Greenpeace activists spend
the night waiting for the imminent arrival
of two nuclear fuel ships from the US to France.
15/04/2005 — After four years of appeals,
the La Hague nuclear plant can now truly be
called a nuclear dump - and an illegal one
at that. French energy giant Cogema has been
ordered to sort out their spent nuclear fuel
rods, or end up paying Greenpeace 1500 euros
a day.
Cogema, a subsidiary of the huge French energy
company Areva, has been illegally importing
and storing Australian nuclear waste for the
last four years. As we tried to tell them
way back in 2001, this storage is a source
of environmental damage. Four years of legal
wrangling later, Cogema has now been ordered
to pay 10,000 Euros in damages to Greenpeace.
"10,000 euros?" you might think.
"Surely that's peanuts to Cogema!"
True - but it's the repercussions of this
decision that could really make an impact.
Basically, so far the nuclear industry has
been able to get away with the very strange
idea that spent nuclear fuel does not constitute
nuclear waste. The admission that the nuclear
waste involved in this case is now admitted
to actually be... well, nuclear waste, means
the whole French policy of waste management
is now at stake.
"This is a major victory," explains
Yannick Rousselet, our French nuclear campaigner.
"This decision confirms what we have
always said: Cogema is illegally importing
nuclear waste on French soil. This decision
applies today to the Australian waste, but
many other types of waste are in the same
situation, which means the La Hague plant
can now truly be called a nuclear dump!"
The Court of appeal also ordered Areva to
produce an operating authorisation for the
reprocessing of the Australian waste within
three months. After this deadline, Cogema
will be given two months to remove the waste
from France, or pay the unexpected penalty
of paying Greenpeace 1500 euros per day. This
decision casts doubt on the fate of all the
nuclear waste stored by Areva, and will hopefully
pave the way for more responsibility on the
part of the nuclear industry.
