ENS NEWS, N° 15:

While some of us were still struggling to recover from the New Year festivities and get back into the swing of things, 2007 hit the ground running and firing on all cylinders. By early January, several significant political developments regarding EU energy policy had already taken place and energy discussions dominated the corridors of power in Brussels. This explains why ENS NEWS N°15 has a distinctly EU flavour to it.

On 10 January, under the glare of the media spotlight, EU President José Manuel Barroso - flanked by EU Energy Commissioner, Andris Piebalgs, and EU Environment Commissioner, Stavros Dimas - presented the EC’s eagerly-anticipated Communication on the future of EU energy policy. The report, entitled An Energy Policy for Europe, is a broad-ranging strategic review of the Community’s energy policy. It gives explicit recognition – for the first time in an official EC policy document – to the important role that nuclear energy should play in helping the EU meet its security of supply, climate change and competitiveness challenges.

FORATOM gave a prompt response to the “energy package,” which ENS NEWS readers can see, together with the official EC press release and other FORATOM information on the home page of the FORATOM web site: www.foratom.org. To summarise, FORATOM welcomed its recognition of the role and importance of nuclear energy in forging an effective long-term EU energy strategy and noted with satisfaction the Communication’s reference to nuclear as “one of the largest sources of CO₂-free energy.” However, FORATOM was disappointed that the EC did not take into account its own research data and emphasise that the share of nuclear energy and renewables in Europe’s primary energy supply could double to about 40% by 2050.

Of special interest to the scientific and nuclear community are the references that An Energy Policy for Europe makes to new technologies and increased research spending over the next 7 years.

Before the ink was dry on the EU’s reworked “energy package” had the EC released the results of a Eurobarometer Survey on Energy Technology, which provided some interesting insight into what EU citizens think about energy matters, including nuclear. I’m happy to report that scientists are still seen as the most trustworthy source of information about energy matters. But before we all get too complacent, the results were far from all positive: only 1 in 5 citizens, according to the survey, support the use of nuclear energy and the percentage in favour has decreased from 37% when the Eurobarometer on Radioactive Waste was published in 2005 to only 20% today. Mind you, as a famous politician once said “There are lies, damn lies and statistics.” Anyway, you can make up your own mind by analysing the results of the survey at: ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/ebs/ebs_262_en.pdf

After the traditional beginning-of-year message from our President, ENS NEWS N° 15 kicks off with a thought-provoking analysis by Andrew Teller of the unfounded opposition to the ITER project expressed by some environmentalists. Next up is some general information about upcoming ENS conferences. As always, more detailed information one each of these flagship conferences, PIME 2007, RRFM/IGORR 2007 and ENC2007, is provided in the ENS Events section.

There is a particularly impressive number of articles in the Member Societies and Corporate Members section this time round, with members sending in articles dealing with a range of issues from Sweden to Slovakia and from Lithuania to Russia.

The Young Generation Network (YGN) report focuses on the 10^th anniversary of the British Nuclear Society’s YGN chapter, which was celebrated at a gala event in Manchester.

As I mentioned earlier, January was a red-letter month for EU energy policy, with the strategic energy review process providing a new “energy package” that includes the aforementioned EC Communication An Energy Policy for Europe and Eurobarometer Survey on Energy Technologies, as well as the PINC (5^th Illustrative Programme on Nuclear). These important initiatives are examined in-depth in the European Institutions section.

In the ENS World News section our friends from NucNet also focus on EU news, especially the European Strategic Energy Technology Plan that was announced by the EC as part of the wider strategic energy review. The Plan’s measures focus primarily on boosting spending on research into the competitiveness of low-carbon technologies and will form part of an overall energy Action Plan that should to be adopted at the European Council in March 2007.

Your comments and suggestions on any aspect of ENS NEWS - style, format or content - would, as always, be most welcome.

In the meantime, have a great 2007 and enjoy your ENS NEWS!

Word from the President

Contributing, communicating, participating.

Dear ENS NEWS Reader,

First of all I would like to wish you and your family a happy, prosperous and healthy 2007!

But what will the New Year bring? Well, it certainly promises to be a busy one and a watershed year for EU energy policy – something that this edition of ENS NEWS has attempted to reflect.

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The strange controversy surrounding ITER

by Andrew Teller

ITER, the reader will certainly recall, is the next step in the world’s endeavour to produce energy by fusing light nuclei together (see ENS NEWS no 4, Spring 2004). After protracted discussions, it was decided last year that the Cadarache site, in the south of France, would house the reactor. Having reached consensus on the siting, the parties got finally round to signing the international ITER Agreement, which took place on 21st November 2006 at the Elysée Palace in Paris.

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Register now for PIME 2007!

PIME 2007 will take place from 11 - 15 February, in Milan. PIME 2007 offers a varied and top-quality programme that covers a range of issues of importance to nuclear communicators. It features a number of international experts and high-level speakers who represent all aspects of nuclear communications. For the first time, in 2007, PIME will include two ‘blind workshops’ that provide participants with a results-oriented, hands-on approach to creating ready-made communication tools in response to key needs.

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RRFM 2007 / IGORR: Research into reactor fuel management in the international spotlight!

In 2007, ENS and IGORR (the International Group on Research Reactors) will, for the first time, jointly organise RRFM 2007 / IGORR. This unique conference for specialists involved in all aspects of research into reactor fuel management and technology will take place from 11 – 15 March 2007, in Lyon, France.

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ENC 2007

Mark your diary!

Sharing knowledge and providing insight on the latest developments in nuclear research and its applications – that is the aim of the European Nuclear Conference (ENC).

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