!!!Atomenergie

Nuclear Energy: While all activities in the field of atomic energy 
were prohibited in Austria until the signing of the State Treaty in 
1955, the federal government and 52 public and private enterprises 
founded the "Oesterreichische Studiengesellschaft fuer Atomenergie 
GmbH" (Austrian Atomic Energy Studies Company) in 1956 and 
commissioned it to build a "Power reactor as an educational model"  
Forschungszentrum Seibersdorf GmbH. With the support of the U.S. 
Atomic Energy Commission, a nuclear reactor centre near Seibersdorf 
(southeast of Vienna) was completed in 1960. The centre originally 
comprised the nuclear reactor  ASTRA, the Institutes of Electronic 
Engineering, Physics, Chemistry, Metallurgy, Biology and Agriculture, 
a Radiation Protection Institute and an IAEA  International Atomic 
Energy Agency laboratory. In 1962 a pilot reactor of the Atomic Energy 
Institute of Austrian Higher Education Institutions (Atominstitute der 
oesterreichischen Hochschulen) near the Stadionbruecke bridge in the 
Vienna Prater recreation park and in 1963 another research reactor in 
Graz went into operation.

\\
In 1972-1977 the Zwentendorf nuclear power plant (Lower Austria) was 
built with a planned output of 730 MW by the "Gemeinschaftskraftwerk 
Tullnerfeld GmbH" (established 1970). The energy plan of 1976 called 
for the construction of a total of 3 nuclear power plants in Austria. 
A plebiscite held on November 5, 1978 prevented the already finished 
power plant at Zwentendorf from going into operation, with 50.4 % 
of the votes cast. Since December 5, 1978, the "Atomsperrgesetz" 
(Anti-Nuclear Law) has prohibited the use of nuclear energy in 
Austria. Efforts to put the Zwentendorf power plant into operation 
were abandoned after the partial meltdown in Chernobyl (April 26, 
1986).

\\
Austria is a member of CERN (European Organisation for Nuclear 
Research) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA, founded 
1958), which is headquartered in Vienna. Even before the practical 
application of atomic energy, Austrian researchers and engineers such 
as L.  Boltzmann, W.  Pauli, V. F.  Hess, E.  Schroedinger and L. 
 Meitner played a decisive role in nuclear research.

!Further reading
Oe. Dokumentationen. Kernenergie, 4 vols., 1977; 
E. Kitzmueller, Oesterreich - Verspaeteter Atomzwerg oder 
nicht-atomarer Anfaenger, in: L. Mez (ed.), Der Atomkonflikt, 1979.


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