30,068 votes sealed the fate of Zwentendorf

"Ladies and gentlemen, the feeling is perfect," he said in the evening of November 5, 1978 on television ORF. The sensation was this: in the first referendum held under the Second Republic – exactly 40 years ago today – an absolute majority voted against the commissioning of the turnkey nuclear power plant at Zwentendorf. The surplus of nuclear opponents rose to 30,068 votes – and the vote was not just a yes or no to nuclear power.

"May not rot"

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"This work exists, it has cost billions of dollars, it must not rot," said the SPÖ Chancellor, Bruno Kreisky, in turn decreed and announced his resignation in case of a negative vote. Two events did not occur after this memorable November 5: Kreisky did not resign and Zwentendorf, although not operational, did not rotten. It now serves as a training center and spare parts warehouse. The defeat of Kreisky was also the birth of the Greens. Of course, there were not only nuclear opponents in the population, quite the contrary: in the polls, one half spoke in favor of the other against the use of the "nuclear power". nuclear energy.

The Austrian nuclear program was launched in August 1969, when the "Radiation Protection Act" was pbaded under the sole government of the ÖVP. In March 1972, Zwentendorf, about 30 kilometers from Vienna, was approved as the site of the first national nuclear power plant. A second nuclear power plant in the border region between Upper Austria and Lower Austria near Saint Pantaleon was being planned.

Although the SPÖ, which decided by an absolute majority, could have decided to put the nuclear power plant into operation on its own, a plebiscite was convened in Kreisky. On the one hand, he wanted the decision to be as broad as possible with a positive result, on the other hand he wanted the discussion to take place before the elections to the 1979 National Council.

"Do not hang up"

After Kreisky spoke of a "personal defeat", party committees managed to persuade the chancellor to continue and he remained in power. "I can not hang myself," I said, "and then there's only one power plant," he said. He "resigned from his resignation". In the elections of May 1979, the SPÖ still reached under 51% its best historical result under Kreisky.

Just weeks after the plebiscite, on December 15, the National Council imposed on Austria a ban on nuclear energy under the "Atomic Energy Act".

Incidentally, the owners of EVN voted again online: www.zwentendorf.com/volksabstimmung – without obligation, of course.