 Italy to start building nuclear reactors in 2013
 On 9 February 2010, the Italian government signed a decree defining criteria and procedures for the construction of nuclear power plants (NPP) in the country by 2020. Construction works are scheduled to start in 2013. The decision follows on from the adoption by the Italian Senate on 10 July 2009 of a bill bringing to an end a ban on the use of nuclear energy that had been in place since 1987.
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| Who said what ? |
 “I do not understand why international financial institutions and development banks do not finance civil nuclear energy projects. The current situation means that countries are condemned to rely on more costly energy that causes greater pollution (…) Therefore, I propose that CO2 credits be used to finance all forms of decarbonised energy under a new global architecture after 2013 (…) The important task today is to send the world a message about our shared determination to make civil nuclear energy a tool for peace, cooperation and prosperity (…) The “quasi-theological opposition” between nuclear energy and renewable resources is out of date.We need both. Of course, nuclear energy cannot reverse climate change on its own, but it will be necessary.” Nicolas Sarkozy, French President at the International Conference on Access to Civil Nuclear Energy in Paris on 8 March.
 “We have heard of revival in the nuclear energy industry for several years. But these words are taken in a special way today because they have past the test of the crisis, (…) Two years ago, when we only started talking of the renaissance of nuclear energy, one could often hear that it was brought about only by a sharp growth of oil prices. But now the situation is different. The price of oil is 70-80 U.S. dollars, not 200, per barrel, as was expected earlier. However leading politicians are talking about the revival of nuclear energy again. And, most importantly, nuclear energy development programmes have not been changed in any of the countries that have announced them.” Sergei Kiriyenko, Head of ROSATOM, at the International Conference on Access to Civil Nuclear Energy in Paris on 8 March.
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Obama pushes nuclear power
 The US President has announced loan guarantees for the country's first nuclear power plants in nearly three decades. Barack Obama is promoting nuclear power as part of his clean energy initiative and economic recovery plan. In January, in his State of the Union address to Congress he had already called for new nuclear power in the country to help curb CO2 emissions.
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Costing the Earth - Fusion Future
 For 50 years nuclear fusion has been touted as the safe, cheap, limitless fuel of the future. In 2010 the future may finally arrive. The Lawrence Livermore Laboratory in the United States is expected this year to fire a laser which will demonstrate, for the first time, more energy coming out of a fusion reaction than has been put in. For many scientists it will be the public proof that all their work has been worthwhile, that the future really does belong to fusion energy. Tom Heap meets the world's top fusion scientists and, from a safe distance, witnesses a fusion reaction taking place.
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| European Nuclear Assembly 2010 |
 Book your hotel now: last week for discount rate
The deadline to be granted a discount rate for a room at the Brussels Marriott Hotel is 16 March. So hurry up and reserve your room now at: http://www.marriott.com/hotels/travel/brudt-brussels-marriott-hotel/
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 Operating efficiency is measured by capacity factor, the ratio of the amount of electricity produced by a plant to the amount of electricity that could have been produced if the plant operated all year at full power. Source: Ventyx / US Energy Information Administration, 2008.
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On 2 March, the Energy Commissioner, Günther Öttinger, said it favoured a European private investor for the completion of the Belene nuclear project in Bulgaria during an international forum on energy security in the Black Sea region. He declared that the EU would lend its support to the country to find one. 
