Marine Tondelier described the government’s project on franceinfo as “worrying”, recalling that “the Institute for Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety is a French flagship”.
“We are degrading nuclear safety”, alerted Monday March 13 on franceinfo Marine Tondelier, national secretary of Europe-Ecology The Greens (EELV), while the bill to accelerate nuclear power is examined in the National Assembly. The government added the reform of nuclear safety by a simple amendment, adopted by the deputies in committee, which aims to integrate the IRSN (Institute for Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety), the technical expert, into the ASN ( Nuclear Safety Authority), the power plant policeman.
“The top of the state has often been pro-nuclear. But here, the great novelty is that they are no longer lucid”says Marine Tondelier. “The Institute for Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety is a French flagship. And if there is more or less decent nuclear safety in France, it is also thanks to their work”underlines the patron saint of the Greens. “As they report a bit alarming, so we suppress them so that they are not ominous birds. It is quite worrying.”
“Unconscious, inconsequential” projects
Marine Tondelier recalls that “all over the world, we look at this correlation, this complementarity between IRSN, which does research in a completely autonomous way, and ASN which is the controller”while the Minister of Energy Transition Agnès Pannier-Runacher claims to want to strengthen the two structures. “It’s very healthy that, when the ASN takes decisions, it is having read reports from an authority that is completely independent. It’s two-headed and it’s welcomed around the world.” The ecologist believes that this “dismantling” announced done “unanimity” against him. “Anti-nuclear people like me, who fear for nuclear safety, are worried. Pro-nuclear people are also against it, saying, ‘what the hell is this?'”
“We had confidence in the IRSN. Why do we change something that works?”
Marine Tondelier, National Secretary EELVon franceinfo
Marine Tondelier also wonders about the construction of new EPRs, wanted by Emmanuel Macron. “We were promised in Flamanville, it was to cost three billion euros and come into force in 2012. We are in 2023. This EPR is still not working and has cost more than 20 billion euros. This technology does not not working.” She judges that France “bases all its energy and climate strategies on a mirage: EPRs where there would be no waste problem, no problem with the link with Russia, no problem building them, no problem as if it was going to work NOW”.
EPRs, a “technology that does not work”
The boss of EELV also denounces the promise to launch power plants “which would work until 2100”. She recalls that Emmanuel Macron “to his wishes, said to us: ‘Who could have predicted climate change and its impacts in 2022?’. If he can’t predict it for 2022, I don’t think he will be able to predict it for 2100 as glaciers melt 100 times faster than expected.” And Marine Tondelier wonders: “We are going to make them work like our nuclear power plants, with droughts which will mean that there will not be enough water when we consume more water today in France for nuclear power plants than for the tap water? What are we going to do when there are risks that we can’t even predict yet?” Marine Tondelier judges government projects “completely unconscious, inconsequential.”