©2011 Chappatte, distributed by Globe Cartoon. More cartoons on Chappatte’s web site. Geneva-based Patrick Chappatte works for the International Herald Tribune, for Geneva newspaper Le Temps, and for NZZ am Sonntag. All cartoons reproduced with permission.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The German coalition has agreed to end Germany’s nuclear power programme by 2022, it announced after late-night talks Sunday 29 May. The agreement came after officials received the report of the German government ethics commission on the country’s use of nuclear energy. The commission’s report will be issued Monday.
Germany has 17 nuclear power plants, one of which has been out of commission for years, and seven of which were closed in March 2011, following Japan’s post-tsunami nuclear crisis. All but three of the others should be closed by 2021, the commission recommended, and those three can be closed in 2022.
Switzerland a week earlier announced that it will end its nuclear energy programme, but it will take longer, until 2034, to spin it out.
Sun setting on power generation by Alstom. ©ALSTOM 2010
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The French energy and transport group, Alstom, has announced the reduction of 4,000 jobs world-wide.
The most heavily affected countries will be Germany, the USA and Switzerland, where 750 jobs are at stake.
Alstom referred to markets where investment in new energy equipment has been most affected by the economic crisis in its release 4 October, and said that 1,000 of the jobs to go will involve the temporary contracts which will not be renewed and natural attrition.
Alstom is Canton Aargau’s biggest private employer and has added hundreds of jobs there in the past. Many of those jobs are expected to go.
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Seven top executives of Foster Wheeler, a major producer of power plants and refineries, are to move from Perryville, New Jersey to Geneva, Switzerland in order to be closer to the company’s markets. The company is domiciled in Zug, Switzerland, and employs 14,000 people worldwide.
