EU Reactor Stress Test Results Show Failure & Scandal

The EU has announced the results of their nuclear commission’s stress tests and they are not good. The tests found serious deficiencies at those facilities inspected including many post Chernobyl fixes that still have not been implemented. Even worse is the reality that the EU commission has no ability to compel member nations or nuclear plant owners to comply with the inspections. Many reactors in the UK and France simply refused entry of the inspectors.

Those that did permit inspection were found to have serious deficiencies including no seismic warning systems. Many lack basic safety equipment that played a role in preventing the Fukushima disaster from becoming worse such as control bunkers. Some plants have less than 1 hour of emergency power.

Environmentalists criticized the stress tests as being watered down before they were started. With tests completed the watered down nature, massive number of deficiencies and inability for the commission to compel cooperation shows a very bad situation in Europe. As usual money was cited as the reason for not completing the needed safety measures.

The EU stress tests report will be released Wednesday, an alternative report cited October 17th as the report release date.

• 4 reactors in 2 countries have less than 1 hour of emergency power
• Many safety upgrades after Chernobyl have still not been done
• Only 24 of 68 plants could be checked by the commission
• The commission was also denied access to reactors in France and the UK by the operators or local authorities
• Reactors in France were deemed the worst, with situations worse than those in eastern Europe.
•  “virtually all plants need better safety measures.”
• German nuclear plants had insufficient earthquake warning systems.
• Even some IAEA standards had not been implemented
• Europe has 134 nuke reactors in 68 plants in 14 countries
• Only 4 EU countries mandate a separate operations bunker with controls
• The lack of completion of safety upgrades was cited as a cost issue where it would cost 10-25 billion euros for operators to fix reactors.
• Terrorist attacks were removed from the EU stress tests.
• 10 reactors have no seismic warning system.

More reading here (in German)
http://www.welt.de/print/die_welt/article109558037/Schwere-Maengel-in-Europas-Atomkraftwerken.html
http://www.welt.de/debatte/article109555632/Die-Ohnmacht-der-EU-ist-der-eigentliche-Skandal.html
http://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article109550267/Europas-Atomkraftwerke-sind-nicht-sicher-genug.html

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