All the Paks data are public – according to the court

What environmental impact will two new nuclear power plant blocks have when they are constructed? Who is financing the investment estimated at 2-3 thousand billion forints (!) and how? How will energy consumption needs change in 10 years? All very important questions, answering which should precede a planned nuclear power plant expansion. This also means rationally that realizing the investment depends on these issues, that is, they determine whether such an enormous project is safe, economical and justified. This was the task of the Lévai project launched in 2009.

With regard to the huge costs of the planned project estimated by experts, the ENERGIAKLUB Policy Institute assessed that the process should be public and transparent from the start. Therefore, exercising the right provided by the act on public access to data of public interest, the ENERGIAKLUB requested the most important details of the project from the MVM in January 2011. The MVM refused to disclose the documents claiming that the requested information is considered decision preparation material, and that it contains trade secrets. The ENERGIAKLUB then filed a lawsuit against the company refusing to provide information.

The Metropolitan Court of Budapest accepted the arguments of the ENERGIAKLUB, and issued a verdict stating that all the requested data should be provided (with permission for the MVM to redact details pertaining to technical issues). The (not binding) decision listed the following among data to be disclosed: total planned costs, timeline and schedule of the project; results of the project to date; data regarding the extent to which companies of the MVM Holding group participate in the work (in terms of the ratio of personnel); a list of further companies, organizations participating in the project that are not part of the MVM Holding group; a list of contracts signed in the framework of the project including the subject of the contract, the amount of payment in the contract and the deadline.

This year a similar case was also decided in favour of the ENERGIAKLUB. In April 2011, the Tolna County Court proclaimed that certain data (total costs and contracts) shall be disclosed from the Teller project laying down the basis for the planned nuclear power plant expansion launched in 2007 by the Paks Nuclear Power Plant and the MVM. The documents can be downloaded from the Control Energy Project website.

Legal representation for the ENERGIAKLUB Policy Institute was provided by the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union’s (TASZ) legal counselling service.