02-08-01 Opponents of gas fired power plants within the ruling Labour Party now demand that the government ask Naturkraft to postpone the building of polluting gas-fired power plants. Labour MP Gunn Karin Gjul is of the opinion that Naturkraft ought to wait, since there is now new technology available to construct emission-free gas-fired plants, and points to the fact that there is now also agreement on how to share the costs between the state and the industry.
The head of the Parliamentary Energy and Environment Committee, Tore Nordtun, also from Labour, is of the opinion that the new technology should be tested out, and that at the same time a small gas-fired power plant be built as a pilot project. However, the Undersecretary of State of the Oil and Energy Department, Bjoerg Sandal, says the Government will not ask Naturkraft to postpone the building of the plants. She says that the gas-fired plants will be built with present-day technology, but that they will be further developed and rebuilt when the new pollution-free technology is available.