German power suppliers are suing the government for 15 billion euros (US$19 billion) in damages over the decision to abandon nuclear power, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported yesterday.
The country’s biggest power utility E.ON, alone, wants at least 8.0 billion euros, the newspaper said, without revealing its sources.
In the wake of the nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan, Berlin decided to phase out nuclear power, forcing energy suppliers to shut down their profitable large-scale power plants, while it also levied a tax on the reactors’ fuel for their remaining lifespan.
Both E.ON and its next biggest rival RWE have already filed complaints with the constitutional court, arguing that the nuclear exit decision has harmed their proprietary rights as they had to shut down reactors early.
E.ON said the complaint was not about the pull-out from nuclear energy per se, which is largely supported in Germany, but about the lack of compensation for the companies affected by the energy policy U-turn.
Both companies have seen profits fall sharply owing to the shutdown of their nuclear power plants.
Meanwhile, the UN atomic watchdog said yesterday “good progress” was being made in enhancing global nuclear safety, almost a year after implementing an action plan in the wake of the Fukushima Dai-ichi disaster.
The program implemented by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in September last year involves fresh assessments of the world’s 440 nuclear plants and emergency measures, as well as more voluntary “peer review” visits by foreign experts.
“Good progress continues to be made ... but the success of this action plan in strengthening nuclear safety is dependent upon its implementation through full cooperation and participation of member states,” Denis Flory, the IAEA’s deputy director general for nuclear safety and security, said in a keynote speech at a nuclear safety seminar held in Singapore.
Flory cautioned countries embarking on new nuclear projects to exercise “the highest level of transparency and openness in communication” to allay public concerns over safety issues.
“Nuclear energy remains a viable option for many countries as they consider their future energy mix, but we must not forget that public confidence in the safety of nuclear power was badly damaged by the Fukushima Dai-ichi accident,” he said.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained