Environmental Graffiti

Tomorrow there will be meetings in eight cities around the UK in which more than a thousand people will be asked to assess the case for and against nuclear power and vote on its use. The UK government has contracted market research company Opinion Leader Research to assess public opinion on the nuclear issue, stating that its intention is “to capture the views of green groups, energy companies, businesses, consumer groups, unions, faith groups and academics.”

The UK was forced to take this step by the high court, after a ruling in February that a previous consultation was “seriously flawed” and “manifestly inadequate and unfair.” However, green groups suspect that this next consultation too is a farce.

Six environmental groups, including Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, WWF and Green Alliance, say the government is still distorting evidence and are considering taking the case back to court: “this document was full of pro-nuclear opinion masquerading as fact,” they claim of the government’s briefing document.

The government is bound by its own guidelines not to rule on new nuclear power stations until after the “fullest public consultation”. If the current consultation is deemed unfair, major decisions on the future of energy production could be delayed for at least a year.

The coalition of green groups have handed the government a paper calling the consultation process, “an expensive sham” and accusing them of “conducting a public relations stitch-up designed to deliver a preordained policy on new nuclear power.”

Tellingly, some weeks before the consultation Gordon Brown told parliament at prime minister’s question time that a decision to continue with nuclear power had already been taken. Greenpeace’s lawyers immediately pointed out the illegality of this and the remark was retracted a week later. “Brown’s original statement prejudged the whole consultation and totally undermined the pretence that the government has an open mind on the future of nuclear [power] in the UK,” the green coalition points out.

The current government has always favoured the use of nuclear power to ensure future energy security; Tony Blair was a champion of the industry. The current official line is that the question must not be decided either way until after the consultation. However, environmental groups suspect that the commissioning of a new generation of nuclear power stations has already been decided behind closed doors.

For decades the pro-nuclear lobby has been making its claims to “safe, clean energy”, but the fact is that nuclear power is hugely expensive to generate. As Greenpeace point out, building enough nuclear power stations to make a meaningful reduction in greenhouse gas emissions would cost trillions of dollars, create tens of thousands of tons of lethal high-level radioactive waste, contribute to further proliferation of nuclear weapons materials, and statistics predict a Chernobyl-scale accident once every decade.

Perhaps most worryingly, however, it would take a huge chunk of financial backing away from the research and investment needed to develop renewable energy solutions.

Sources include: Government News Network; Greenpeace; The Guardian

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