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monday, march 26th 2001
leaked eu commission paper
asking council to give additional 2 billion
for nuclear power plants
Brussels, 26
th
March:
Friends of the Earth today released a leaked
document prepared by the Commission which is
destined to eventually be presented to
Finance Ministers to sanction a subsidy for
the nuclear power industry. The paper asks
for 2 billion Euro for loans to enable more
nuclear power plants to be built in Member
States, Accession countries and the former
Soviet Union.
The leaked document has a section called
"Justification for raising the lending
ceiling" in which is tries to convince the
financial ministers of EU Member States that
"
the Commission has a powerful financial
tool that can be used to influence the
nuclear safety beyond the Union borders to
the east. The two recent decisions to grant
loans for projects in Bulgaria and the
Ukraine demonstrate that the instrument can
be used as a support for Commission policy in
the field. …With the loans being tied in to
earlier closure of old units."
In the most recent Euratom project, the
completion of two reactors in Ukraine, the
project was financed in the face of strong
criticism by EU governments, energy experts
and environmentalists in the Ukraine and the
EU. Furthermore, none of the Commission´s
conditions for giving the money can actually
be enforced by the Western project partners.
Specifically there is no guarantee that
Western nuclear safety standards will to be
reached, since this is the competence of the
Ukrainian nuclear authority.
In the case of the only other Euratom loan
awarded in a decade, the life extension and
upgrade of Kozloduy 5 and 6, the loan was
given to Bulgaria on the condition of early
closure of the units 1-4 of Kozloduy. However
the Bulgarian Government is already making it
clear that units 3 and 4 will not be closed
until 2010, after the date suggested by the
Commission (2006).
The Commission also claims that
"Given
that the instrument can also be applied to
help finance the decommissioning of power
plants, we expect the financing offered by
Euratom to provide a positive contribution to
the nuclear safety culture."
However,
such financing has not and will not occur as
it is impossible to imagine that the
decommissioning of a nuclear facility – which
is not revenue generating – would pass any
economic criteria put forward by the European
Investment Bank.
"This talk about safety and
decommissioning is a kind of PR to divert the
attention that the EURATOM money is going to
be used for the construction of new nuclear
power plants. This is obvious when we look at
the projects that are applying for EURATOM
loans, like unit 2 of the Cernavoda nuclear
power plant in Romania." says Patricia
Lorenz, FoEE.
At the beginning of March the Romanian
Government confirmed the application for an
Euratom loan for completion of unit 2 in
Cernavoda and announced a plan to build 3
more units. The Cernavoda power plant is a
Canadian designed CANDU reactors. Unit 1 has
already been completed with financing from
the Canadian and Italian Export Credit
Agencies. The electricity produced is
intended for export – to the EU.
The Euratom Loan facility was established
in the 1970s, before Three Mile Island and
Chernobyl, at a time when politicians
believed nuclear power was safe and economic.
Today there are no reactors under
construction within the EU and the majority
of countries are non-nuclear or have
phase-out plans for their nuclear power
plants.
"Euratom Loans were established decades
ago as a subsidy for nuclear power when
people believed nuclear power might play a
role in the EU’s energy system, it is time to
abandon this subsidy for a dying and
dangerous industry", said Patricia Lorenz,
FOE Europe.
Final approval from the Council of
Ministers requires unanimous support from
Member States. It is clear that this level of
support does not exist, the Commission must
withdraw this proposal.
Contact and background paper on Euratom
and the leaked Commission document:
Patricia Lorenz, Friends of the Earth
Europe: Tel: 32-2-542 0184
Fax: 5375596
Email:
Patricia.Lorenz@foeeurope.org
www.foeeurope.org
Howard Mollett, Friends of the Earth
Europe Press & Information:
Tel: 02 542 01 89
Email: howard.mollett@foeeurope.org
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