Good acceptance: Public opinion about nuclear energy in Slovenia

Nuclear Training Centre Milan Copic at the Jozef Stefan Institute in Ljubljana is performing extensive public information activities. All the elementary and high schools in Slovenia are invited to visit our permanent exhibition and attend the lecture about the nuclear energy or radioactive waste disposal. In the year 1998 7427 visitors visited us. Most of them are from the 7th and 8th grade of elementary school, age 14 to 15. Every year in the spring we ask several hundred of visitors the same set of questions about their knowledge and opinion about nuclear energy. They are polled before they listen to the lecture or visit the exhibition. In that way we are trying to obtain their opinion based on the knowledge they obtain in everyday life. This paper shows the Result of the 1999 Poll. Comparison of the results with previous years shows stable and steadily improving public acceptance of nuclear energy in Slovenia. The following conclusions can be obtained: Cleanliness of nuclear power is not well understood and should be stressed in information activities; Radioactive waste is still considered as a major problem of our industry and is even gaining on importance; Percentage of people believing that NPP Krsko should operate until the end of its lifetime is high and steady. For the first time we have determined, that almost of people would accept a new nuclear power plant in the country. No correlation between social environment and understanding of nuclear energy could be found. But, relatively favourable public acceptance can change over night. Therefore a permanent information activity is essential