning on Thursday (2026-08-20), broadly flat. Whether a full Paks return eases gas-fired generation across the region depends on how quickly the restored 2 GW is dispatched and where late-summer demand settles across Central and Southeast Europe.6
The Danube's reliability remains the constraint operators cannot resolve by announcement alone. Every partial restart since late July has been contingent on water levels holding, and every fresh warning of cuts followed when they did not. Rainfall that falls short of what is needed to sustain cooling margins through the rest of August could force another curtailment before full capacity is reached.4
A complete return to 2 GW would ease most of the supply pressure that pulled EU emergency coordination into play. But Paks has run for most of this summer on a river at historic lows, and August's rolling sequence of partial restarts and fresh warnings offers limited grounds to treat the week-of-2026-08-24 timeline as certain. September hydrology along the Danube, not the confirmation from Budapest, is what will show whether the plant's cooling constraints are genuinely behind it.3