Ashot Sarkissov, advisor of Nuclear Safety Institute, member of Rosatom Public Council

– Such centers are designed to carry out active work to provide people with objective information about nuclear energy

Information Center for Nuclear Energy was opened in Voronezh Jan 29 2009. This is the third such center opened in the framework of a special program of Rosatom State Nuclear Energy Corporation with the support of Atomenergoprom OJSC and Energoatom Concern OJSC. Similar centers will shortly be organized in many other regions hosting nuclear power plants and other nuclear facilities. The Center is supposed to contact with schoolchildren, their parents, public organizations, mass media and authorities and to inform them about nuclear energy and nuclear power engineering. It will have a special multimedia program “Voyage into the World of Nuclear Energy,” which will be shown to all visitors. Schoolchildren and their parents will be offered to attend special courses on astronomy, geography, national studies and other subjects.

Atomenergoprom’s initiative to set up information centers for nuclear energy should be considered in the context of our hopes for renaissance of nuclear energy.

This is a very important component of the information support provided to the program of large-scale development of our nuclear industry.

The key thing about organizing such structures is that their work should be of systematic nature. Special attention must be paid to the younger generation, schoolchildren, just like they do it in France. Children must be offered a large interesting program: exhibitions, open lessons by specialists, other interesting events.

Such centers are designed to carry out active work to provide people with objective information about nuclear energy in Russia and worldwide, about the energy situation in the face of looming fuel shortages. Much work must be done to overcome the existing prejudice and misunderstanding with regards to the safety of nuclear power plants and the effects of radiation on people and nature and to shape a correct public vision of the role of nuclear energy and understanding of its comparative ecological safety.

I would like to point our once again that these centers must work on a systematic basis as one-time campaigns will not be effective. Our goal is to explain to people that nuclear energy is not something bad, that it is an important factor of economic welfare.