Nuke protesters pile on pressure

Senior US, Japanese and Australian experts and Taiwan's top researchers and policy analysts will discuss the global transition from industrial energy systems based on large-scale nuclear and coal plants to a decentralized, market-based system relying on a diversity of energy sources and technologies.

Lee Yuan-tseh (李遠哲), President of Academia Sinica and Christopher Flavin, President of Worldwatch Institute, an influential US conservation group, will attend the conference as keynote speakers.

According to Lin Tze-luen (林子倫), research associate at the CEEP, topics to be discussed range from electricity restructuring, environmental sustainability, the problems with nuclear power and the energy conservation revolution.

Some anti-nuclear energy experts from the Taiwan Environmental Protection Union (TEPU) have made preparations at the conference to highlight the necessity of abandoning nuclear energy.

In addition, Hideyuki Ban, director of Japan-based Citizens Nuclear Information Center (CNIC), will present recent information regarding a radiation leak accident which occurred at a uranium-processing plant, operated by the privately run JCO Co in central Japan on Sept. 30, 1999, causing several casualties.

Mari Takenouchi (竹野內真理), a Japanese translator for the CNIC, said that the most recent reports in Japan, exposing the slow and agonizing death of one of injured workers at the JCO plant, had shocked Japan.

Takenouchi said that the story was published in May by Shukan Gendai (週刊現代) magazine.

"Maybe people will think differently about nuclear safety when they learn how the poor worker suffered from losing up to 80 percent of his skin during the last stage of his life," said Takenouchi.

The Taiwan Environmental Protection Union deputy secretary-general, Pan Han-chiang (潘翰疆), said that Japanese anti-nuclear activists are coming to Taiwan this week not only to attend the conference but also to expose more details of nuclear accidents that have happened in Japan.

Pan said that allying with counterparts overseas -- especially in Japan -- to expose frightening nuclear accidents in that country, was a top priority for local anti-nuclear activists.

"Japan has been an example used by Taipower to tell Taiwanese people that nuclear energy is safe. Now, it's time for people to face the facts," Pan said.

Currently, Pan said, some anti-nuclear groups in Japan are aligning with residents of Okinawa (沖繩), the south tip of Japan, to join in opposition to Taiwan's Fourth Nuclear Power Plant, situated in Kungliao township, Taipei County. Residents of Okinawa, about 630km away from Taipei, might be exposed to radiation contamination if a meltdown occurred at the plant.

Pan said that more pressure needed to be put on governmental officials, who tend to consider nuclear issues in terms of economic development and ignore the environmental burden and potential hazards it represents.