20 May
2010

20-04-2007 – Official inauguration of the OPAL reactor in Sydney, Australia : Under the chair of Australia´s Prime Minister John Howard, last April, 20th. the oficial inauguration of the OPAL nuclear reactor took place at Lucas Heights NSW, near Sydney.

 Hector Otheguy, Daniel Filmus, Julio De Vido, Juan Pablo Ordoñez, Jose Abriata y Pedro Villagra.

Under the chair of Australia´s Prime Minister John Howard, last April, 20th. the oficial inauguration of the OPAL nuclear reactor took place at Lucas Heights NSW, near Sydney.

The ceremony was attended by the Argentine Ministers for Federal Planning, Investment and Services, Julio de Vido and for Education, Science and Technology, Daniel Filmus; as well as by the Australlian Ministers for Industry, Ian Mac Farlane, the Minister for Education Science and Training, July Bishop, Ziggy Switkowski,  President of the Board of ANSTO, Ian Smith, Executive Director of ANSTO, and several authorities in office at the time of the bidding and signing of the contract, sucha as Nick Minchin, Finance Minister reposnsible for ANSTO at that time, and Helen Garnet, Executive Director of  that agency during the same period. Also present were the Secretary for Energy, Mining and International economic relations, the Argentine Ambassador Pedro Villagra Delgado and the presidents of the Argentine Atomic Energy Commission José Abriata, and of the Excecutive Director of the Argentine Space Agency and founder of INVAP, Conrado F. Varotto.

“As a self-confessed sports lover and crickett tragic, let me simply say … I do look very much to the day when the achievements of Australian Science and Australian scientists are as celebrated and as revered as the achievements of the sports men and women of this country.” (…) “This facility will relieve human suffering, it will be of direct, often life-saving, benefit to countless thousands of our fellow countrymen and women.”

Australian and Argentine authorities in OPAL inauguration

Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) chairman Ziggy Switkowski, who headed the government’s nuclear taskforce, described the new reactor as Sydney’s third icon, after the Harbour Bridge and Opera House.