In the past week, there was an opening of a Nuclear Power Plant in Mersin Akkuyu. Indicating that it would cover up to 10% of Turkey’s electricity supply, we heard many positive things being declared about this power plant. Being a professional in the energy sector and running these kinds of facilities for a long time and as well as a typical patriot, I’d like to share with you some questions that this topic raises for me.

 

First, I’ll start with the most critical questions:

 

*Nuclear Waste

Countries that have power plants have a serious amount of nuclear waste that spreads radiation, which gets buried metres deep into the ground to be isolated. What will they do with the nuclear waste in Mersin Akkuyu?

 

*Waste Heat

There is an immense amount of waste heat that comes out of nuclear power plants. This waste is then transferred to the sea where the nuclear power plants are generally based and this procedure is constantly continued with the transferring of heat. For this reason, the flora in the sea is immensely damaged. As the water is severely warmed from the waste, the creatures that live in the sea struggle to stay alive. Infact I know that in the USA, there are nuclear power plants that were shut down purely for this reason. In order to reduce the permanent effects of damage, what are the measures they are thinking of putting into place?

 

*National Security

In one of our seIect regions in the Mediterranean, we are depending on another country to run the nuclear power plant in Mersin. Infact, it’s quite obvious that from time to time, we suffer conflicts of interest with this super power neighbouring country. Will we be left in a difficult situation economically and strategically if we have a power plant like this under their control?

 

*Accident Risk

My mother’s side is from the Black Sea. The people from this region suffered a lot already due to the Chernobyl disaster. There was a huge explosion of people that died from cancer. We all lived through this painful experience. Even the perfectionist Japanese couldn’t estimate the Tsunami risk involved with the Fukushima. An accident that stems from a nuclear power plant has the same effect of destroying everything as does a plane accident. The chance of surviving is very minimal. Even if you were to survive, the damage left to the human body is quite severe. Although they have indicated that the Mersin nuclear power plant has a very low possibility to having an accident, if an accident was to happen, have they estimated what the cost of this pain and anguish would be?

Now, I’d like to express the other questions that I have on my mind:

 

*Cost

What is the cost for this nuclear power plant? How much renewable energy in MW strength (sun, wind, bioenergy, biogas, biomass, biofuel, geothermal, wave, flow etc) can be installed with the size of this investment?

 

*Government Financial Incentive

What is the guaranteed financial incentive given by the government? If this incentive is higher than the financial incentive given to renewable energy, should we take this as renewable energy being a second preference to nuclear?

 

*Safety of the Power Plant

God forbid a missile is thrown over to us from a neighbouring country, do we have a shield protection system in place? Are there any precautionary measures in place for interventions that may come from the outside?

Everyone’s aim is to make the world a more liveable and better place for the coming generations. Sometimes, the things we do with the best of intentions turn out to create problems later. For this reason, we are obligated to ask these questions.

Of course, I’d also like to underline this: the energy we are looking for can be found in abundance in nature. The only thing is, we need to use the correct technologies to use and produce as much energy as we need in the most effective way. Renewable energy, in both an economic and ecological means, does not create and make way for such issues that I have raised in this article. For this reason, my personal suggestion is that we never go astray from renewable energies.

 

Take care.

 

This nuclear power plant is run by the same company that will build the plant in Akkuyu: Kalininskaya NGS

Tag: yaşam