When in Sardinia there is something that has to go under the radar, there is no mistake: mid-August or New Year's Eve. The state calendar, in those days, has always been circled in red. Collective distraction, between beaches and barrels at the end of the year. This time the most executive arm of the government, that Invitalia di Stato, the agency that goes from tampons to masks, from radioactive sites to infrastructure contracts, has chosen the end of 2022 to bother the Official Journal. The date is December 28, the publication is in the Special Series dedicated to public contracts, number 151, the last one of the year. The contracting station is spelled out in full: Invitalia Spa National agency for the attraction of investments and business development.

The arm of state

The State Procurement Operational Arm acts on behalf of the National Inspectorate for Nuclear Safety and Radiation Protection. When the theme is radioactive, it is difficult to go unnoticed, less so in Sardinia than elsewhere. The tender is one of those that must go through the legal publication without making too much fanfare: assignment of the supply, installation, assistance and maintenance of two automatic stations for monitoring radioactivity in atmospheric particulate matter, with a high sampling volume.

Chief Hunt

Sardinia in the "nuclear" contract is never explicitly mentioned, there is not a single reference to a municipality on the island. It simply says Capo Caccia, in brackets SS, which translated means Sassari. The site is listed as military, more precisely in the hands of the Air Force. To be placed in that hermitage of uncontaminated nature and breathtaking landscapes on the coast of Alghero, not surprisingly called the Coral Riviera, there is nothing less than a very modern and very powerful radioactivity monitoring station in atmospheric particulate matter with a high sampling volume.

Radiation station

A radioactive monitoring station that would replace an old military contraption placed right in that area chosen for this new installation. The Invitalia contract provides for two of these powerful nuclear monitoring stations, one in the Bric della Croce air force remote station, in the province of Turin, and one, in fact, at the top of the Capo Caccia promontory. Millionaire contract, one and a half million for two radioactive monitoring stations. Exactly one year to build them, plus 1095 days, exactly 3 years, of "Ordinary assistance and maintenance", which start from the issue of the final certificate of conformity of the stations and installed equipment.

The mystery of Sardinia

The documents in our possession explicitly speak of "two new stations, fully automatic and technologically advanced, which will make it possible to detect the presence of radioactivity in the atmosphere with high sensitivity and more quickly than in the past". One fact is certain: in an area, at least officially, without any radioactive installation, without a single nuclear structure within a radius of 200 km, it is envisaged to position one of the three radioactive monitoring stations. While for the other two stations, that of Turin, included in the contract together with Capo Caccia, and that of Trieste, there are objective reasons to monitor possible nuclear accidents and risks, given the proximity to the nuclear power stations still in operation in France and on the Eastern European side, for Sardinia that tender imposes weighty questions and answers without subterfuge.

Heavy questions

First of all: why was it decided to install a radioactive monitoring station in that area of northern Sardinia? What is the criterion with which a positioning so far away from any side at risk was decided? And above all, is there an official document that justifies this contract activated on New Year's Eve? All questions for now without an answer, given that the project for the construction of these two plants, the Sardinian and the Piedmontese one, have in fact been secreted given that the contract clauses explicitly include a chapter for "Intellectual property and confidentiality".

Classified projects

The content of the provisions for the contractor leaves no room for doubt: «All projects, drawings, specifications, technical and technological information relating to the execution of the Contract must be kept strictly confidential». The contract "confesses" to be part of a network called REMRAD, for automatic monitoring of environmental radioactivity and early warning. However, the Sardinian station, unlike the others, cannot be classified in either of the two main cases examined by the "National plan for the management of radiological and nuclear emergencies". In fact, the island is too far away, beyond the 200 km envisaged by the Plan, with respect to the Italian plants being decommissioned and those across the border that are still operational.

The real risks for the island

To try to understand what objective is behind this choice, it is necessary to resort to the sequence of risks envisaged for the three stations. In addition to national and foreign nuclear power plants, in fact, there are at least four other major risks contemplated in the plans envisaged for the monitoring stations contracted out by Invitalia. These are types of risks that someone, in the secret rooms of Rome, could awkwardly associate with Sardinia. In fact, the serious risks envisaged by the Plan for radioactive alarm include shivering hypotheses: Port areas affected by the presence of nuclear-powered vessels; Transportation of radioactive or fissile materials; Transport of irradiated nuclear fuel; Orphan sources. For both cases, Sardinia would be faced with serious and unilateral actions by the state, given that, after the "departure" of the American nuclear submarines from La Maddalena, the island has declaredly chosen to keep away any radioactive danger.

Danger announced

Since the decision to place that radioactive monitoring station at Capo Caccia is not credible due to the risks associated with possible accidents in the radioactive plants of other countries, the danger that someone is planning and anticipating harmful choices for Sardinia not only cannot be ruled out, but , in the light of this procurement, must be seriously considered. Sardinians are warned.

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