[NukeNet] IAEA Push To Promote Nuclear Power, Court Climate Catastrophe

Wed Nov 8 10:28:18 CST 2006

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "FoE Sydney - Nuclear Campaign"
<foesyd4 at ihug.com.au>
To: <Abolition-Global_Council at yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Wednesday, November 08, 2006 2:50 AM
Subject: Friends of the Earth Europe Press Release
7 Nov 2006 - NUCLEAR POWER CAN'T SAVE THE CLIMATE

  Friends of the Earth Europe

Press Release

For Immediate Release: 7 November 2006

******
NUCLEAR POWER CAN'T SAVE THE CLIMATE

Friends of the Earth Europe deplores International
Energy Agency
proposal to add nuclear nightmare to global
climate crisis.
*****

Brussels, 7 November 2006 - Friends of the Earth
Europe has chastised
the International Energy Agency (IEA) for pushing
a global energy policy
that would promote a nuclear revival, while still
condemning the world
to catastrophic climate change. The policy was
outlined in the IEA's new
World Energy Outlook, published this morning.
Friends of the Earth
Europe has declared the proposed paths dangerous,
a threat to the
climate and economically unviable.[1]

Frank van Schaik, nuclear energy campaigner at
Friends of the Earth
Europe, said:

"Nuclear power is not the solution to the problems
of climate change and
energy security. Nuclear power remains the most
dangerous form of
energy. An accident like the 1986 explosion of the
reactor in Chernobyl
in the Ukraine could happen every day. And the
question of what to do
with highly radioactive waste remains unsolved. We
can secure the supply
of energy ten times cheaper through investing in
energy savings instead
of new nuclear power. On a level playing field,
nuclear power is
economically insane." [2]

Friends of the Earth Europe has highlighted that
beyond burdening future
generations with a dirty legacy for centuries, new
nuclear power comes
at a high financial cost for society, if the real
costs of nuclear
power are properly taken into account. These costs
include century-long
waste treatment and storage, the decommissioning
of old plants and the
costs of potential accidents. Not a single nuclear
power station has
ever been built without massive government
subsidies.
The European Commission has recently started
investigations concerning
illegal state aid for a nuclear power plant
currently under construction
in Finland. [3] Also, contrary to the claims in
the World Energy Outlook
2006, uranium is a finite resource that, even if
nuclear energy capacity
was kept at present levels, would last only 50
years.[4]
New nuclear plants will diminish the world's
chances to avert the
growing climate crisis. Money invested in energy
saving measures and
renewable energies can achieve far greater
emission reductions than if
invested in nuclear power.
Friends of the Earth welcomes the acknowledgment
by the World Energy
Outlook 2006 that policies and measures to
increase energy efficiency
will yield financial savings exceeding initial
extra investment costs
for energy producers and consumers. But the report
does not give
sufficient prominence to cutting energy waste and
exploiting the full
potential of increasing energy efficiency.

Jan Kowalzig, climate campaigner at Friends of the
Earth Europe, said:

"We need drastic cuts in greenhouse gas emissions
to avoid the economic
and environmental repercussions of catastrophic
climate change. But the
recommendations of the International Energy
Agency's World Energy
Outlook 2006 would lead to soaring emissions for
decades. The report's
suggestions for reducing energy waste are far too
weak, and it lacks
proposals for strong and effective policies to
move away from dirty
energy production into an era of renewable
energies."
Friends of the Earth also debunked the myth that
nuclear energy is an
energy source free of greenhouse gas emissions.
Nuclear power emits as
much CO2 as a modern gas-fired co-generation
plant. When assessing the
overall emissions, the whole lifetime of a nuclear
power station need to
be part of the equation, including fossil fuels
burnt during uranium
mining, processing and transportation, building
the nuclear power
station and decommissioning as well as long-term
waste storage and
treatment.[5]

***

For more information, please contact:
Frank van Schaik, nuclear campaigner at Friends of
the Earth Europe:
Tel: +31 206 126 368; Mobile: +31 620 295 755;
Email:
frank.vanschaik at foeeurope.org
Jan Kowalzig, climate campaigner at Friends of the
Earth Europe:
Tel:+32 25 42 61 02; Mobile: +32 496 384 696;
Email:
jan.kowalzig at foeeurope.org

Rosemary Hall, Communications Officer at Friends
of the Earth Europe:
Tel:+32 25 42 61 05, Mobile: +32 485 930 515,
Email:
rosemary.hall at foeeurope.org

NOTES

[1] The G8 summits in Gleaneagles and St
Petersburg asked the the
International Energy Agency to advise on a 'clean,
clever and
competitive energy future' for the world energy
needs. The World Energy
Outlook 2006 is seen as the response to this
request. It compares a
Business-As-Usual 'Reference Scenario' with an
'Alternative Policy
Scenario'. The latter would still see increases in
global greenhouse gas
emissions by about 30% compared to 2004 levels,
putting for example the
EU's objective of keeping global average
temperature increases below 2°C
out ofreach. In chapter 11, the WEO 2006 also
sketches out a 'Beyond
Alternative Policy Scenario' that however would
merely cap emissions in
2030 at today's levels. See
http://www.worldenergyoutlook.org

[2] "Nuclear power: economics and climate
protection potential": Rocky
Mountains Institute; January 2006; available at
http://www.rmi.org

[3]
http://europa.eu.int/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/06/1456

[4] "Nuclear Power: Myth and Reality - The risks
and prospects of
nuclear power" - by Gerd Rosenkranz, published by
Heinrich Böll
Foundation and WISE, Chapter 3: The Nuclear Fuel
Cycle, p.22.
http://www.boell.de/de/04_thema/4064.html

[5] "If one takes into consideration the mining of
resources [uranium],
the transportation, the building and maintaining
of nuclear power
plants, the distribution of the electricity and
the necessary additional
production of heat, then nuclear power does often
look worse for climate
protection than other forms of energy production.
A modern gas-fired
power station in connection with heat production
[co-generation] can be
more favourable for the climate. Even better for
the climate are
renewable energies and most of all the efficient
use of energy." [own
translation] - German Environmental Ministry, in:
'Atomkraft: Ein teurer
Irrweg. Die Mythen  der Atomwirtschaft', March
2006. See (in German)
http://www.erneuerbare-energien.de/inhalt/2715/4592/

Rosemary Hall
Communications Officer
Friends of the Earth Europe
Rue Blanche 15 B-1050 Bruxelles Belgium
Tel.: +32 2 542 6105
Mobile: +32 485 930515
Fax:  +32 2 537 5596
rosemary.hall at foeeurope.org
http://www.foeeurope.org

-- 
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Niccolo' Sarno - Media Coordinator (Amsterdam, The
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niccolo at foei.org - http://www.foei.org/media -
Tel:+31-20-6221369
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in 70 countries and 1.5 million individual members
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