Là suta. Our nuclear heritage in a triangle of water.
Là suta. Our nuclear heritage in a triangle of water.
Two referendums saw the production of nuclear energy in Italy cease. Saluggia, a small agricultural municipality in the province of Vercelli just 40 km from Turin, holds the majority of the nuclear waste produced in Italy. The area runs alongside the Dora Baltea river, one of the main tributaries of the Po, and is bordered by the irrigation canals that carry water to the Vercelli paddy fields. It is also crossed by the aquifer which feeds the Monferrato aqueduct. This triangle of water, starting from the end of the 1950s onwards, saw the construction of a nucelar research centre, an experimental reactor and a reprocessing plant in which techniques were developed to extract uranium and plutonium from irradiated fuel elements. Therefore, spent fuel rods from all of Italy's nuclear power stations and from reactors in other countries were sent to Saluggia to be dissolved and reprocessed. In 2000, severe flooding caused the Dora Baltea to burst its banks and destroyed the embankments of the Farini canal. The flooding also affected the nuclear sites. On that occasion, Nobel Prize winner for physics, Carlo Rubbia, then chairman of ENEA (which had been entrusted with the management of the Saluggia installations), spoke of being a whisker away from a “global catastrophy”. If the highly radioactive liquid waste had been dragged by a flooded Dora into the Po, the consequences would have been devastating for the entire Po Valley. While the creation of a single National Deposit in which to safely and definitively store Italy's radioactive waste continues to be postponed, a new temporary waste deposit, the D2, is being built in Saluggia, in the same area which was so heavily flooded in 2000.
Produced by: Associazione Almaterra
With the support of: Film Commission Torino Piemonte, Fondazione CRT, CGIL Vercelli-Valsesia
Under the patronage of: Regione Piemonte
With the collaboration of: Baby Doc Film, Zenit Arti Audiovisive
Subject: Cristina Monti
Direction: Daniele Gaglianone, Cristina Monti, Paolo Rapalino
With: Gian Piero Godio, Rossana Vallino, Umberto Lorini, Giovanni Vallino, Enrico Adduci
DOP: Paolo Rapalino Fonico di presa diretta
Mix audio Fabio Coggiola
Music: Ryuichi Sakamoto (kind concession of the song Fukushima#1), Fabio Viana
Historical archives: Archivio Nazionale Cinema d'Impresa
CsC, Ivrea; Archivi privati
Festivals and Awards
Documentaria Noto, Noto (SR) – novembre 2015Uranium Film, FestivalBerlino - settembre 2015
Mediterraneo Video Festival Agropoli, Premio Giuria Studenti (SA) - settembre 2015
Sardinia Film Festival, Villanova Monteleone (SS) - agosto 2015
Clorofilla Film, Festival Grossetto - agosto 2015
Siciliambiente Documentary Film Festival, Premio miglior documentario per il Pubblico, San Vito Lo Capo (TP) - luglio 2015
Genova Film Festival, Genova - luglio 2015
Sisak Ecologic Film Festival, Sisak, Croazia - giugno 2015
EFFA – Environmental Film Festival Albania, Tirana, Albania - maggio 2015
Uranium Film Festival, Rio De Janeiro, Brasile - giugno 2015; Quebec City, Canada - aprile 2015
Cinema Planeta, Cuernavaca, Messico - aprile 2015
Valsusa Filmfest, Menzione speciale Concorso MEMORIA STORICA, Condove (TO) - aprile 2015
FReDD, Toulouse, Francia - aprile 2015
Sguardi Altrove, Milano - marzo 2015
Premio Libero Bizzarri, San Benedetto del Tronto (AP) - luglio 2014
Cinemambiente, Torino - giugno 2014
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