Environmental association Zero has sounded the alarm over Portugal’s lack of preparedness for a nuclear accident – the risk of which is “growing all the time” thanks to Spain’s reluctance to mothball its obsolete nuclear plant at Almaraz on the Tejo river, 100 km from the boroughs of Castelo Branco and Portalegre (click here).
Despite an “urgent meeting” called between the two countries’ governments last September, nothing appears to have changed (click here), reports national tabloid Correio da Manha.
Zero’s Francisco Ferreira explains that research should be done to evaluate the “transfrontier impacts” of keeping Almaraz going and siting a nuclear waste dump alongside it.
He also stresses the lack in Portugal of any kind of emergency plan – saying that at the very least health centres and pharmacies near the border should be stocked with iodine tablets, which “protect against radiation”.
Spain is due to discuss these issues early in the New Year, says CM.
