Press Release 19 Nov 2005
Nuclear safety risks highlighted by recent power failures  

If anything, the last two power failures have demonstrated one thing.  Cape Town could not cope if there was a need to evacuate a large number of people out of the city in a short time The power failures have shown that without electricity and traffic lights, traffic is snarled up for miles  taking ages to move short distances. A major nuclear accident could well require the reactor to shut down and bring on another power failure.  At present we do not have an evacuation plan for such an event in Cape Town.

The pro nuke lobby are punting the proposed nuclear  PBMR as the answer to our problems.  During the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) process for the proposed Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR) we were told that the plant was “inherently safe” and hence there was no need to evaluate the impact of a catastrophic incident on Cape Town.  We were also told that this conclusion was based on a final design of the reactor.

But international expert, Gordon Thompson commissioned for Earthlife Africa in December 2004, concluded that the safety analysis report was poorly written, badly constructed document that did not meet the standards of analogous documentation in the US.  It also stated that statements made in the EIA report about safety were generally not supported by analysis or by citation of another document. The possibility of severe damage to nuclear fuel was not examined. The PBMR safety report had stated that the reactor was designed to withstand "significant external forces" like the impact of an aircraft and was also "highly resistant" to explosion from possible saboteurs. However, none of these possibilities was examined in the safety analysis.

Tom Ferreira, of the PBMR (Pty) Ltd replied to a news report on this matter and stated that that safety analysis had been done at an early stage, that a new safety analysis was being done, and said the PBMR design had changed since the EIA report was compiled and so the safety analysis contained in the EIA report was out of date.  But this contradicts the assertions made in the environmental impact report that the design was final!

In the meantime are we still to believe we don’t need to evaluate the risks of a catastrophic incident at the proposed reactor site?