EDITORIAL - Stampede to go nuclear

The blackouts lasting eight to 12 hours that crippled Metro Manila and other parts of Luzon from 1991 to 1992 are still fresh in people’s memories. But the bogey of blackouts should not stampede the nation into activating the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant.

The BNPP, the most expensive white elephant of the Marcos dictatorship, was mothballed by the administration of Corazon Aquino amid studies questioning the safety of the plant, which reportedly lies near an earthquake fault. Ferdinand Marcos reportedly received an $80-million kickback for the contract to build the power plant, which was won by Westinghouse. By the time Marcos was ousted, the plant had cost the Philippines more than $2 billion.

Some of the world’s advanced economies are pitching nuclear power as a cheap and reliable source of energy. These countries point out that they have had no safety problems with their plants, even in Japan, which like the Philippines lies along the so-called Ring of Fire and is frequently rocked by earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

But even Japan and France, a major proponent of nuclear energy, have not yet developed a way of getting rid of all the nuclear waste that has accumulated over the past decades, except to keep the toxic material in storage and hope the planet is dead before the waste starts contaminating the environment. If the BNPP is activated and its waste is buried in the sea, this could further endanger the Philippines’ already fragile marine ecosystem.

Perhaps one day nuclear waste can be recycled into something useful. But even if that technology is developed any time soon, the activation of the BNPP cannot be fast-tracked. Environmentalists have pointed out that the design of the plant is outdated and do not meet current safety standards. This will add to the cost — conservatively placed at $800 million — of rehabilitating the plant.

If all that proponents of the activation of the BNPP want is to wean the nation away from its dependence on fossil fuels, there are many other alternative sources of energy that can be developed without posing risks to the environment. The country has geothermal resources and hydropower as well as natural gas. In northern Luzon, wind power has gained popularity. For construction purposes, household and commercial uses, solar energy technology is advancing at a rapid pace. There are many other uses for that $800 million, and the environment and public safety need not be compromised.