Prague - Most ministers in the new technocratic cabinet of Prime Minister Jiri Rusnok are in favor of carrying out the expansion of the Temelin nuclear plant, Aktualne.cz has learned.
Industry Minister Jiri Cienciala will meet this week with senior officials of Czech semi-state company CEZ that operates Temelin, in order to learn what is the current situation.
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"If there is a better energy source, let's use it, but at this moment we do not have anything better, - just look at how have renewable energy sources fared here," said Cienciala in reference to the so-called solar boom.
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Transport Minister Zdenek Zak is also in favor of nuclear energy. "The main reason for me is the fact that the energy sector will determine which places will be prosperous and which won't - and we should want to be in an island of prosperity," said Zak, adding that the Czech Republic may increase its influence in Europe by exporting energy.
Environment Minister Tomas Podivinsky, who visited the Temelin nuclear plant on his first day in office, is also among the proponents of the expansion.
"A nuclear plant is a clean, carbon-less source of electric energy, and that's why I support it. I visited Temelin as my first official trip outside Prague on purpose, symbolically... I have been interested in this issue for more than 15 years, and it is very important to me that our country achieves a raw material, energy and economic - and, in effect, political - independence in the long term," said Podivinsky in an interview with the HN daily.
"I have a positive stance on Temelin," said Health Minister Martin Holcat.
Culture Minister Jiri Balvin, Foreign Minister Jan Kohout, Interior Minister Martin Pecina, Defense Minister Vlastimil Picek and Regional Development Minister Frantisek Lukl are also in favor of the construction of the third and the fourth reactors at the Temelin plant.
