For a document consisting of over 400 pages, the environmental impact assessment for the new Ignalina nuclear power plant in Lithuania is missing some very significant details. Prepared by Pöyry Energy Oy in Finland and the Lithuanian Energy Institute, the report has some rather large holes in it, as Greenpeace has discovered…

1) Most surprisingly, the report gives no details on what model of reactor is to be built. Given that reactor waste produced in a year can range between 47 and 370 tons, depending on the model of reactor, fundamental and accurate assessments of environmental impact cannot be made.

2) Any discussion of the impact of nuclear waste and how it would be dealt with and managed is missing from the report.

3) The construction timetable is completely unrealistic. As we’ve seen with the reactor building at Flamanville, France and Olkiluoto, Finland, tight deadlines have lead to poor safety regulation and incompetence which only lead to schedules and budgets over-running.

4) The report boasts that migrant workers will boost the local economy. It fails to mention that this benefit will only last until the short-term construction period is over.

5) Viable alternatives to nuclear power are ignored. The report goes as far to say that without a new nuclear plant, Lithuania will be forced to increase it’s reliance on fossil fuels.

6) The risk to the tens of thousands of people living near the plant have not been considered. Research into the correlation between proximity to nuclear reactors and instances of cancer have been ignored.

7) The affects of a nuclear accident are played down by the report.

These are fundamental questions that need to be asked about the construction of any nuclear power plant. Why were they left out? Did Pöyry Energy Oy and the Lithuanian Energy Institute do it in a rush like a school kid who’s left his homework until the last minute? We’ve all done a poor job sometimes, when we’re tired or demotivated or it’s Friday afternoon, but then most of us aren’t building nuclear power stations.

Again, we can only assume that these omissions are due to the fact that Pöyry Energy Oy and the Lithuanian Energy Institute are less than confident about the so-called benefits of a new reactor. If they were, why ignore these questions and not answer them fully and transparently?

(The full text of Greenpeace's reaction is available here.)