WISE - NIRS Nuclear Monitor 635-636

What happened 25 years ago? We go back to news from our 1980 WISE Bulletin, comparing anti-nuclear news then and now.

Then
In WISE Bulletin vol. 2 nr. 4 we wrote about the growing debts caused by nuclear power: "In most cases the foreign debts already amounted to many millions or even billions of dollars before the start of the nuclear power programme. The nuclear selling countries extend loans, but these also have to be paid back sometime."

Now
The Philippines is still buckling under the weight of the debts incurred for the Bataan nuclear plant. Former president, Ferdinand Marcos borrowed US$1.9 billion to cover the costs of constructing the plant and because of that, every day until 2018, the Philippines obligated to repay US$170.000 to the lenders. And that for a plant that has never produced electricity because it was built on a known earthquake fault. In April 2005, Supreme Court Associate Justice Reynato Puno advised the country's government to consider stopping payments for this loan because it was taken out by the notoriously corrupt government of Ferdinand Marcos. Puno argued that the creditors should not be repaid since they had knowingly given the loan to a corrupt military regime and therefore were in essence party to a crime.

The same issue is raised in other countries. In 2000 the Argentine Federal Court made a ruling about its own foreign debt deciding that a great portion of the debts were acquired by illegitimate military rulers and were not used for the benefit of the state and its people therefore the state should not be obliged to repay them. Argentina built two nuclear power plants (Atucha 1 and Atucha 2), of which one has never been finished because of the rising costs but still billions of US dollars, which were already spent, must be paid back. Another expensive scheme linked with the Atucha 2 reactor is the Arroyito Heavy Water Plant (PIAP). Even though construction costs for PIAP reached US$1.3 billion, it will not be possible to maintain without Atucha 2 and given that it is unlikely Atucha 2 will ever be completed, it is likely that more money will have to be spent to convert PIAP for other industries or the country risks losing the investment already made in the plant along with the US$1 billion already wasted on Atucha 2.

http://www.odiousdebts.org/odiousdebts/index.cfm?DSP=content&ContentID=12901
http://www.odiousdebts.org/odiousdebts/index.cfm?DSP=subcontent&AreaID=152
WISE/NIRS Nuclear Monitor on November 12, 2004

WISE-Amsterdam/NIRS

ISSN: 1570-4629

Reproduction of this material is encouraged. Please give credit when reprinting.

Editorial team: Tinu Otoki (WISE Amsterdam), Michael Mariotte (NIRS). With contributions from Alice Hirt, Ken Bossong (Ukrainian-American Environmental Association), Laka Foundation and NIRS.

The next issue (637) will be mailed out on November 4, 2005.

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