Stichting Laka

Publicatie Laka-bibliotheek:
Power in Czechoslovakia

Auteur	Frank Leek, Laka
Datum	augustus 1992
Classificatie	2.33.0.00/09 (TSJECHOSLOWAKIJE - ALGEMEEN (tot en met 1992))
Voorkant

INTRODUCTION

LAKA is an environmental organization derived from the antinuclear energy 
movement, and seated in Amsterdam. One of the main objectives of LAKA is 
to collect information about nuclear energy and to make this, in a systematic 
way, accessible to the general public.

For the past few years LAKA has been cooperating with the Czechoslovakian 
environmental organization Children of the Earth. The cooperation concerns among 
others the exchange of information and experience. Because of these relations, at
LAKA the idea rose to allow research to be done about a subject that is important to 
the environmental movement in Czechoslovakia: nuclear energy. In Czechoslovakia 
the question whether nuclear energy should play a greater role in the near future is 
now very current. It appears that there is no unanimous agreement to this question by 
political organizations and the environmental movement. Some people see nuclear 
energy as the only possibility to close down outdated coal power plants and thus 
reduce an important environmental problem: the emission of sulphur-dioxide. Other 
people are convinced that this environmental problem can also be brought to 
acceptable proportions by using more gas and modern coal power plants. Furthermore 
they think that also other alternatives for nuclear energy have to be considered: 
saving, co-generation of heat and power with gas and hydro power.

The Federal Ministry of the Economy, that prepares the energy policy, is an advocate 
of nuclear power. For the energy policy up until 2005, the Ministry sees nuclear 
energy as the energy source for new power generating capacity. Environmental costs 
of coal power plants are not the only consideration for the Ministry, who also 
motivates the choice on the basis of costs, and strategic interests.
This wider motivation for nuclear energy created the necessity of a wider comparison 
(on more issues than environmental effects only) of nuclear energy and alternatives.

After visiting Prague one month this paper is my contribution to such a wider 
comparison. During my stay in Czechoslovakia I got to know different views on the 
energy policy, through talks with activists, researchers and policy makers. Moreover 
these views were shaped by reports and papers about the Czechoslovakian energy 
policy that :I studied. Following the visit to Czechoslovakia my paper was drawn up 
with the cooperation of the instructor (LAKA), my university (Prof. dr. M.J. Ellman) 
and the mediating institute (Wetenschapswinkel ).

De Wetenschapswinkel, literally "the science-shop", is an initiative of the Universiteit 
van Amsterdam (University of Amsterdam). De Wetenschapswinkel brings non-profit 
organizations with a research question into contact with students. In this way these 
organizations are able to let research be carried out at low costs, while at the same 
time students get the chance to acquire research experience.

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