I was surprised when I opened the Greenpeace Youtube channel this morning.

I got a message on our inbox coming from veterans of the historic anti-Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP), campaign in the 80s. The message was from the NUKLUS Band,  an alternative and progressive rock band that performed during the 80′s. They were the ones who composed the song “Dambuhala Sa Morong” (Monster of Morong), in 1980 which became the battle-cry of the Philippine anti-nukes movement at the time.

Attached with their message is a video clip of their song, which I’ve embeded on top of this post. It seems that the BNPP revival move in Congress is drawing more and more anti-BNPP veterans out into the broad opposition to the BNPP.

It is our hope here at Greenpeace that Philippine Congress would head the call to stop the madness of reviving the BNPP.

Also for those of you who are in Facebook, you might want to join the lively discussion on our wall regarding the BNPP, all you have to do is fan our page and then speak your mind about what you feel regarding the recent plans to revive the BNPP.

Our Facebook page is www.greenpeace.org.ph/facebook

Chuck Baclagon

Chuck Baclagon

Technicians at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine are ordered to test the safety emergency reactor core cooling system on the Number 4 reactor. The test is delayed during the day. The night shift operators arrive at midnight but are unprepared to carry out the test.

It is April 26th 1986

The reactor is inadvertently powered down to just one per cent of its capacity. To counter this and increase power in order to conduct the test, the operators remove the control rods, the system that regulates the fission of the nuclear fuel, destabilising the reactor. The reactor has a design flaw that means it is unstable at low power.

Not knowing the reactor is now unstable, the operators commence their safety test at 1.23am. The operators turn off the reactor’s turbine and wait for the safety system to start. The turbine drives the reactor cooling system’s water pumps and so the flow of water drops. With less water to cool it, the reactor gets hotter and hotter and more steam is generated increasing the pressure inside to a huge degree. The operators try to reduce the power inside the reactor by reinserting the control rods. Instead, this has the effect of massively increasing the power inside the reactor beyond its capacity. The pressure cannot be contained. The nuclear reaction cannot be stopped.

The reactor goes critical.

The worst nuclear accident in history is seconds away.

At 1:24am the first explosion blows the lid off the reactor. The lid weighs 2,000 tons. A second, more powerful explosion follows seconds later. Burning debris is thrown high into the air and onto the reactor’s roof starting fires. Air is now entering the open reactor and it ignites.

‘The roof was open like a book and there was a magnificent light; a beautiful blue fire,’ says Vasily Tikhomirov, a soldier at the scene, later. The beautiful blue fire will spread radiation across Europe. Fifty tonnes of nuclear fuel is thrown into the atmosphere, the equivalent of ten Hiroshimas. The radioactive cloud created covers over 30 countries.

Two people are killed in the explosion. Thirty-seven die of acute radiation sickness soon afterwards. Dozens are killed while building reactor 4’s concrete sarcophagus according to engineers who are there. More than 2,000 villages around Chernobyl are contaminated by radioactivity. More than 330,000 people are evacuated and relocated. Statistics predict approximately 270,000 cancers and 93,000 fatal cancer cases will be caused by Chernobyl. At least three million children will require medical treatment. The number who will fall ill and die is rising. The effect on the health of the survivors and their children is devastating: accelerated ageing, cardiovascular and blood illnesses, psychological illnesses, chromosomal aberrations and an increase in foetal deformations.

It is April 26th 2009

World leaders look to a nuclear ‘renaissance’. They forget the children of Chernobyl.

Earlier we have posted a video of Noel Cabangon’s take on John Hall’s Power during his last March 20 gig at the 70s Bistro

Now we are posting The Jerks’ performance of their classic song Nukleyar which they performed in the same March 20 concert at the 70s Bistro.

Enjoy =)

Chuck Baclagon

Yesterday afternoon, various faith-based groups, social movements and communities see their opposition to Bataan Nuclear Power Plant, as an act of “choosing life over debt”. The church groups also said that the campaign against BNPP is now the shared responsibility of all people of faith and goodwill.
Organized by the Faith-Based Congress Against Immoral Debts (FCAID), a broad formation of different church and religious groups against immoral debts, the kite-flying event dubbed as the “ Collective Ascension of Kites Against the BNPP” reflects the renewal of collective hope as we celebrate the message of Easter. It promises to be the biggest gathering so far of different faith-based, social movements and coalitions against BNPP.

“While we collectively commemorate Easter, we also manifest the Filipino people’s struggle to ascend from the evil consequences of operating the BNPP, which will push the country and the people deeper into the vicious debt and underdevelopment trap”. - Fr. Ben Moraleda of FCAID

We here at Greenpeace are in solidarity with the religious sector in this initiative, we hope that through this activity, a strong message will be sent to the legislators that the people are closely watching them, and that the faith-based sector is making its intervention concerning the BNPP’s operation.

Click here to read more about the event

Chuck Baclagon

Greenpeace activists gathered outside the main gate of the ASEAN+3 Summit venue in Thailand. They were there to highlight that it’s time for the government leaders meeting at the summit turn the current financial crisis into an opportunity for addressing runaway climate change. They can ensure the economic stimulus package being proposed for the region goes into the development and deployment of clean renewable energy systems that can also create thousands of sustainable jobs in the region.

With talk of re-commissioning the Bataan nuclear power plant in the Philippines still circulating and the governments of Thailand, Indonesia and Vietnam also expressing their intention to build nuclear power plants, now is also the time for the ASEAN leaders to realise that they cannot and should not waste money on the importing of costly and dangerous nuclear reactors.

As if we needed to repeat it, the costs of new reactors worldwide have rocketed to three times as much as the nuclear industry was promising only five years ago. The French EPR reactors under construction in Europe are already massively over budget, years behind schedule and riddled with thousands of defects.

Expensive, late, and unreliable. Not words you want to hear when it comes to fighting climate change.

Justin

Tara delivers our message to the Thail delegate: "Nuclear power is bad for Southeast Asia's future!"

Today I joined my counterparts, Isa and Hikmat, the media officers of the Thailand and Indonesia offices of Greenpeace Southeast Asia, at a Greenpeace activity at the ASEAN Summit in Pattaya, Thailand. Neung, was the media officer, while Hikmat and I, as well as some others, were there to support the team. (Earlier we had attended a nuclear campaign skillshare led by Jan and Aslihan from Greenpeace International. They shared their experiences about the ongoing campaign in various countries in Europe.)

Anyway, our Greenpeace team was in Pattaya to deliver a message to the ASEAN leaders attending the summit that nuclear power is a waste of money and that their governments should instead put investments in renewables which are the real solution to climate change.

Thai TV stations interviewing Tara and Jan, our nuclear energy expert

We were able to get in at the main entrance of the venue, where we launched a globe balloon, and displayed a banner with the message “Not nuclear, money for renewables. Climate action now!” A Thai delegate received the letter brought by our Thailand Campaign Manager, Tara.

The globe balloon--a big hit!

We hope our governments get (and listen) to the message!

The riot police just outside on the street--there was high security during the ASEAN meeting, due to the current political unrest in Thailand. Fortunately we finished our activity before the political protesters arrived.

If they don’t–well, we’ll be back….hehehe

Lea Guerrero

A Greenpeace volunteer engage the youth in signing up as cyberactivists at the launched of the comic book "Nuclear Meltdown" last April 03 on the first day of Ozine Fest one of the biggest anime convention in the country.

18 years ago I bought a DC Comic book with a storyline entitled: Armageddon 2001, which is basically about a nasty villain named Monarch who was an oppressive tyrant from a bleak, dystopian Earth fifty years in the future. Unhappy with his rule, a particular scientist named Matthew Ryder, an expert on temporal studies,  was convinced he could use his technology to travel back in time and prevent the maniacal ruler from ever coming to power. He learned that forty years ago, one of Earth’s heroes would eventually turn evil and become Monarch, and ten years from that he would conquer the world.

Ryder traveled back to the DC Comics Universe equivalent of 1991; Ryder was determined to find out who the Monarch really was and, if possible, kill him before he could rise to power. As he travelled through the rift, his body mutated into a form of living temporal energy, and upon arriving at his destination, he took the name Waverider.

Waverider used his abilities to peer into several possible futures of different members of the Justice League (along with several other characters), and was finally able to pinpoint exactly who would eventually become Monarch thus changing the future.

Changing the future

Francis Dela Cruz, public coordinator of Greenpeace, challenges the youth at the Ozine Fest to change the future

I was reminded of this story when I first read,  Nuclear Meltdown: A message from the darkness, an advocacy comic book about the perils of nuclear power and how the youth can make a difference in making the world a better place.

The idea of changing the future is actually not as far-fetch as it is presented in sci-fi literature, in fact it is something that we actually are already in the process of doing as we live our lives, making decisions and living in accordance to those decisions that ultimately determines what the future will ultimately become.

That being said, we are now in a crucial period in history as the world is faced with the danger of catastrophic climate change and the sudden nuclear renaissance, and it is a time again for heroes to rise up to challenge the status quo of apathy in the midst of such global threats.

Now is a time for heroes
As of this writing I am alone in the office right now, since today is a national holiday in the Philippines as it is the Day of

Click here to sign up as a Greenpeace cyberactivist!

Valor (“Araw ng Kagitingan” in Filipino) commemorating the fall of Bataan during World War II, celebrated as a day of reverence to those who showed valor in the time of war.

A day for -heroes.

Benjamin Disraeli once said: “The legacy of heroes is the memory of a great name and the inheritance of a great example.” As heroes capture our imagination whether it be of the superhuman comic book type or that of the ordinary man heroism is not something that is inconsequential, as what most of us would like to believe it is, perhaps the seed of environmental heroism planted to the youths who’ve read Nuclear Meltdown and who got acquainted with environmental activism at our booth in last week’s Ozine Fest will eventually bloom with the fulfillment of a green and peaceful world of the future.

Click here to view more pictures from the Ozine Fest

Chuck Baclagon

Almost everybody knows that Google is the best place to find information about anything. Thanks to Google, we now know that we’ve made a terrible mistake on the issue of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant, according to a recent search that we did on the famed search engine – the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant is safe!

I guess its time for us to swallow our prides and concede our convictions. Apparently we were wrong – the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant was safe  all along…
Click here to read all about it.

Chuck Baclagon

PBA097p91s09

Greenpeace staff, volunteers and supporters marched in solidarity with the people of Bataan to oppose the revival of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant during the church-led rally in Morong

The word ‘solidarity‘ rarely strikes a chord in this day and age.

Gone were the days when the word solidarity was so taken seriously that one would risk their life, limb and liberty in solidarity with the plight of a people, a race, a cause and the earth.

It seems that along with the advent and progress of the technological age, a lot of people have gotten busy. Busy with meeting deadlines, work and making ends meet, without fully realizing that it exactly their business that has kept them in an ‘ignorance is bliss’ and ‘business-as-usual’ mode, which is fertile ground for injustice.

I think it is quite possible that it is that sort of mindset that stirred the likes of Mark Cojuangco and the other legislators who moved in Congress to push for the “re-comissioning” of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant. They figured that it would be business as usual for the people and that the bitter lessons of the historic struggle against the BNPP would be forgotten, by a late-blooming generation.

Thankfully the lesson wasn’t forgotten. There are still those who choose to go not gently unto the night of the nuclear renaissance.

Today we choose to stand in solidarity, with the broad movement that seeks to oppose the unfeasible, dangerous, economically unviable and corruption laiden monster that is the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant.

Prayer

"To clasp the hands in prayer is the beginning of an uprising against the disorder of the world." -- Karl Barth

Prayer is universal because it speaks to some basic human need. As Thomas Merton puts it, “Prayer is an expression of who we are… we are a living incompleteness. We are a gap, an emptiness that calls for fulfillment.” In prayer we break silence, and sometimes those words flow out of our deepest parts.

We pray because we want to thank someone or something for the beautiful glories of life, and also because we feel small and helpless and sometimes afraid. We pray for forgiveness, for strength, for contact with the One who is, for assurance that we are not alone.

The case of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant is truly a cause for prayer.

Solidarity with the people of Morong
Organized by the Parish of our Lady of the Pillar, Morong, Bataan, and supported by the Diocese of Balanga prayer rally brought not only the faithful men and women of faith, but also the various groups of individuals, NGOs, people’s organizations, social movements etc into a collective expression of solidarity.

It is our hope that our solidarity with the people of Bataan who are faced with the 30-year old Monster of Morong, will create a ripple towards the final vanquishing of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant.

Show your solidarity by putting a web banner on your website. Click on the image for more information

The story of the BNPP and the people of Morong is one seemingly unending saga of greed, corruption and utter disregard for the environment and plain logic. Our hearts here at Greenpeace is in solidarity with the people of Bataan.

Chuck Baclagon

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I hope you’ll not only enjoy this performance – that it will also empower you to take action and say no to a nuclear future.

Chuck Baclagon

A certain Rey Vincent P.E., wrote a letter-to-the-editor to the Philippine Daily Inquirer (dated March 25, 2009) with a title that reads: Now is the the best time for nuclear power.

Here’s my 10 cents worth on his letter…

On climate change

How convenient it is to talk about global warming when pushing for nukes?

Very easy.

However talk is cheap. Nuclear energy has not suddenly become safe or clean, in much the same way that coal is not safe even if its clean coal. Its all just ‘greenwash’.

In speaking of nuclear safety versus global warming, he makes it seem that we have no choice but to choose between radiation contamination over catastrophic climate change. Such must not be the case because climate change and pollution are both unacceptable.

Another thing that he touched is on the issue of renewable energy where he fondly writes:

“ Wind and solar energy are not yet commercially competitive and can only generate power in limited quantities.”

Here’s my take – first he needs to qualify his statement is he merely talking about wind and solar or is he addressing renewable energy (RE) as a whole, for starters the above mentioned RE sources is not representative of the entire RE makeup of the Philippines as our RE energy portfolio includes wind, biomass, photovoltaic, solar thermal, geothermal, ocean and hydroelectric power. These sources of energy are abundant in our country and, compared to conventional fuels, are free. The Philippines’ potential for renewable energy sources are vast and much, much greater than what fossil fuels or nuclear can provide.

The Greenpeace report ‘Energy [R]evolution: A Sustainable Philippine Energy Outlook,’ draws up a comprehensive energy strategy for the Philippines to show how renewable energy can become the country’s energy backbone. The report show how renewable energy can provide as much as 57% of the country’s energy needs by 2030, and 70% by 2050, with ‘new’ renewables, such as wind, biomass, geothermal and solar energy, contributing as much as 58% to the energy mix.

In fact, that is one of the reasons why the Renewable Energy Bill has finally been signed into a law last year, so to speak of nukes in an age of RE is distracting. Because as the way things are talks ought to be focused now on pushing for an uptake in RE instead of pushing for nukes.

You can’t solve a problem by creating another problem. To propose nuclear expansion in the name of climate change is stacking one potential catastrophe over another. Not only does it seem outrageous to dig up mistakes from the past, it is would be a complete waste of money that is much better spent on further development of the country’s plentiful renewable energy sources—the real solutions to climate change.

On safety

In writing about the safety of nuclear power plants he cites the Japanese nuclear industry as a good example and argument against the issue of geological hazards that plague the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant. But is that really true?

One needs not to go back far in tracing Japan’s poor record of safety with regards to nuclear reactors. In 1991, a fatal accident has killed at least four people at the Mihama nuclear power plant in Japan. There was no leak of radioactivity but it is the deadliest accident in a catalog of nuclear scandals in Japan.

Seven workers were also injured due to the steam leak, possibly caused by a lack of cooling water in the reactor. This latest accident follows the explosion at Tokaimura plant in 1999, where workers mixed radioactive material in a bucket, causing a reaction that killed two workers, injured several more and irradiated hundreds of civilians. In 1997 also at Tokaimura a fire and explosion released radioactive gas into the atmosphere. In 1995 a serious accident at the Monju fast breeder reactor led to its shut down. In 1991 another reactor at the same Mihama plant suffered a serious radioactive leak.

Time and time again the industry has demonstrated that safety and nuclear power is a contradiction in terms.

On theology and science

He writes: “It is a waste of time to wait for scientists and theologians to agree.”

I say: one doesn’t need to wait for scientists and theologians to agree on the issue of nukes. Because scientists and theologians do agree. The Catholic Bishops Conference stands on the same anti-BNPP ground as that of the geologist Dr. Kelvin Rodolfo of the University of the Philippines’ National Institute of Geological Sciences; the scientists from the successive review panels that have been commissioned by the previous administrations. Perhaps its not about theologians and scientists agreeing but an issue of people using scientific argument only for the purpose of convenience.

Concluding thoughts

Personally I do not only see this as an environmental issue but also a justice issue the BNPP incurred a monster loan of US$ 2.3 billion and some US$ 640 million worth of interest payments, from an initial estimated cost of US$600 million in 1975. That the BNPP has yet to produce a single megawatt of power makes its debt fraudulent, wasteful, and useless. While the government’s accounting books have already cleared the original BNPP debt, these methods of repayment have yet to be examined and successor loans of the BNPP have yet to be identified.

The bill has already indicated that US$ 1 billion is to be raised either by charging consumers an additional 10 centavos surcharge in electricity generation, or by incurring more debts. This is less of a choice than a matter of enslavement – that the people will have to pay either way because the priority of government has always been debt service over social welfare.

Lastly, when all has been said and done there is a human cost to nukes especially in the incidence of a nuclear disaster. The Chernobyl disaster is a grim reminder of the tragic cost of nukes on the lives of people – a cost that they are paying until today.

As I end this response to  Rey Vincent – I remember the account of one of our campaigners when the chief proponent for the BNPP Congressman Mark Cojuangco made a comment that only 60 people died in the Chernobyl catastrophe a comment that caught the ire of a shocked nun who questioned the value that the chief BNPP proponent puts on life.

“Only 60 people died!” she said in shock.

Ultimately, nuclear power is not just about technology or economics, but about what kind of future we want for ourselves and for our children. What kind of future do you want?

Chuck Baclagon

Spotted last Friday (March 21) at 70s Bistro: singer Noel Cabangon and alternative rock and blues band the Jerks performing anti-nuclear standards.  Noel sung “Power” by John Hall, and The Jerks did “Nukleyar.”  Videos of their performance will be distributed as part of a Do-It-Yourself anti-nuclear campaigning kit for communities. Watch this space for the launch.

Nukleyar

Kay rami ng katibayan
Upang ito’y tutulan
Bakit pinagpipilitan
Sa taong bayan
Sadya’y pagkakitaan
Ng mga taksil sa bayan
Kapalit ng buhay
Ng mga mamamayan

No-no-no-no-no-no-no nukleyar
No-no-no-no-no-no-no
Plantang nukleyar

Chernobyl, 3-mile Island
Pagbomba sa Japan
Nagbabantang panganib
Ng meltdown
Pinsala sa kalusugan
Pati sa kalikasan
Isa ang patutunguhan, kamatayan

Ito’y isang kalokohang
Hindi dapat patulan
Kung ayaw mong magsisi sa hulihan
Hindi dapat payagan
Nukleyar kahit saan
Malaking pananagutan
Sa taong bayan

Lea Guerrero

Patrick Moore at the Rockland Business Association's annual meeting

Lobbyists and proponents of the biotechnology, logging and nuclear industries have always cited Patrick Moore, as an example of an environmental activist who has seen ‘the light’.’

Recently Congressman Mark Cojuangco has been quoting Moore, on the issue of nukes and I was wondering if had he not been formerly a part of Greenpeace would his opinion on the issue still count?

I recently stumbled upon this quote from Patrick Moore:

Nuclear power plants are, next to nuclear warheads themselves, the most dangerous devices that man has ever created. Their construction and proliferation is the most irresponsible, in fact the most criminal, act ever to have taken place on this planet.

Patrick Moore, Assault on Future Generations, 1976

Looking at it now, I can’t  help but wonder – did nuclear power all of a sudden become safe? Or is Patrick Moore a liar?

Chuck Baclagon

From Greenpeace: Making Waves

It’s always nice when people agree with you. We’ve maintained that nuclear power is a dangerous distraction to the real solutions to the climate crisis for a long time now. It’s dirty, it’s unsafe, it’s a threat to world peace and it is terribly, terribly expensive.

Now, Al Gore, who’s sometimes been on the other side of this argument has come round to our position. Because, as he notes, even if you assume problems with safety and waste can be overcome, it just doesn’t make sense economically.

Over at our Nuclear Reaction weblog we’ve been chronicling the meltdown of the nuclear industry for a while now. Last year the number of nuclear reactors connected to the world’s electricity grids fell by one. In January this year two more were removed, while the next reactor scheduled to go online is the Iranian build in Bushehr, a project which almost no-one outside Iran wants to see proceed.

Meanwhile China builds a wind turbine every two hours. What looks like the technology of the 21st century to you?

Martin Lloyd

SOMETHING terribly wrong is going on for nuclear power to be considered “clean energy.” Nuclear power is not the solution to climate change and it creates more problems than it purports to solve.

Believers in nuclear power, like Representative Mark Cojuangco, think that climate change is their best argument. Nuclear power, they say, is the only alternative to the dirty coal fuel. But notice how, when they talk about nuclear power, they omit or belittle renewable energy. To admit that renewable energy works (it does) renders nuclear power irrelevant.

The strongest case against nuclear power is safety, a serious concern downplayed by its proponents. They have to. Although the nuclear industry claims that new designs have made a disaster a remote possibility, the reality is that the threat remains.

Compared with other power sources, only nuclear energy can turn entire regions into radioactive wastelands, and cause cancer and mutation that can be passed on to tens of generations.

Clearly, the risks from nuclear energy are real. If disasters are possible, the risk of one happening soon is just as great as it happening later. So, the debate is not whether a nuclear accident can happen (it can), but whether we are ready to face the consequences when it does.

Irresponsible

This concern is deliberately buried in the efforts to revive the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP). While the Cojuangco bill seeking to activate the BNPP has been stalled, attempts to push the measure persist. The congressional numbers game (now at 194) is being used to advance what would be perhaps the most irresponsible legislation ever proposed in the House of Representatives.

What can be worse than reviving a mothballed nuclear plant, inherently unsafe, further judged unsafe by every single study conducted on its premises?

Safe nuclear reactors are a myth. The whole life cycle of a nuclear plant is fraught with danger. Mining, processing, transporting and using radioactive fuel are risky. During operations, radioactive material is discharged into the atmosphere and bodies of water.

Worse, its waste product, plutonium, is more deadly than the fuel. Its deadliness lasts more than 240,000 years, requiring storage with garrison-like security. Plutonium has two particular characteristics: it is of high strategic value for weapons and it is highly radiotoxic. A few kilos are enough for a nuclear weapon and a few micrograms can cause fatal cancer.

A major accident in a light water reactor can cause radioactive releases several times those at Chernobyl and about 1,000 times that caused by a fission weapon. Evacuation can be needed for areas as large as 100,000 square meters (as big as Luzon) and cancer deaths can exceed one million.

The death toll at Chernobyl is not 60. A Belarus study estimates at least 270,000 cancer cases and 93,000 fatalities from cancer in the years that followed the meltdown.

The safety records of the BNPP’s sister plants are shady. A cooling system leak shut down the plant in Slovenia in 2008. No deaths were reported but the incident could have triggered a catastrophe. Nuclear power is thus electricity generation living on the edge.

Costly cleanup

Even without accidents, most radioactive contamination comes from the decommissioning of reactors and leaks from in-storage sites. The Hanford nuclear complex in Washington, USA, is now the site of the biggest environmental cleanup.

The cleanup started in the late 1990s and continues today, costing taxpayers $2 billion a year. Here, the problem of nuclear waste rears its ugly head: scientists cannot stabilize the 55 million gallons of radioactive waste which have leaked into the soil and water. There is no known scientific solution to nuclear waste. The only thing that can be done with the waste is to store it and pray it doesn’t leak in your lifetime.

Take action by clicking on this image!

With such inherent problems, nuclear power is clearly not the energy of choice. Rather, it is the energy of “no choice,” only considered if there is no alternative source of power. After all, who would choose nuclear power – grotesquely expensive and hideously unsafe, whose fuel requires vast amounts of electricity to enrich, whose decommissioning and waste storage each cost more than the plant itself, and whose waste is infinitely more deadly than its fuel – when there are better sources of electricity?

This is the stark reality of nuclear energy that the industry downplays, and which Cojuangco is trying so desperately to sweep under the rug. But at whose expense?

What makes nuclear power so abhorrent to taxpayers is what makes it so attractive to dubious politicians and monopolistic business interests.

This is also why nuclear power can only prevail when these same politicians and business interests devalue renewables. What makes renewable energy undesirable to certain politicians and monopolies is what makes it so beneficial to taxpayers. Renewable energy systems take shorter periods to build, cost less and the fuel (wind and sun) is the sort that can’t be cornered by industry or subjected to anomalous supply contracts.

Deceptive

Nuclear power has been harnessed by other countries, but just because they expose their nations to risks doesn’t mean that we should, too.

The nuclear industry has been trying vainly to shed the disgraceful association between nuclear energy and nuclear weapons programs, building the myth of safe, clean and cheap nuclear power.

Measured against the criteria of reliable, affordable, economically viable, socially acceptable and environmentally sound energy, nuclear power failed on all counts.

Lea Guerrero

Nuclear power in fact undermines climate protection and can only make a negligible contribution to carbon dioxide (CO2) reduction.

The nuclear industry would like us to believe that nuclear power offers a much better option for generating electricity because it does not release significant amounts of greenhouse gases or toxic pollution. However, nuclear power plants are not much of an improvement over conventional coal-burning power plants despite claims that nuclear is the “clean air energy.”

Uranium mining, milling, leaching, plant construction and decommissioning are all energy-intensive activities which produce substantial amounts of greenhouse gases. Taking into account the carbon-equivalent emissions
associated with the entire nuclear life cycle, nuclear plants contribute significantly to climate change and will contribute even more as stockpiles of high-grade uranium are depleted.

Click on the image for more information as to why nuclear is not the answer to climate change

Even assuming that the nuclear industry is the largest carbon-free energy source, as proponents claim, even if the industry quadruples its generating capacity, this would only reduce CO2 emissions from the energy sector by a mere six percent by 2050. Yet to achieve that, 1,300 large reactors would have to be built. That means one reactor every two weeks, starting from today to 2050, with investment costs reaching up to $10 trillion.

Add this to the insurmountable problem of radioactive nuclear waste whose toxicity lasts for 12,000 human generations, and nuclear energy is clearly not the right choice and should definitely not be part of any climate change strategy.

Click here to to download our Briefing Paper entitled Why Nuclear is Not an Answer to Climate Change

Beau Baconguis

]]> http://greenpeacesoutheastasia.wordpress.com/2009/03/05/photos-that-speaks-a-thousands-of-words/ Thu, 05 Mar 2009 12:22:37 +0000 Chuck Baclagon http://greenpeacesoutheastasia.wordpress.com/2009/03/05/photos-that-speaks-a-thousands-of-words/

Photography has always been a powerful tool of communication. It is one of the new media forms that helps change perception and even the structure of society. This is proven by the photo exhibit we put up last Feb 28, 2009 at Malate Church. The exhibit stands with photos of the aftermath of the Chernobyl disaster, taken by a reknown Dutch photographer, Robert Knoth, where the main focus was on people whose lives have changed drastically and dramatically because of nuclear power. As the parishioners viewed the photos, they were captured by the depressing condition of the subjects. They really took time reading the captions while parents explained to their children the grim effects of the nuclear disaster shown in the photos.

Afterwards, we attended a forum on the issue where Tessa De Ryck, Greenpeace Southeast Asia Nuclear Campaigner, is one of the guest speakers. Mr. Roland Simbulan of Nuclear Free Philippines was also there to tackle the history of BNPP and the nuclear energy in general and the reality involve in it. The audience were very attentive and concern about the issue. According to one of our colleagues, people who usually attend this monthly forum leave early but this crowd really stayed until the end. They asked a lot of questions like how other countries with nuclear power plants store their wastes, what are the alternative sources of energy to fight the impending energy shortage and what can they do to stop the House Bill 4631 (the bill proposed by Rep. Mark Cojuangco that will revive the BNPP).

I hope that as the photo exhibit travels we also gain opportunities like this to communicate to the public the issue of nuclear energy. Who knows, maybe in one of those sessions one of the congressmen who signed the bill or Mark Cojuangco himself attend and be enlightened on the reality and danger of their propose solution to climate change.

Click here for more images

A.C. Dimatatac

“Not in our backyard!” was the common sentiment of the mass that gathered in the prayer rally against the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant.

Under normal circumstances no one would bathe in the heat of noon. Noontime here in the Philippines temperatures rise to almost 30+ degrees celsius, no one who’s in their right mind would expose themselves in such heat – not unless there’s a truly legitimate reason for it. That may be the case for the people of Bataan.

Considering the fact that their hometown, the place where they live and earn a living and raise up their families under threat from the so-called ‘monster of Morong,’ all because of a handful of politicians railroading the operationalization of a derelict nuclear power plant in a geologically active area. That would explain why scorching afternoon heat had little effect on detering the already determined people of Bataan from voicing out their cry against nukes.

As I stand in the middle of this crowd under the blazing afternoon sun. I feel at one with them in their cry against nukes.

Click here to read an interesting editorial piece about the prayer rally in Bataan

Chuck Baclagon

Here is a song dedicated to Rep. Mark Cojuangco and other members of the House of Representatives who seem hellbent on railroading the HB 4631 calling for the revival of the Monster of Morong – the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant at to tune of $1 Billion.

The song “Power” written by soft rocker and now New York Congressman John Hall became the anthem of the no nukes movement in the late 70s. With eerie prescience, the song was released three weeks before the meltdown at Three Mile Island in 1979. “Power” addressed the urgent need for renewable energy sources – 27 years ago.

John Hall helped organized the Musicians for Safe Energy (MUSE), which staged five huge anti-nukes concerts in New York, drawing 300,000 people to hear Hall, James Taylor, Carly Simon, Bruce Springsteen, Jackson Brown, Bonnie Raitt and others. MUSE denounced nuclear reactors and demanded a green future.

The video shows the last part of the No Nukes Concert where MUSE sang together “Power”.

Here is the lyrics of song with later verses added to the original made by the classic folk group Peter, Paul and Mary.

POWER (John Hall)

Just give me the warm power of the sun
Give me the steady flow of a waterfall
Give me the spirit of living things as they return to clay
Just give me the restless power of the wind
Give me the comforting glow of a wood fire
But won’t you take all your atomic poison power away

Everybody needs some power I’m told
To shield them from the darkness and the cold
Some may seek a way to take control when it’s bought and sold

I know that lives are at stake
Yours and mine of our descendants in time
There’s so much to gain and so much to lose
Everyone of us has to choose

Just give me the warm power of the sun
Give me the steady flow of a waterfall
Give me the spirit of living things as they return to clay
Just give me the restless power of the wind
Give me the comforting glow of a wood fire
But won’t you take all your atomic poison power away

We are only now beginning to see
How delicate the balance of nature can be
The limits of her ways have been defined
And we’ve crossed that line

Some don’t even care and know what we’ll pay
But we have seen the face of death in our day
There’s so little time to change our ways
If only we together can say

Beau Baconguis

I didn’t reply because I was sickened by those bright people. Who in his right mind, with even the slightest shred of decency, would think that this kind of messages, on forum sites for all to see, is actually making up a discourse? Maybe you can tell, and I’m upset about it.

Getting apathetic or resigning comments is really upsetting. It makes me wonder. How can they not see the problem? How can they just let Rep. Mark Cojuangco say everything is going to be fine with reviving BNPP? That’s rather like a cook saying to the lobster, “relax, the stove and pot will be just fine.”

Truly, I despair at such resignation.  The fact that I have recently been attacked by bad comments containing the worst type of messaging as a prelude to a cyber discourse, that many witnessed the willingness of people in high positions to push a sordid bill that should never be tolerated, doesn’t help.

It is going to be a lot of pain for all of us if the bill makes it. BNPP will definitely push the start button of our countdown to extinction. Right now, we should allow intellect to overrule anger because it knows that what we do does make a difference. There is no excuse for not doing something to prevent its being worse. So, to the we-can-do-nothing-about-it advocates and the nay-sayers, I have something to say. I refuse to resign. And I know a lot who refuses, too, because there will always be something within us, something immutable about the human spirit, that refuses to give up. If you don’t want to help stop the BNPP’s revival then get the hell out of the way of those of us who do.

- Jenny Tuazon

There was a certain kind of chill in the air as I walked in the still empty campus of the University of the Philippines (U.P.), it was still 5:30 in the morning, the sun’s not yet up and there was no one there lest for the occasional jogger or cyclists.

But as I got nearer to the meeting area for Greenpeace volunteers I was surprised to see that the registration booths, the banners and the markings on the ground for the ‘human banner’ was already up, and that’s why by the time the dawn cracked and sunlight beamed on the dew laden lawn of the U.P. Sunken Garden all was already prepared.

Later we were joined from groups belonging to the Network Opposed to BNPP (Bataan Nuclear Power Plant) which is a network of progressive organizations, social movements, academics, progressive legislators, human rights advocates, ecologists, media people, church workers, consumers movements & activists involved in preventing the immediate rehabilitation and operation of the defective Bataan Nuclear Power Plant in Morong.

Within a few minutes people were already being gathered to form the giant human banner that spelled out our message: “NO TO BNPP”.

You can view the images of the photo protest by clicking the image

The human banner was done as a message of solidarity with the people of Bataan who are against the use of dangerous nuclear power. Apart from the human banner we also asked the people to have their photos taken at the picture protest booth, we also asked them to write solidarity messages to a banner that we will be bringing tomorrow at an anti-nukes march organized by the Roman Catholic Church in Bataan.

The measure to revive the BNPP is currently being debated at the House Committee on Appropriations after it passed the Committee on Energy headed by Cong. Mikee Arroyo, a co-author of the bill. Critics have noticed the undue haste with which the bill is proceeding in Congress.

Hopefully this action will in its own little way help turn the tide in the debate.

If you want to see all the photos from the event please do visit our Flickr photo stream by —>clicking here<—

Chuck Baclagon

• Greenpeace International Nuclear Reaction weblog has publish an interesting quote from him.
• Also there is Philippine Greens’ Roberto Verzola’s fascinating series of posts about Cong. Cojuangco and in his blog.

Enjoy =)

Chuck Baclagon

With all that online chatter about BNPP and nukes suddenly the prospect of a nuclear holocaust no longer seems far-fetched. You can accuse me of exaggerating, but absorbing that idea was difficult as hoping in the face of the mushroom-shaped cloud.

It wasn’t really surprising on my part to know that many people believe that nuclear power can and will make a great contribution to our energy supply, that it will harness the future of energy source in the Philippines. I have long been gone talking to people on street about nuclear technology – its cost, waste, and proliferation – when I was still doing direct dialogue work couple of months ago. I remember the first time I approached a pro-nukes guy on street, my blood immediately rushed to my head when he told me that nukes is the Philippines’ energy messiah.  His cards were these: Nuclear power stations have been built all over the world and many more are planned; Fast reactor means that supplies of uranium will last much longer; nuclear power stations use vastly less fuel to produce electricity than the fossil fueled power stations, with less immediate effect on the environment, and; we will live comfortably all the years ahead because of the sweet promise of nukes.

On the face of it, nuclear power SEEMS to be the answer to our energy problems. But wait, let’s take a closer look. Natural uranium is safe to handle but nuclear power is not as simple as it seems. Nuclear fission gives off dangerous radiation which is fatal. Can we just forget the Chernobyl nuclear reactor disaster in 1986? Hell no. It was very catastrophic that even the next generation, or the next, will be informed about that.

At the moment it is thought that the best method would be to amalgamate the waste with glass and bury it in remote parts or even if they can make equipment very safe, we can never completely eliminate the factor of human error. We can never ensure that an accident cannot take place. The pro-nukes guy still clutched to what he believes in. He said all he wanted was to live a life of comfort and that he’s not an activist to start with. What dropped out of my mouth was this, “choosing revolution is not about being willing to give up your life, but being willing to give up your comfort” (thanks, Alice Walker).

Many conversations like this followed which made me learn 3 things to perhaps handle the blood rush: teach, explain but never debate. Teach and cite the facts you know. Explain the facts and say your stand. Lastly, never debate on things like nukes because nuclear power is the answer to a very stupid question, not the solution to climate change whatsoever.

Philippines is a third world country for crying out loud. It would be a mistake for developing countries like ours to go down a path which has ended in economic, political and social failure in some countries. There is only a finite amount to spend for new energy, thus investments in nukes is money denied to renewables. With about 50 years of failure and still no solutions to its basic problems, nuclear power remains an utterly poor choice. If our government would still push their rehabilitation plan for BNPP to eventually revive it, it would be right for me to conclude that they are just clutching at straws. This is just a bandwagon we cannot afford to jump in. We can never count on nuclear power solving our energy problems.

- Jenny Tuazon

“The nuclear industry has hitched a ride on the climate change bandwagon, proclaiming that nuclear power will solve the world’s global warming and energy problems in one sweeping “nuclear renaissance.” As you might expect, there’s a catch. Nuclear energy faces escalating capital costs, a radioactive waste backlog, security and insurance gaps, nuclear weapons proliferation, and expensive reactor decommissioning that will magnify the waste problem.”

- Rex Weyler

It wasn’t ancient history when the image of my then 3-year old nephew sporting a ‘No Nukes’ button, was something that puzzled my relatives. That was during the late-1980s, I was grade 2 at the time and my nephew’s parent’s were part of the broad movement of concerned Filipinos who opposed the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP).

Flashback – BNPP
It was during the administration of the late President Marcos that the construction of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP) started in 1977 at Napot site in Morong, Bataan, nine kilometers from the volcano Mt. Natib situated between the Philippine Fault and the West Luzon Fault, at a cost of US$2.2 billion.

After the 1979 Three Mile Island accident in the US, the BNPP construction was immediately stopped. An inquiry on the plant’s safety revealed 4,000 defects. “…Mr. Marcos and his nuclear advisers may well be long remembered for having put up the most expensive and dangerous nuclear power plant in the world, thereby saddling present and future generations of Filipinos with enormous foreign loans…,” according to former Senator Lorenzo Tanada, on August 6, 1983.

Marcos was overthrown by the People Power Revolution in 1986. Days after the April 1986 Chernobyl disaster, the succeeding administration of President Corazon Aquino decided not to operate the plant. Among other considerations taken were the strong opposition from Bataan residents and Philippine citizens.

The newly installed Aquino administration decided to “mothball” the plant, pursue court action against Westinghouse, and form a Cabinet Committee on the BNPP to study options and alternatives. Government’s decision to “mothball” the BNPP was a victory for the people of Bataan and for the coalition that worked on the issue, the victory against the BNPP also paved the way for still another coalition to take on the struggle for the removal of US military bases in the Philippines.

R.I.P. – BNPP
Today, we stand here again at the front of the Philippine House of Representatives with an 8-foot tall tombstone with the words “R.I.P. BNPP” at the entrance of the Philippine House of Representatives compound in Batasan Hills. The activity was meant to send a message to lawmakers not to revive the mothballed Bataan Nuclear Power Plant and not to pursue the path of nuclear power which we contend is grotesquely expensive and based on faulty economics.

Later I dugged-up our old tape deck and listened to a cassette tape entitled – No Nukes: The Muse Concerts For a Non-Nuclear Future – a 1979 triple live album that contained selections from the September 1979 Madison Square Garden concerts by the Musicians United for Safe Energy collective, with Jackson Browne, Graham Nash, Bonnie Raitt, and John Hall being the key organizers of the event and guiding forces behind the album.

As I listened a line from Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are A-Changin’”  (as performed by James Taylor, Carly Simon and Graham Nash), caught my fancy. The line says:

“Come senators, congressmen
Please heed the call…”

- Chuck Baclagon