“In less than one minute I’m on the other side of the fence, I follow the road on the ‘cold zone’ and walk to the gate.” Anja Hermans, a Belgian environmental activist, discovered it was duck soup to get on the premises of the nuclear power plant at Doel near Antwerp. She wrote down her observations, took pictures and warned the authorities, trying to blow the whistle on the sloppy safety of the nuclear site. Owner Electrabel however went out of its way to try to ignore her warnings.
“I climb back over the fence and start to doubt the existence of a security system to protect the outer ’cold zone’ against intruders. Given the fact that I’m walking here, while safety guards and police patrols are driving somewhere on the other side of the fence, it’s hard to think otherwise.” After trespassing on the outer perimeter of the nuclear site, Hermans found her way to the most essential nuclear facilities within three days of inspection.
Entering nuclear sites in Belgium had been done before. In 2002 the plant at Doel, situated on the left bank of the river Scheldt near the harbour of Antwerp, was visited by Greenpeace activists, who climbed a cooling tower to show a banner saying ‘Stop nuclear power’. What makes Hermans’s unsolicited visits to the nuclear site so alarming, is their sheer number, the situation she encountered and the ensuing indifference on the part of Electrabel.
Hermans (then 27) gained access by jumping over a ditch and climbing over a fence, by crawling through a sewer, by simply walking through the main gate, by wading through the water of the Scheldt and by crawling through a hole in the fence. All in all she managed to walk on the site for as many as twelve times before she was actually arrested. Considering the frequently repeated claim by the nuclear industry that protection against intruders is a top priority, one would expect authorities to be on high alert and show immediate and adequate response on trespassing. Hermans’s exploratory walks demonstrated just the opposite.
Although already on her first visit to Doel safety guards addressed her and asked her what she was looking for, her noticed presence went without consequences for about five months. This is all the more surprising because Electrabel knew her identity from the very first day of her nuclear tour. Guards drove her with a mini-van to the plant itself in order to copy the documentation she had with her. Next police drove her to her temporary address in Doel to check her passport.
Being an ex-convict, one would assume her presence to make authorities much more apprehensive than they turned out to be. Hermans is a former Animal Liberation Front activist, who had already spent four years in prison for violent acts and arson when she started her observations at Doel. When finally police did bring her in for serious questioning, Hermans was not detained, nor was her camera confiscated or were her pictures destroyed. After taking down her statement, the police sent her home.
Hermans on her part, had started to warn the authorities on the low level of security measures and physical barriers at the nuclear plant long before her actual arrest. Each time security guards and police officers ran into her at the site, she openly discussed her findings, expressing her worries. Much to her surprise the safety guards did not even try to deny the poor protection of the outer zone. They simply stated this perimeter was considered an ‘unimportant’ boundary. This was also confirmed by Electrabel when Hermans was invited at Doel headquarters for an interview and officials described the cold zone as a ‘public‘ space.
Walking about, the first thing that struck Hermans was the fact that the outer fence was not electrified. Moreover, Hermans observed several holes in it, some cut deliberately and covered by corrosion, thus pointing to a long neglect of maintenance and other intruders. Along the fence she found grass and reeds standing high, providing trespassers excellent cover, as did the many trees and bushes on the outer perimeter.
With no lights on the fields at the far end of the grounds, she could easily reach the inner enclosure around the nuclear facilities in pitch dark. Most of the time Hermans found the gates standing wide open during the day and some part of the evening. And most of the time the security cabin at the entrance was empty. When she interviewed a courier who brought deliveries to the plant on a regular basis, he declared his car was seldom checked.
During day time she could walk or even ride a bike on the cold zone without being interviewed by security personnel. Hermans decided to try their alertness and procedures. She walked along the fence one evening, waiting to be addressed by a security guard. While talking to the patrol, two other activists crawled through one of the unprotected sewers to walk around on the premises of the nuclear plant. Apparently the personnel wasn’t properly trained to avoid such easy pitfalls. On one occasion it took 60 minutes for guards, who had noticed her presence on security camera’s, to act upon it.
The two cooling towers at Doel take their water directly from the Scheldt. According to Hermans the facility for water intake is poorly protected and could be damaged or destroyed easily by explosives or a bomb attack. The biggest vulnerability of Doel, which has a yearly production of 22 billion Kwh, lies however in the nuclear waste which is stored in buildings above ground, while other chemical waste is lying in bins stacked against the fence around the ‘warm zone’. Doel will only start building underground storage facilities from 2025; building underground storage for low level radioactive waste might start somewhere between 2015 and 2020.
Doel had been subjected to a safety audit by the Belgian federal agency for nuclear control (FANC) in 2004. Controls were executed after signs of a ‘possible degradation of safety culture’. Internal reorganisation had resulted in ill-defined decision procedures. Questions on safety posed by experts were not answered on time or answers showed a lack of quality. FANC came up with a list of improvements. This led to an action plan issued by Electrabel in January 2005, proposing clearer definitions of tasks and responsibilities, as well as a more rigorous execution of safety rules. Hermans started her first observation on July 2, 2007 and was arrested in November 2007. It took about two years before Hermans was indicted by Electrabel.
Her conviction in February 2007 for ‘malicious affectation’, sentencing her for eight months imprisonment, led to protests in the Belgian press, calling the verdict “ridiculous“. While the lengthy report Hermans had written about her findings at Doel was published by Friends of the Earth and Indymedia.be, several political parties like the Belgian green party, openly declared to support Hermans, calling the court’s verdict an example of prejudiced, “class justice“. They argued Electrabel should take Hermans’s actions, focused on raising awareness, more serious. Hermans, still free, has filed an appeal against her conviction, but it may take another year before she has to appear before a higher court.
With her appeal still pending, Hermans who writes for Indymedia.be, now faces new trouble. The police has been harassing her several times lately, trying to force her to turn over her press card to the police. Until now, Hermans has refused to comply with their request.
Electrabel claims all is safe and sound at Doel and always has been, although any aircraft can fly over Doel and any one can study the site on Google maps. Nonetheless, at the nuclear site trees have been trimmed, holes in the fence have been repaired and grids now protect sewers. In March 2009 security guards addressed a journalist who walked about with a video camera, checking the fence. After 30 minutes.
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Pictures made by Hermans at Doel can be found in her report. Go to ‘download (word document)’ under the story ‘Electrabel sleurt milieuactiviste Anja Hermans voor de rechter’.
