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COP Parallel Events / Regional Activities - Meeting Details

Event:		Nuclear Energy – Threat to the World – No Solution to Climate Change
Event Type:		Parallel - Montreal
Hosts:		Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS), Sierra Club of Canada, the Heinrich Böll Foundation
Date:		Wednesday, December 7, 2005
Time (local):		1:00 pm - 3:00 pm
Location:		Palais des Congrès de Montréal Room 3
Audience:		General
Speakers:		Felix Matthes, Program Coordinator, Energy and Climate, Öko-Institut, Germany Michael Mariotte, Executive Director, Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS), United States Elizabeth May, Executive Director, Sierra Club of Canada Rebecca Harms, Member of the European Parliament, Alliance 90/ the Greens, Germany Richard Worthington, Earthlife Africa, South Africa José Goldemberg, Secretary for the Environment of the State of Sao Paulo, Brazil Moderator: Jörg Haas, Program Director, Environment, Heinrich Böll Foundation, Germany
For More Information:		info@sierraclub.ca
Description
In 2006, the nuclear disaster of Chernobyl, Ukraine, will have its 20th anniversary. On April 26, 1996, a chain reaction and explosion caused the radioactive contamination of broad regions across Europe. Even today, many areas are heavily affected, and some foods, such as mushrooms and deer, are still contaminated. Recently, nuclear energy is increasingly mentioned in the debate about how to combat climate change. Around the world, advocates of nuclear energy try to win support as a “clean” energy which could replace fossil fuels for energy production to achieve necessary emission reductions. The risks involved with nuclear energy do not weigh in to the envisioned benefits of increased usage of nuclear power: Nuclear power plants cannot considered to be safe; in times of global terrorism, there is no guarantee that enriched uranium from nuclear power plants may end up in dangerous hands; and thirdly, nuclear power remains expensive and not profitable; public investments will rather direct crucial financial support from innovation and deployment of renewable energy technologies, such as wind, solar, or biomass. To counter the advocacy for nuclear energy in the fight against climate change, the Heinrich Böll Foundation publishes a series of issue papers on critical questions of nuclear energy (Nuclear Safety, Nuclear Fuel Cycle, Nuclear and Proliferation, Nuclear Economics, Nuclear and Climate Change) and a summary for policy makers. The issue papers will give a state of the art overview on recent issues and debates on the use of nuclear power in the energy sector but also include some reflections on the history of nuclear power during the last four decades. Together with Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS) and Sierra Club of Canada, the Heinrich Böll Foundation seeks to present these critical questions at COP-11/MOP-11 in Montreal. In this side event, the key results of the papers will be discussed and commented by the co-organizers of the event. It is the goal to reach out to policy makers and civil society organizations at COP11/MOP-1.