Peru won’t need to look to nuclear power as an alternative energy source for the foreseeable future thanks to its large hydro-electric potential and natural gas reserves, President Alan Garcia said. He also said the country could consider banning the energy source.
“Having so much hydro-energy, gas and oil resources, Peru can today make a commitment for the next 100 years or so to be free from that threat, even more so because of being a seismic country,” state news agency Andina reported Garcia as saying.
“Peru has its Cordillera from the Andes and rains and can generate a vast amount of electric energy, the cleanest, non-polluting, blue energy that doesn’t endanger anyone,” he added. “And it has its gas reserves that will increase with exploration.”
Garcia said he will discuss with his cabinet the possibility of sending to Congress a bill that would ban the development of nuclear energy in Peru.
“This should be analyzed and take advantage of the immediate experience to make decisions that will benefit those that we will not see, the next generations. And Peru will be an example in the world, perhaps the only country that declares itself free from atomic [energy] production,” he said.
Garcia’s comments follow concerns over a meltdown at Japan’s Fukushima power plant. The plant, located in northern Japan close to the epicentre of a magnitude-9.0 earthquake, was damaged by an ensuing tsunami.
Nuclear power is dangerous, especially in earthquake prone areas. But for President Garcia to say that hydro-energy “doesn’t endanger anyone” is ignorant at best.
Many people have been killed due to dams bursting during earthquakes. Earthquakes can also be induced by dams. There are over 100 cases of earthquakes that scientists believe were triggered by reservoirs due to the water pressure created in the micro-cracks and fissures in the ground under and near a reservoir.
The most serious may be the 7.9-magnitude Sichuan earthquake in May 2008, which killed an estimated 80,000 people and was linked to the construction of the Zipingpu Dam.