Stop New Nuclear. Blockade of Hinkley Point on 3 October 2011

WHY HINKLEY?

Hink­ley Point, near Bridg­wa­ter in Som­er­set, is the first of eight pro­posed sites for nuclear new build to go ahead. We stopped them here before, and we can do it again. If they fail at Hink­ley, it is unlike­ly the “nuclear renais­sance” will have the momen­tum to con­tin­ue.

The cat­a­stro­phe is still unfold­ing at Fukushi­ma, but the British gov­ern­ment is con­tin­u­ing with its plans for build­ing new nuclear pow­er sta­tions – nuclear new-build. While oth­er coun­tries at least put a mora­to­ri­um on new nuclear, or even make plans to phase out nuclear ener­gy com­plete­ly, in Britain it’s as if Fukushi­ma didn’t hap­pen. Like a mantra, gov­ern­ment and the nuclear indus­try keep repeat­ing that Fukushi­ma could not hap­pen in Britain because there are no earth­quakes of that mag­ni­tude. We heard sim­i­lar excus­es after Cher­nobyl (1986) and Three Mile Island (1979). But nuclear acci­dents can and do hap­pen – even in Britain; the dis­as­ter at Wind­scale in 1957 released mas­sive lev­els of radi­a­tion into the atmos­phere. If we con­tin­ue to use and expand nuclear pow­er, there will cer­tain­ly be more cat­a­stroph­ic acci­dents, not to men­tion all the oth­er enor­mous prob­lems asso­ci­at­ed with nuclear pow­er pro­duc­tion, even when it is work­ing ‘nor­mal­ly’.

NUCLEAR POWER IS NOT NECESSARY, NOT SAFE, NOT SUSTAINABLE

- Nuclear pow­er is not nec­es­sary. Sev­er­al stud­ies, from the gov­ern­men­t’s Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Com­mis­sion to Green­peace and the Cen­tre for Alter­na­tive Tech­nol­o­gy show that Britain can meet is ener­gy needs with­out nuclear, and reduce car­bon emis­sions at the same time.

- Nuclear pow­er is not safe. Acci­dents such as at Three Mile Island, Cher­nobyl, and Fukushi­ma show the poten­tial­ly cat­a­stroph­ic con­se­quences of nuclear pow­er. Numer­ous small­er acci­dents and inci­dents also hap­pen at pow­er sta­tions in Britain: at Wind­scale, Brad­well, Sizewell, and oth­ers.

- Nuclear pow­er is not sus­tain­able. Nuclear pow­er depends on ura­ni­um min­ing, which destroys huge land­scapes and local com­mu­ni­ties liv­ing there. Ura­ni­um itself is a finite resource, and requires huge amounts of ener­gy to be mined.

- Nuclear pow­er is not the answer to cli­mate change. Nuclear pow­er is not as low car­bon as the gov­ern­ment and the indus­try want us to believe. In addi­tion, nuclear pow­er is expen­sive, and takes a long time to build. In short: nuclear pow­er pro­vides too few car­bon reduc­tions, too late, and will divert invest­ment from renew­able, gen­uine­ly low-car­bon forms of ener­gy pro­duc­tion.

- Nuclear pow­er is a threat to our civ­il lib­er­ties. Because nuclear pow­er sta­tions are poten­tial mil­i­tary or ter­ror­ist tar­gets, they pose a threat to our civ­il lib­er­ties. The nuclear police have spe­cial pow­ers, and every­one approach­ing a nuclear pow­er sta­tion can be seen as a poten­tial threat.

For more details, see our web­site at stopnewnuclear.org.uk.

WE CAN STOP NEW NUCLEAR

The gov­ern­ment and the nuclear indus­try want us to believe that nuclear new-build in Britain is a done deal. They want to dis­cour­age us from protest­ing – the mes­sage they want us to swal­low is clear: oppo­si­tion is futile, and we will be going ahead any­way! How­ev­er, that could­n’t be fur­ther from the truth. Yes, the gov­ern­ment has intro­duced a frame­work which effec­tive­ly will sub­sidise new nuclear at our expense – as elec­tric­i­ty con­sumers and tax­pay­ers. Yes, the gov­ern­ment has effec­tive­ly deprived local com­mu­ni­ties from hav­ing a say in the plan­ning process for new nuclear and oth­er major infra­struc­ture projects thus dump­ing a cru­cial cor­ner­stone of local democ­ra­cy.

But nuclear new-build in Britain is already behind sched­ule and has faced legal and oth­er set­backs. Pub­lic con­cern is mount­ing fol­low­ing the Fukushi­ma dis­as­ter. If we can stop the build­ing at Hink­ley, we can stop the whole process. Now is the time to mobilise and take action.

New-nuclear in Britain is far from being a done deal, and we can still stop it!

NEW NUCLEAR — STOP IT AT HINKLEY!

The action: A non-vio­lent block­ade of Hink­ley Point nuclear pow­er sta­tion in Som­er­set

On 3 Octo­ber 2011 we will – with hun­dreds of peo­ple – non-vio­lent­ly block­ade the access to Hink­ley Point nuclear pow­er sta­tion for one day.

While the block­ade will be the key focus, there will be plen­ty of roles and activ­i­ties for peo­ple who do not wish to risk arrest. So every­one who is anti-nuclear can come and join us on the day to express their oppo­si­tion in many dif­fer­ent ways. We will pre­pare our­selves for this block­ade with non-vio­lence train­ing, and we will not be deterred by police try­ing to pre­vent our non-vio­lent action. The block­ade will be inclu­sive, allow­ing peo­ple from all walks of life and with a wide range of expe­ri­ence in non-vio­lent action – or no expe­ri­ence at all – to par­tic­i­pate. We will organ­ise a safe envi­ron­ment for every­one, built on trust for each oth­er, but also on our deter­mi­na­tion to stop nuclear new-build.

In the days before the block­ade, there will be local actions in Bridg­wa­ter. There will be a camp and local accommoda­tion for peo­ple over the week­end and non-vio­lence train­ing will be pro­vid­ed.

More infor­ma­tion at stopnewnuclear.org.uk.

PLEDGES
(All sig­na­to­ries of the pledge will receive a brief­ing pack and be kept informed of the progress of our cam­paign by reg­u­lar email updates)

Blockad­ing pledge
This pledge is for peo­ple who want to join the block­ade of Hink­ley Point on 3 Octo­ber 2011.
Sign the blockad­ing pledge.

Sup­port­ing pledge
This pledge is for peo­ple who want to sup­port the block­ade of Hink­ley Point on 3 Octo­ber 2011, but do not want to risk arrest, or can­not make it to Hink­ley Point on the day.
Sign the sup­port­ing pledge.

Organ­i­sa­tion­al pledge
This pledge is for groups and organ­i­sa­tions that want to sup­port the block­ade of Hink­ley Point on 3 Octo­ber 2011.
Sign the organ­i­sa­tion­al pledge.