By Alex Villafania
INQUIRER.net
PLANS of the Department of Energy (DOE) to reintroduce the use of nuclear energy is meeting staunch criticism from environmental and science activists.
The Samahan ng Nagtataguyod ng Agham at Teknolohiya para sa Sambayanan (AGHAM) and Greenpeace in separate statements argue that the Philippines is not ready to use nuclear energy, citing the potential cost of using such technology and the hazards that come with it.
Instead, both groups suggest that the Philippines should use renewable forms of power, such as geothermal, natural gas, wind and hydroelectric, which they point out to be cheaper and safer.
Greenpeace Southeast Asia campaign director Von Hernandez warned that the statements of DOE Secretary Angelo Reyes were “dangerous and misleading” and could cost the Philippines financially and environmentally.
Hernandez also argued that Reyes should already have learned the lessons from the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant, which was one of the biggest financial losses of the Philippines during the era of former president Ferdinand Marcos in the 1970s.
Hernandez also argued that accidents in nuclear power plants have far more disastrous consequences. He cited the catastrophic Chernobyl meltdown in Russia and Japan’s Kashiwazaki nuclear incident after an earthquake.
“Lest we forget our country is located in the typhoon belt and on the edge of the Pacific Ring of Fire that makes it prone to extreme weather events and earthquakes. Combine this with our government’s inept capacity to maintain and enforce safety standards or environmental guidelines you have potential disaster in the making,” Hernandez said.
Meanwhile, AGHAM national chairperson Giovanni Tapang in his statement criticized Congressman Mikey Arroyo, son of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and a member of the congressional committee on energy, for planning to make revisions to the Electric Power Industry Reform Act in the hopes of hastening privatization of power generation.
“With this, the people expect more of the same in power rates: ever increasing pass-on rates from the embedded purchased power adjustments and currency adjustments that has driven the prices of power to more than 10 pesos per kilowatt hour,” Tapang said.
Tapang warned that the strategic importance of electric power and energy should not be put in the hands of private interests.
“Privatization of electric power has resulted to increasing energy rates: this is our lesson from EPIRA. We should not try to accelerate privatization but rather we should stop and reverse it for our people to have a respite from the burden of high electric power rates”, Tapang concluded.
On August 19, President Arroyo ordered the DOE to further study the possibility of using nuclear energy.
August 23rd, 2007 at 8:22 pm
[...] Inside Science : No to nuke energy, say environmentalist groups [...]
August 23rd, 2007 at 9:55 pm
It’s time for other energy alternatives like nuclear energy.
August 24th, 2007 at 9:36 am
They must remember Nuclear Research is one thing but building Nuclear Plants is quite another.
They know the problem of First World Countries about nuclear waste disposal, yet they ignored it.
They know that we are in the Pacific Ring of Fire and are warned of destructive earthquakes yet they poo-poohed it.
They know that recently Japan with its robustly constructed nuclear plants was damaged and suffered a severe radioactive leak yet they looked the other way.
As usual, those who are enamored with this technology ignore disastrous consequences of this.
We as Filipinos should not always look at solutions in the point of view of Americans or other First World countries. We should look at what technologies would fit us geographically and resources wise.
An enormous potential for the Philippines using sea-wave technology is there right under our noses yet we do not even research its great potential.
We are an archipelago surrounded by oceans and seas, not a massive land mass! We have regular sea waves many stories in height yet we ignore developing resource which is already there because many are fixed in the mentality of follow-the-economic-leader. We have no trust in the ingenuity of our people. We refuse to allocate proper funds for Research and Development. We have failed to nurture something which is “Truly Filipino” ang Sariling Atin; adapting the technology to our unique environment. Our scientists go abroad and get jobs which they are overqualified for but pays a bit better.
We want to develop clean energy like electric jeepneys which is a good thing yet we contract other nations to build this instead of having our own indigenous one. This technology is practically off the shelf yet we still want “imported” fully constructed units. We contract foreign entities to make broadband networks yet we fail to properly harness IT and make this a tool for mass education. We have the technological capacity to produce solar panels or could invite industries which specialize on this tech; but do we even consider these? I don’t think so.
And now this, we’re going to loan money to build a Nuclear Plant despite the fact that accidents of this kind could bring catastrophic consequences.
As of yet, there is still no technology to completely render radioactivity inert. Let us take this as a common sense sign that we do not tamper with things that would be beyond our control when disaster strikes.
We have other potentials for harnessing energy, use them. Meanwhile the homegrown nuclear researchers should be content with doing small scale nuclear research for a while.
Reprogram the Filipino psyche back to its roots. Let us regain confidence to our people and support those who have the ingenuity and expertise. Let us leave this culture of corruption, cheats, fraud, cover-ups, mediocrity and bootlicking. Let us find the best in the Filipino and reach it every way we can.
August 24th, 2007 at 2:38 pm
[...] Inquirer.net [...]