The Rainbow Warrior III of the Greenpeace environmental organization went off the coast of Cotentin Friday for an action in front of the site of the future nuclear power plant Flamanville in the Channel, where the NGO denounced "pollution of nuclear waste" and the "fiasco" of the EPR project.
A banner "EPR: the fiasco"
The flagship of Greenpeace arrived around noon in the waters of Flamanville, where he stayed half an hour, noted an AFP photographer who was on board. On the Rainbow Warrior III, the militants hung a banner on which was written "EPR: the fiasco".
Party of Cherbourg, the Rainbow Warrior III led at 9 am a first action in front of the nuclear waste reprocessing plant of Orano, ex-Areva, in La Hague before heading to the EPR site, announced Greenpeace France in a statement. For Greenpeace, it was "to recall the failure of the nuclear industry in France and the EPR whose cost has almost tripled, which was to start in 2012, which is now scheduled for 2022 and which will probably not be" According to Yannick Rousselet, campaigner on nuclear issues for Greenpeace France, by telephone to AFP.
>> INQUIRY - Will the Flamanville EPR see the light of day?
Against the discharges at sea of nuclear waste
In La Hague, the boat made a "stop at the exhaust pipe of the Orano reprocessing plant, to protest the release of radioactive substances into the sea," the NGO said. The environmental activists deployed pneumatic boats, in which they spread yellow banners that read "nuclear pollution" with arrows pointing to the waters, and "nuclear waste: it overflows".
"The nuclear industry produces radioactive waste en masse, but what is less known is that it also discharges the waste of its radioactive and chemical activities along the French coast," said Yannick Rousselet, quoted in the press release. The NGO wanted to denounce "dirty energy, which also contaminates the oceans", and show that it "continues to get involved in the public debate" after its legal setback last month against Orano's subsidiaries.
Prohibition to approach
In late July, the Paris court temporarily banned Greenpeace France to approach within 250 meters convoys "transport and transport of materials or waste nuclear or radioactive" two subsidiaries of Orano. The ban applies to all members of the NGO and persons under its authority and runs until 25 September. The Orano plant "throws thousands of liters of nuclear waste on a permanent basis and is a sting on the issue of nuclear waste in France," said Yannick Rousselet.