Quitting nuclear power ‘would kill thousands’

Press, 11 May 1977, Page 9

Quitting nuclear power ‘would kill thousands’

NZPA-Reuter '< Salzburg. Austria |< i Thousands more people < will die from pollution if the < world gives up nuclear i power and relies exclusively 0:1 conventional systems, an 1 international atomic-energy ’ conference has been told. ] Dr Jan Doderlein, of the i Norwegian Institute forp Atomic Energy said that oil|i and coal-fired electricity-jj generating plants would] cause thousands more deaths 1 from cancer and lung dis- I ease than nuclear plants. 1 “Can we wilfully sacrifice i these lives in stopping nu- < clear energy?” he asked the!! 2000 delegates attending the two-week conference spon-,1 sored bj* the International.' Atomic Energy Agency. < His comments echoed ail report fro pt the Brookhaven | National Laboratory in the: United States saying that if] a moratorium were placed ji on nuclear .energy now,..thej extra coal burned to meet; energy .needs would cause]] between 2300 and 29,000 j extra deaths in the United : States by the year 2000. ]' This figure was about the same as that forecast for a single atomic reactor acci-’

;dent, the report said, but !added that whereas the coalinduced deaths were fairly certain, the odds for reactor deaths occurring were “one in a million.” The Nobel Laureate, Dr Hans Bether, of Cornell University, said: “Nuclear power is a necessity, not merely an option.” If the , world were to make a | smooth transition to the i post-oil world. | “The dominant feature of the world energy situation is that oil is running out,” Dr Bethe said, adding that the world neededmuclear and all other energy options “just Ito stay in the same place.” A dissenting view came from another Nobel Prizeiwinner, Dr Hannes Alfven, of Sweden, who said that i nuclear technology in its present form was obsolete, and who accused the nuclear ! Establishment of suppressing j criticism of its possible dangers. I Calling for a world energy (policy based on conserved oil and coal and alternative ! systems such as solar and I wind power, Dr Alfven told the nuclear Establishment that the glamour of their 'professions had passed.