---
title: "Anti-nuclear movement"
chunk: 4/15
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-nuclear_movement"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:22:20.182369+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

==== Other technologies ====
The international nuclear fusion project, the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), is constructing the world's largest and most advanced experimental tokamak nuclear fusion reactor in southern France. A collaboration among the European Union (EU), India, Japan, China, Russia, South Korea, and the United States, the project aims to transition from experimental studies of plasma physics to electricity-producing fusion power plants. In 2005, Greenpeace International issued a press statement criticizing government funding of the ITER, believing the money should have been diverted to renewable energy sources and claiming that fusion energy would result in nuclear waste and nuclear weapons proliferation issues. A French association including about 700 anti-nuclear groups, Sortir du nucléaire (Get Out of Nuclear Energy), claimed that ITER was a hazard because scientists did not yet know how to manipulate the high-energy deuterium and tritium hydrogen isotopes used in the fusion process. According to most anti-nuclear groups, nuclear fusion power "remains a distant dream". The World Nuclear Association have said that fusion "presents so far insurmountable scientific and engineering challenges". Construction of the ITER facility began in 2007, but the project has run into many delays and budget overruns. Several milestones of the project have already been completed, but the First Plasma completion date has been discussed and postponed multiple times, with various conclusions. In late 2016, the ITER council agreed on an updated project schedule, with a planned First Plasma opening by 2025, nine years after the originally anticipated opening.
Some anti-nuclear groups advocate reduced reliance on reactor-produced medical radioisotopes, through the use of alternative radioisotope production and alternative clinical technologies. Cyclotrons are being increasingly used to produce medical radioisotopes to the point where nuclear reactors are no longer needed to make the most common medical isotopes. However, the development of newer, more reliable and efficient particle accelerators also fuels the proposals for subcritical reactors with a Spallation Neutron Source being used for nuclear transmutation of "legacy" waste and/or power generation. Such reactors could also be used to produce medical isotopes. Some isotopes, like Cobalt-60 are currently mostly produced in reactors like the Canadian CANDU.Plutonium-238, the preferred material for radioisotope thermal generators for use in spacecraft, faced a significant shortage after a single reactor producing it shut down, before the U.S. established a capacity to produce it from Neptunium-237 at one of their laboratories.

=== Nuclear-free alternatives ===

Anti-nuclear groups say that reliance on nuclear energy can be reduced by adopting energy conservation and energy efficiency measures. Energy efficiency can reduce energy consumption while providing the same level of energy "services".
Renewable energy flows involve natural phenomena such as sunlight, wind, tides, plant growth, and geothermal heat, as the International Energy Agency explains:

Renewable energy is derived from natural processes that are replenished constantly. In its various forms, it derives directly from the sun, or from heat generated deep within the earth. Included in the definition is electricity and heat generated from solar, wind, ocean, hydropower, biomass, geothermal resources, and biofuels and hydrogen derived from renewable resources.
Anti-nuclear groups also favour the use of renewable energy, such as hydro, wind power, solar power, geothermal energy and biofuel. According to the International Energy Agency renewable energy technologies are essential contributors to the energy supply portfolio, as they contribute to world energy security and provide opportunities for mitigating greenhouse gases. Fossil fuels are being replaced by clean, climate-stabilizing, non-depletable sources of energy. According to Lester R. Brown:

…the transition from coal, oil, and gas to wind, solar, and geothermal energy is well under way. In the old economy, energy was produced by burning something – oil, coal, or natural gas – leading to the carbon emissions that have come to define our economy. The new energy economy harnesses the energy in wind, the energy coming from the sun, and heat from within the earth itself.