Sweden
has shut down four of its 10 nuclear plants after
faults were discovered. A major fault was discovered
after a serious incident at the Forsmark nuclear
power station, a former director of the plant
later said: "it was pure luck there wasn't
a meltdown.
The closure of the Swedish plants
has removed at a stroke roughly 20 percent of
Sweden's electricity supply. Emergency power systems
to the Forsmark plant failed for 20 minutes during
a power cut. If power was not restored there could
have been a major incident within hours.
A former director of the Forsmark
plant said, "It was pure luck that there
was not a meltdown. Since the electricity supply
from the network didn't work as it should have,
it could have been a catastrophe."
It appears that the fault in
the backup power systems originates from new equipment
installed in 1993. Not exactly reassuring that
faulty equipment, vital for preventing a meltdown,
went undetected for 13 years. The same equipment
now uncovered to be faulty is also installed on
other nuclear power plants in other countries.
Germany is already investigating if the same fault
affects its nuclear plants.
Power cuts
Nuclear industry propaganda
has been saying that we need nuclear power to
prevent future power cuts. But actually current
nuclear plants are vulnerable to power cuts. All
nuclear plants need power to control them. If
mains power is lost, back up power is required
to control the reactor. This power is supplied
by back up generators but there have been many
instances where these generators have been found
to be faulty or susceptible to storms or floods.
This has caused the temporary closures of nuclear
plants in the US and elsewhere.
Cut the power to a single wind
or solar farm and while they will stop generating
electricity for the grid at least it won't threaten
to melt down. Nuclear power relies on old, inefficient
centralised power grids that are vulnerable to
power cuts. Clean renewable energy sources help
create more efficient decentralised power where
it is generated much closer to where it is used.
When the going gets hot, nuclear
plants stop running
The problems with Swedish nuclear plants come
hot on the heels of problems with nuclear power
plants in Europe due to the hot dry summer. Two
nuclear plants in Germany recently had to reduce
output due to the lack of sufficient water for
cooling in rivers. If the drought continues many
nuclear plants that rely on rivers for cooling
water will have to reduce output or shut down.
Luckily Sweden plans to phase
out its nuclear power plants in the coming years.
Unfortunately a small minority of other European
countries like France, Finland and the UK seem
determined to rely on dangerous, dirty and expensive
nuclear power that can fail dangerously during
a power cut and be shut down by droughts.
Recent events expose industry
lies about nuclear being a reliable energy source.
A combination of safe, renewable
energy and energy efficiency measures are the
only sane solution for power generation - in Europe
and in Canada. Read our report on clean energy
solutions for Ontario.
