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France’s Nuclear Failures

France’s Nuclear Failures Greenpeace 3 Feb 09 Hazardous waste, illegitimate and dangerous new reactors and a diversion to the solutions to climate change – here’s why France’s picture of nuclear energy is just a ‘great illusion’…Despite the French government’s global marketing of its flagship European Pressurised Reactor (EPR) as cheap and safe, nuclear energy is rapidly becoming the most expensive way to produce electricity, and its highly radioactive waste poses an ever-increasing problem.

Greenpeace has recently uncovered evidence that nuclear waste from the European Pressurised Reactor (EPR) – the flagship of the French nuclear industry – will be up to seven times more hazardous than waste produced by existing nuclear reactors, increasing costs and the danger to health and the environment.

This alarming evidence was buried away in the environmental impact assessment report from Posiva, the company responsible for managing waste at the world’s first EPR under construction at Olkiluoto in Finland, and in EU-funded research……………………………………. No appropriate waste facilities exist – or are even being planned – in Finland, France or any of the countries considering buying the EPR (including the UK, the US, Canada and India). In Finland, plans for burying the nuclear waste that are awaiting approval are simply inadequate for preventing interim and long-term health risks, and will pass on huge financial liabilities to future generations…………………………..The Global Chance report shows:

• how France’s nuclear programme fails to rise to the challenges of climate change and energy security;
• how France has not benefited economically from their ‘all electric, all nuclear’ approach
• how nuclear power is liable to suffer serious accidents – whether due to system failure, natural disaster or deliberate attack
• how no satisfactory solution has been found for the management of long-term waste; and
• how France contributes to proliferation, which remains a major risk for global security.

France’s Nuclear Failures | Greenpeace International

Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, radioactive, uranium

February 4, 2009 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | France, politics