Nuclear stress tests

Last Friday, ENSREG, the European Nuclear Safety Regulator Group, came to a compromise on the criteria for the planned nuclear stress tests. EU Member states have until today, Wednesday, at midnight, to veto the proposal - if they don't the proposal will be accepted. The Greens in the European Parliament, who have seen the text, criticise the proposal as completely insufficient and have called upon Energy Commissioner Oettinger to reject it

Commenting on the compromise, Rebecca Harms, President of the Greens/EFA group in the European Parliament, and Claude Turmes, Vice-President, today said:

"The proposals by ENSREG add nothing to the debate on the so-called nuclear stress tests. Besides general insufficiencies such as participation being voluntary and a lack of independence, we note substantial flaws which will impede effective security checking of the nuclear reactors using the latest technical and scientific knowledge and tools.

Specifically, tests relating to human error, terror attacks, cyber attacks and airplane crashes are either not covered at all or are dealt with insufficiently. Furthermore, accidents, known technical flaws and the ageing of reactors are not addressed or will not be dealt with in the tests.

The nuclear lobby itself is dominating the conception and implementation to such a degree that the independence and the transparency of the results cannot be ensured.

The Greens call upon Commissioner Oettinger to keep his promise not to accept an inadequate proposal and to reject the ENSREG proposals. Member states too should veto the ENSREG proposals and ensure the safety of EU citizens with their own, more ambitious proposals for stress tests. The next deadline is 10 June, the next council meeting of EU energy ministers."