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Publicatie Laka-bibliotheek:
Nuclear power, what it means to you

Auteur	P.Bunyard, G.Morgan...
Datum	1981
Classificatie	2.05.0.00/08 (GROOT-BRITTANNIË - ALGEMEEN)
Voorkant

Foreword to 1981 edition

In February 1981 The House of Commons Select Committee on Energy reported on 
the nuclear power programme, on the Department of Energy and on the CEGB (i). 
The report (made by selected M.P .s of all parties, empowered to take evidence from 
whom they desired) carries a great deal of weight. It endorses many of the criticisms 
made in this booklet and expresses a level of disillusionment and scepticism which 
must be without precedent. In particular, electricity demand forecasts by the CEGB 
and the Department of Energy (which have been used to justify the building of 
nuclear power stations) are described as 'wildly optimistic'. The Committee was 
'dismayed' to find that seven years after the first major oil price increases, the 
Department of Energy has no clear idea of whether investing around £1,300 million in 
a single nuclear plant is as cost effective as spending a similar sum to promote energy
conservation'. They were sharply critical of almost every aspect of the government's 
plan to order at least one nuclear power station each year in the decade from 1982 
and they were especially critical of the proposals for the PWR.

These powerful and wide-ranging criticisms endorse the principal accusations we 
have made against the AEA, the CEGB and the Department of Energy. They also 
destroy the professional credibility of those individuals who have advised successive 
Ministers of Energy. That such a scandalous personal inadequacy has existed for so 
long suggests to us that the parties in political Opposition, whether Socialist, Liberal 
or Social Democrat, might be well advised to consider an alternative route for the 
decision-making process involving individuals blessed with a greater share of 
commonsense and excluding individuals whose personal empires stand to gain 
from the presentation of inaccurate information.

Within a few days of the publication of this Report the Conservative government 
found itself confronting a hostile coal industry. Because the miners have already 
unseated one Conservative government and are clearly able to repeat the performance, 
the dismantling of the industry and the replacing of its energy contribution by nuclear 
power has become an article of faith for the Tory party. Faced with the threat of a 
long-term strike, the Cabinet instantly reversed its decision to close 'uneconomical' 
pits. Those of us who are concerned with the long-term interests of the country saw 
this governmental humiliation as exemplifying the futility of trying to mix a sane 
national policy with doctrinaire politics.

At about the same time, four of the largest and newest nuclear power stations in 
Western Germany were ordered to be shut down because of faults. Described as 
'perhaps the largest single blow to nuclear power in Europe since programmes began' 
(ii) it illustrates once again the supreme folly (and crippling expense) of using an
inherently dangerous technology unnecessarily.

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