April 15, 2019, Sochi, Russia, - The second Atomexpo Awards ceremony took place during the 11th annual International Forum ATOMEXPO-2019 in Sochi (Russia). This international professional award acknowledges the contribution to the development and use of nuclear technologies for the benefit of humanity.
The international jury of one of the nominations “Public communication” that was chaired by the Secretary General of the European Nuclear Society, Fernando Naredo, commemorated Ministry of Energy and Natural Sources of the Republic of Turkey with its “Turkey wants nuclear power” campaign shortlisted as one of the finalists. In total 14 projects were applied in this nomination this year. The Ministry received a special diploma for excellence that highlighted achievements reached by this creative campaign in forming positive perception of nuclear power in the country.
The campaign originally initiated in 2018 included special TV ad with Nobel laureate Prof. Aziz Sancar and UNESCO-awarded scientist Prof. Bilge Demirköz who explains the objectives of the Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant and its importance to Turkey. The campaign also included infographic movies explaining benefits of nuclear energy and opportunities it brings not only in energy generation, but also in medicine, science and other areas. It circulated on all national TV channels and was actively broadcast on social media that helped to reach out the number of audiences about 1 mln people. The video received a great amount of positive feedback. The campaign was managed and created by Dreambox Visual Communications company.
Jury member of Public Acceptance nomination Dr. Jonathan Cobb, Senior Communication Manager of World Nuclear Association notes: “Public support is important to the success of nuclear new build projects in newcomer countries. For a campaign to be successful it needs to appeal to a broad audience. The Turkey Wants Nuclear Power video features not only respected scientists, but also ordinary men, women and children, giving voice to a wide range of people and demonstrating the many benefits of nuclear technologies”.
İbrahim Halil Dere, Turkish Republic Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources, General Director of Nuclear Energy: “We thank the jury of Atomexpo Awards for acknowledged our project. This is very important for us. We pay special attention to inform people and raise awareness among public about benefits of nuclear energy and all opportunities it can bring and already brings to our country. I’m confident that this gesture will also encourage people who trust and support nuclear projects in Turkey. The Ministry continues to implement activities in the area of raising public acceptance on nuclear energy”.
Atomexpo Awards, international professional prize, is awarded to companies from the global industry for their outstanding performance, which significantly contributed to development of the nuclear industry and nuclear energy use for the benefit of mankind. First ceremony was held during the 10th Anniversary International Forum ATOMEXPO 2018.
This year a total of 52 projects from 25 countries were submitted in the competition.
The award competition was held in five categories:
- “Nuclear technologies: Improving the quality of life” (projects in the field of non-energy application of nuclear technologies); - “Innovations for the future” (the most breakthrough and innovative technological projects);
- “Best start” (projects related to the launch of the national program in the field of nuclear energy);
- “Public acceptability” (the most effective communication projects);
- “Development of human capital” (the best projects in the field of development of human resources).
52 projects from 25 countries participated in the competition, including Argentina, Bangladesh, Bolivia, China, Czech Republic, Denmark, Egypt, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Japan, Kenya, Mongolia, Morocco, Philippines, Republic of Korea, Russia, Spain, Turkey, the United States of America, Uzbekistan and Zambia. There were also the projects of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and cross-regional projects. An independent international award panel consisting of world experts in the nuclear industry evaluated each project from a professional point of view and identified 17 nominees with five of them selected as the best projects during the meeting prior to the forum.
The winners were presented with awards by the panel chairmen for each category: Henri Proglio, member of the Board of Directors of AKKUYU NUKLEER JSC and Fennovoima Ltd.; Fernando Naredo, Secretary General of the European Nuclear Society (ENS); Takuya Hattori, Advisor to the Japan Atomic Industry Forum (JAIF); Pedro Porras, Executive Director of the European Nuclear Education Network (ENEN); Luis Echávarri, consultant to Ingeniero Industrial.