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The aim of the Kyoto Protocol was to stabilise greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere and thereby reduce global warming. In a bid to decrease our dependence on fossil energy, attention focused on nuclear energy, which is considered one of the least carbon-intensive technologies. The earthquake in Japan and the ensuing Fukushima nuclear accident on 11 March 2011 have reminded us once again of the risks of nuclear energy. Twenty-five years before Fukushima, the accident at Chernobyl on 26 April 1986 raised serious questions about the future of nuclear energy. It is therefore worth looking at Parliament’s historical documents on this issue, to see how nuclear safety risks were assessed shortly after that incident.
In March 1987, a year after the Chernobyl accident, Madron Seligman MEP drafted a report on ‘the future of nuclear energy’. Also in March 1987, Leopold Späth MEP drafted a report on ‘the consequences of the Chernobyl accident’. While Seligman’s report takes a broad view of the energy field as a whole, Späth concentrates rather on the practical aspects and safety issues brought out by the Chernobyl accident.
An interesting point raised in Späth’s report was that the existing but modest competences of Euratom concerning nuclear safety had been largely neglected. It was evident that after such a serious accident this practice had to be changed. In addition, it was emphasised that the Community itself had to take responsibility for nuclear safety matters. Finally, the Commission was criticised for having taken no action to improve obvious shortcomings in the existing Euratom treaty. Accordingly, several measures were proposed to improve the situation, such as the establishment of a Community Inspectorate for monitoring the application of Community standards on reactor safety.
Madron Seligman drew attention to an important aspect, the possible risks from nuclear energy. He stated that ‘Western atomic designers claim that in designing the PWR (pressurised water reactor), they have foreseen and catered for every conceivable combination of mistakes and design errors’. It was considered essential after the Chernobyl catastrophe to eliminate all human error factors as possible causes of a nuclear accident.
Although Seligman’s report was written shortly after the Chernobyl accident, it provides a broad view of energy policy aspects in the late 1980s. For example, he pointed out that there were several countries which did not have their own supplies of fossil fuel and saw no alternative to a steady increase in nuclear-powered electricity generation. Further on, he observed that if nuclear power were banned completely, fossil reserves would be exhausted much sooner than expected. In addition, he stressed that the rapid expansion in world population and increasing industrialisation in China, India and Africa would massively increase the demand for energy. In the ensuing debate Seligman strongly opposed abandoning nuclear energy, since that would lead to ever-increasing dependence on fossil energy. However, both Späth and Seligman were well aware that there were no easy ways out of the current situation.
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