drafting international, 2 mar ( EFE).- the alarm generated by the accident at the nuclear complex Japanese of Fukushima last year has led some countries to rethink their nuclear plans or to strengthen the security measures, but has not slowed down the expansion of this energy source.

The disaster gave a turnaround to nuclear and energy policy of Germany, where the Government of Chancellor Angela Merkel, initially supporter of prolonging the life of 17 nuclear reactors until the mid-2030, opted for the permanent abandonment of nuclear energy for 2022 and the promotion of renewable energy.

Fukushima revived in the European Union (EU) the bitter memory of Chernobyl (Ukraine) 25 years earlier, and led Brussels to launch resistance tests to assess the safety of the 143 reactors of the EU, eight of them in Spain, whose final results will be announced next June.

Of the Institute of radiation protection and Nuclear safety of France experts consider that an accident such as that led to the earthquake and subsequent tsunami of March 11 in the Japanese central would have in Europe a greater impact in the population, as for Fukushima much pollution headed the ocean.

But unless a greater accent on safety, Fukushima has not meant major changes in nuclear plans in a depressed economically, Europe is not prepared to increase their dependence on the import of hydrocarbons.

Numbers are stark: Japan, where nuclear energy covering 30 percent of the energy demand before the catastrophe, recorded its largest trade deficit in January 2012 in the past 33 years to increase its energy bill to stay only two of its 54 reactors operating.

According to the latest projections by the international agency of Atomic Energy (IAEA), the global nuclear capacity will increase from the current 375 gigawatts to 501 gigawatts by 2030, estimates 8 per cent lower than those made before the disaster of Fukushima

There are currently 63 reactors under construction in fifteen countries and are planned other 156, especially in developing nations.

United States ended last February to a nuclear more than 30-year moratorium imposed after the accident of the reactor at Three Mile Island in 1979, to approve the construction of two new reactors in Georgia to deal with increased electric demand and reduce dependence on fossil fuels.

For his part, Russia builds now nine nuclear reactors and plans to double the production of atomic energy in the coming years to reach 30 per cent of the total.

Not have stopped nuclear expansion plans in China, the country in the world that more reactors under construction has (twenty, against the 13 already operating), and that by 2030 plan to reach the hundred or so reactors, similar to that now owns us.

However, the accident of Fukushima Prefecture caused the temporary suspension of the approval of new projects and the implementation of greater security and measures of cooperation with neighbouring countries, as well as advances in research of “fourth generation”, apparently safer reactors and a younger generation of toxic waste.

In figures, this will cause the country, which had a capacity of 10.9 gigawatts of nuclear power generation in 2010, expected to reach 70 gigawatts by 2020, when before the accident estimated reach for that year 120.

In Latin America, only Venezuela, a country rich in oil, announced a freeze on the preliminary plans of the nuclear power program.

At the end of last September, Argentina launched the operations of the central nuclear of Atucha II, on the outskirts of Buenos Aires, the third built in the country and neighbouring Atucha I, the first installed in Latin America.

And in Brazil, the Government stated that the nuclear policy would be not modified in the absence of risk of earthquakes or tsunamis and because two existing plants (Angra I and II) were planned to withstand earthquakes of up to 6.5 degrees on the Richter scale and waves of up to seven metres in height.

Fukushima accident has not varied project of the Indian Government lift a nuclear power plant with six reactors in Jaitapur, an area of high seismic activity in the West of the country. EFE