Long-distance protest
January 21, 2010
The Federated States of Micronesia, comprising hundreds of tiny islands in the Pacific Ocean, has contacted the government of the Czech Republic to protest plans to modernise a coal-fired power plant. Micronesia says if this and similar projects go ahead, rising sea levels caused by global warming will cause their country to eventually disappear.
Micronesia is more than 12,000 kilometers (7,400 miles) away from the Czech Republic, but using a legal instrument normally reserved for settling regional environmental disputes, the collection of tiny islands has appealed to the Czech Environment Ministry concerning plans by the country's state-owned power utility CEZ to modernize its Prunerov lignite-fired power plant in north-west Bohemia.
A nation about to sink
The Federation says that CEZ's modernization plans do not go far enough to reduce the worldwide CO2 emissions that threaten its very existence. Micronesia was alerted to the plant's existence partly thanks to a long-term publicity campaign against Prunerov by the environmental group Greenpeace.
"Prunerov is one of many coal-fired power stations in the world that contribute to global climate change," Ben Jasper, international projects coordinator at Greenpeace Czech Republic told Deutsche Welle. "It happens to be the 18th largest power station in the European Union, and the largest source of greenhouse gas in the Czech Republic. So, when we heard that there was going to be this inadequate renewal and an extension to the life of the power plant, we found that totally unacceptable."
The letter from Micronesia's Office of Environment and Emergency Management to the Czech Environment Ministry has become front-page news around the world, creating good publicity for Greenpeace, and embarrassing CEZ and the Czech government. Greenpeace says it merely provided information to the Micronesian authorities, but CEZ suspects Greenpeace is orchestrating the whole affair.
CEZ spokesman Ladislav Kriz recently told Czech television, "In our view it's nothing more than a successful Greenpeace publicity campaign. Each week in China a completely new coal-fired power plant starts producing electricity. I think the effect of those plants is far more important than one plant in the Czech Republic."
Micronesia says Prunerov produces about 40 times more carbon dioxide than the whole of Micronesia itself, and wants CEZ to spend more money to reduce CO2 emissions at the plant. Greenpeace has called for the entire plant to be decommissioned by 2015, or at least have its emissions mitigated.
The Czech Environment Ministry is due to announce its recommendations in the weeks to come, although Micronesia's concerns are unlikely to have a major impact on Prunerov's future.
Author: Rob Cameron (bk)
Editor: Rick Demarest