Report on the court process regarding the data related to Nuclear Power Plant’s Damage Control Measures

The court proceeding at the Metropolitan Court continues between Energy Club and the National Atomic Energy Agency’s Nuclear Safety Directorate (OAH-NBI). Press was present in great numbers, unfortunately no decision was made yet.

During the previous hearing, Paks Power Plant Rt. joined the respondent. The Power Plant proposed to ban the public from the court proceedings but the judge ruled against it. The legal counsel of Paks Power Plant asked for the rejection of the claimant’s petition, saying that the required data are trade secrets or fall under the protection of copyright laws, thus they cannot be considered public data. Furthermore the Shareholding company is not within the scope of the data protection act. They are required to publicize data within the scope of the Nuclear Act, which is done through their public information brochures. According to their opinion they do not have to comply with the Environmental act either, since they are required to operate according to the nuclear authorities’ procedural regulations. Energy Club wanted to acquire the calculations and measurements according to which the respondent decided that the removal of the fuel cells did not pose unacceptable levels of risk and gave permission for the discharge of the fuel cells.

Share

Related articles

Profit-making through FOI?

A draft bill on the re-use of public sector information submitted to the Hungarian Parliament by the government would make the national FOI legislation highly unpredictable - according to the HCLU and K-Monitor, major Hungarian NGOs working for transparency and freedom of information. The proposal intends to harmonize Hungarian freedom of information legislation with the EU law by implementing the 2003/98/EC Directive on the re-use of public sector information. The latter is to be revised soon, due to a proposal of the European Commission. The HCLU and K-Monitor ask legislative authorities to withdraw their draft proposal due to the following reasons.

Whistleblower Protection in Central and Eastern Europe

K-Monitor Association and the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union organized a project on Legal Regulation of Public Interest Disclosures in Post-Soviet Democracies. The two Hungarian NGOs created a virtual conference on whistleblowing protection with an interactive discussion surface in English as well as an online content in form of this website. For the implementation of the “virtual conference”, K-Monitor and HCLU also invited NGOs working in the field of anti-corruption from Bosnia, Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, Poland, Moldova and Hungary to take part in the project.

Government agrees to back mega-project in Hungary despite concerns about transparency - Anti-corruption NGOs have turned to Joaquín Almunia

Some of Hungary's major anti-corruption NGOs have turned to EU Competition Commissioner Joaquín Almunia. The NGOs are concerned about a giant project financed with state aid and therefore urged the Prime Minister to immediately suspend the 'murky' 130 mn EUR investment, financed by an EU fund and the Hungarian Development Bank (MFB). Gordon Bajnai, Prime Minister of Hungary finally ordered the Ministry of National Development and Economy to make the feasibility study of the project public.