NGOs environment campaign against the new coal fired power plants in the countries of West Balkans is increasing. From Croatia to Bosnia and Serbia NGOs are protesting against the coal TPPs. The coordinator of the campaign “Stop the dirty energy, because the future is renewable”, in front of the Centre for Environment from Banja Luka, Igor Kalaba believes that the citizens of BiH and the whole region should look to the people of Labin, who declared against the construction of coal-fired thermal power plant.
In Labin (Istria) 94 percent of the citizens voted at a local referendum held yesterday against the construction of new thermal power plant of 500 MW. At the referendum, according to unofficial information, came out 36 percent of citizens.
This is the second case in which the local community voted against air pollution and destruction of the environment in Croatia – said Kalaba in a joint ecologists’ statement from Tuzla and Banja Luka.
The coal-fired thermal power plants, according to him, are harmful because of a number of reasons such as climate change, the destruction of human health as well as economic reasons, which shows a worldwide trend to withdraw the two planned for each built thermal power plant.
-Besides, these reasons against new coal thermal power plant with the rapid development of renewable energy and great opportunities to improve energy efficiency, technology and activities in the employ far more people than thermal power plants – said Kalaba.
– We have already argued for years that the Plomin C is economically, environmentally and health damaging project. The citizens did not believe to HEP’s promises that the local community would benefit from Plomin C, but a whopping 94 percent rejected it. This information should not ignore the Government – said Marko Gregovic, head of the energy and climate program “Greenpeace” Croatia.
According to research conducted by IPSOS, published on June 23rd, 2014th, 64 percent of Croatian citizens are also opposed to the coal-fired thermal power plant Plomin C.
This is not the first time that the majority of people voted against environmentally and economically damaging projects in Croatia. In January this year, the citizens of Ploce sent a clear message against the construction of thermal power plants in that place where 90 percent of citizens circled “No” to the question “Are you for the building of the coal-fired thermal power plant in Ploce?”.
– Because of the poor energy efficiency of losing large amounts of electricity, Bosnia and Herzegovina has excellent potential at the same time for development of renewable energy sources – also considers Denis Zisko, coordinator of the campaign “Stop the dirty energy, because the future is renewable”, in front of the Centre for Ecology and Energy from Tuzla.
-Instead of developing new dirty coal-fired thermal power plants, our politicians must finally pay attention to the profession and common sense and reject the plans of dirty energy export that poison our citizens and should turn to the improvement of our life quality and ensure a secure future for the next generation in BiH – concluded Denis Zisko.
