ENERGY DEBATE:A LEADING physicist says he still believes the Government should rescind legislation which bans nuclear energy provision in Ireland.
Prof Philip Walton, emeritus professor of applied physics at NUI Galway, said the emergency alert at Japan’s earthquake-stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant represented a “setback”.
However, he said, it was “not a Chernobyl situation”, and so far there had been no major release of radiation and no health consequences.
Prof Walton is son of Prof Ernest Walton, the first person in history to split the atom, and his father was also the only Irishman to win the Nobel Prize for science.
He is delivering a series of lectures countrywide on Nuclear Power: Facts and Fiction under the aegis of the Better Environment with Nuclear Energy group.
The group believes Ireland needs to face its long-term energy needs, and that the Government should form an expert group to advise on nuclear power generation. It should also rescind the legislation which bans nuclear power provision in the State, given dwindling fossil fuels and uncertainty about oil prices, Prof Walton said.
However, Green Party Senator Niall Ó Brolcháin yesterday called on the Government to “firmly rule out nuclear power generation as an option for Ireland”. He was concerned that the Government had “left the door open for a possible move towards nuclear power in its joint programme.
“A previous Fine Gael-Labour government introduced controversial mass burn incinerators on to the Irish political agenda,” he said.
Prof Walton said the nuclear energy industry had learned from its mistakes and the situation in Japan would be studied closely.
The domestic and international energy situation had changed since opposition to a proposed nuclear power plant at Carnsore Point, Co Wexford, was expressed by thousands attending free concerts there in 1978 and 1979, he has said.
“Global warning was not an issue then, and there was a plentiful supply of oil and gas,” he said. “Ireland is nearly 90 per cent dependent on imported fossil fuels.
“Italy, which is similarly dependent like us, began and then stopped a nuclear energy development programme after the 1986 accident at Chernobyl,” he said. “However, Italy is currently progressing the first of 10 such nuclear plants.” He said there had been a “big renaissance” in nuclear energy provision in Europe, mirrored by a new development programme in Britain.
He also said the effects of the Chernobyl accident in the Ukraine have been “greatly exaggerated”, while acknowledging that 6,000 children subsequently developed thyroid cancer in Ukraine and neighbouring states, including Belarus.
The Commission for Energy Regulation has taken issue with a report in this newspaper last week which stated that it believed there was no economic case for nuclear power. The commission said the official who made this recent comment was speaking in a personal capacity only.