nuclear-news

Anti nuclear movement encouraged by Swiss court ruling to close Mühleberg nuclear power station

Mühleberg decision heartens foreign activists by Peter Siegenthaler and Samuel Jaberg, swissinfo.ch Mar 19, 2012  A ruling by the Swiss Administrative Court ordering the closure of the Mühleberg nuclear power station has galvanised anti-nuclear campaigners elsewhere in Europe too. If the plant, just outside Bern, really is closed down, this would step up pressure on old nuclear stations at home and abroad.

The court said Mühleberg must close by June 2013 unless the operators,
BKW, show that they are prepared to invest massively in maintenance
and repair. Among the causes of concern it cited were fissures in the
reactor’s core shroud and the absence of a cooling system other than
the River Aare.

BKW is fighting the ruling. It says decommissioning would be extremely
expensive, and although it would not bring the company down, it would
weaken it, and mean it had less money for investment. So it wants to
keep Mühleberg in operation, as long as it is “safe and economical” to
do so.

Vorarlberg
The Austrian federal state of Vorarlberg on the Swiss border –
regarded as particularly strongly anti-nuclear – has filed a complaint
against Mühleberg and says it will not drop it until Mühleberg has
been decommissioned. Vorarlberg’s governor, Markus Wallner, told the
local media there that the Administrative Court ruling showed the risk
the plant represents. ….. “Should there be an accident, the people
of Vorarlberg could be affected rapidly and seriously,” Linz lawyer
Christian Hadeyer, who is handling the case, told swissinfo.ch.

There is a lot of discussion about Mühleberg’s safety in Vorarlberg,
he said, “especially since it has been learnt that the construction is
similar to that of the disaster reactor in Fukushima and we have seen
with our own eyes what safety hazards there are”…..
Fessenheim and Mühleberg
In France, which gets most of its energy from nuclear power plants,
the press has said little about the Mühleberg ruling. But anti-nuclear
activists have been following events closely.

“We were very pleased to hear about the Swiss court decision,” said
André Hatz, a member of the “Stop Fessenheim” organisation, named
after France’s oldest nuclear power plant still in operation, situated
on the border with Germany and only 40 kilometres from Switzerland.

“I am not surprised that an appeal has been lodged, since we know the
power of the nuclear lobby in France. I can only advise the
associations and people to stand firm to ensure that the Mühleberg
station really does stop operation in 2013.”…..
“Since Germany announced that it would abandon nuclear power by 2022,
and Switzerland halted new projects, the number of anti-nuclear
campaigners has increased in France too,” said An ASN inspector
visited Mühleberg in December 2011….. Dieter Wörner, head of the
Freiburg environment office told swissinfo.ch that the local media had
reported in detail about the legal wrangling over the future of
Mühleberg, but that people in general are more concerned about
Fessenheim, only 25 kilometres
away.   “We have to keep up the cross-border fight, whether to demand the
closure of Fessenheim or of Mühleberg, both of which represent an
intolerable risk for the people around them,” said Hatz.   http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/Home/Archive/Muehleberg_decision_heartens_foreign_activists_.html?cid=32319900

March 20, 2012 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | EUROPE, opposition to nuclear, Switzerland