Tampa Bay Business Journal
Fri, Oct 31 1997
Construction of a nuclear power plant in Cuba could be restarted as soon as next year, putting Florida residents and businesses squarely in the path of potential radioactive fallout.
To stem the possibility of catastrophe, Congress recently approved a $3 million-plus "early warning" system that would monitor any radioactive releases from the plant, located on Cuba's southern coast about 180 miles south of Key West.
And U.S. Senators Bob Graham, D-Miami Lakes, and Connie Mack, R-Cape Coral, have co-sponsored legislation that would cut U.S. funding that is funneled through the International Atomic Energy Agency to the Cuban nuclear effort.
"We don't want to be alarmist because there is not an imminent threat, but we want to keep a close eye on the situation and take appropriate steps to prepare for it," said Robert Filippone, the national security advisor on Graham's staff in Washington, D.C. Construction of two Soviet-designed nuclear reactors near Juragua, Cuba, began in 1983 to help offset Cuba's heavy dependence on imported oil, but was suspended in 1992 because of financial constraints. To date, nearly $1 billion has been spent on the plant, according to the U.S. General Accounting Office. An estimated $750 million will be needed to complete the job.
Although Cuba has announced that the project will be postponed indefinitely, an official of the Ministry of the Russian Federation for Atomic Energy told GAO officials last February that Russia intends to resume the construction of the Juragua plant in 1998 with financing provided by an international consortium of countries, including Russia.
U.S. government concerns over the Cuban plant center on the quality of the civil construction completed to date, the lack of a regulatory organization and the adequacy of operator training. In addition, there is some evidence, based on a recent visit by an NBC camera crew to the site, that both the equipment and the structure itself have not been properly protected from the corrosive Caribbean air.
The nuclear reactors in Cuba pose a threat because they "are not being built to Western standards" and are based on "untested designs," according to Gene Aloise, assistance director of energy resources and science issues for the GAO.
"If there is an accident, there could be problems," he said. But he stressed that, at the present time, "These reactors are not built, and there is no nuclear fuel for them."
Studies by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have shown that an accidental release of radioactivity from the Cuban nuclear plant would cover Florida almost entirely. In addition, the contamination would travel as far north as Washington, D.C., and as far west as Texas.
"The entire United States could be covered by some of the radioactivity," Aloise said.
In response to the Cuban nuclear threat, the Pentagon's 1998 appropriations bill, recently passed by Congress, includes between $3 million and $5 million for the Caribbean Radiation Early Warning System, or CREWS. The system will include several radiation sensors in Florida and other states along the Gulf of Mexico.
"The primary objective of the CREWS system is to create an early warning system that would provide timely data for emergency preparedness in the event of a catastrophic radioactive release," Aloise said. "It would also establish a regional monitoring network capable of detecting activity that could be a precursor of larger operational problems."
The legislation introduced in July by senators Graham and Mack is aimed at keeping U.S. funding out of the Cuban nuclear power effort, although the U.S. government will continue to fund safeguards at the site through its contributions to the International Atomic Energy Agency, an organization that has promoted the peaceful use of nuclear energy since 1958.
"We have supported some of the (IAEA) efforts to make the Cuban plant safe during its dormancy in recent years, but we don't want more money going into this to get the plant up and running," said Filippone, the Graham staffer.
GAO requests to review documents outlining the Cuban plant's ability to cope with a nuclear accident have been denied by IAEA, which says it must receive approval from the Cuban government to release the documents. Such approval has not been granted.
According to the State Department, all of Cuba's nuclear facilities are subject to safeguards under legally binding agreements between IAEA and Cuba. From 1963 through 1996, IAEA spent $12 million on nuclear technical assistance projects for Cuba, according to the GAO. The agency recently approved an additional $1.7 million for nuclear technical assistance in Cuba for 1997 through 1999.
Last year, the United States contributed more than $16 million, or about 30 percent, of the $53 million in the IAEA's nuclear assistance fund.
Dillon is a reporter for the Orlando Business Journal, a sister publication.
Copyright 1997, Tampa Bay Business Journal. All rights reserved.