The Green Party, Nuclear Power, and Party Discipline
Is the Green Party too rigid in its opposition to nuclear power? Is nuclear power a safe alternative to fossil fuel? Are the Green Party concerns about the long term (seven generations) impact of nuclear power more important than the short term energy consumption needs of today’s generation?
Based on the interest in this story last week, I felt compelled to post this interesting story out of the UK. A Green Party Candidate for Parliament is finding himself in hot water for suggesting that atomic energy might have a role in fighting climate change. From The Independent:
Chris Goodall, prospective parliamentary candidate for Oxford West and Abingdon, upset many party members with his assertion in yesterday’s Independent that atomic energy has a role to play in the fight against climate change. Mr Goodall was one of four prominent environmentalists disclosed as having had a change of heart about the nuclear issue, having moved from an anti-nuclear stance to believing that atomic power is a necessary part of the energy mix in the struggle to cut carbon emissions and halt global warming.
The others are Lord Smith of Finsbury, the former Labour cabinet minister who now chairs the Environment Agency; Stephen Tindale, a former executive director of Greenpeace, and Mark Lynas, the author of two studies of climate change. But while the others are in essence free agents, Mr Good-all’s case is distinctive in that his views are now formally at odds with one of his own party’s key policy positions.Resolute opposition to nuclear power has been a cornerstone of Green party policy for years, as is made clear in the party’s principal policy document, Manifesto for a Sustainable Society, which states unambiguously that a Green government, on taking office, would set a deadline for phasing out all nuclear power.
Mr Goodall’s remarks had left many party members “seriously concerned”, the Green Party leader, Caroline Lucas, MEP, said last night. “It is of great concern to me that a candidate should be promoting a policy which is at odds with the party manifesto, and I shall be taking that forward,” she said. “In any party, you have a range of different views, but once selected as a parliamentary candidate, you have a particular responsibility.”
The matter would be dealt with by the party’s regional council, after speaking to Mr Goodall directly, she said. Asked if this would include disciplinary action and possibly even de-selection as a candidate, Ms Lucas would only say: “We will be taking appropriate measures.”
The Green Party of the UK and the USA both explicitly oppose nuclear power in their platforms. The Green Party globally was formed just 30 years ago, in many places it formed as a union between anti-nuke activists, peace activists, environmental activists, and social justice activists. These roots still run deep in the Green Party, but are they now being challenged? At least one European Green Party caught hell for their reluctant support for a war (was it Kosovo or Iraq?). The Green Party of Mexico is catching hell for their support of the death penalty.
Are nukes on the table or not?
I am not a “Green Party member” anymore.
But, I am still a “green.” And, since I have friends and family in the party, a historical perspective on it, and the plan that I might join again someday…
Please! Any talk about the Green Party tolerating nuclear energy should be quickly squashed. Call it discipline. Call it logic. Call it loyalty to our original purpose.
The whole sunflower symbol we use dates back to the fact that the Green Party and green movement evolved from the anti-nuclear movement.
Also, if the Green Party is pro-nuclear, than we are not needed. Trust me, there are enough other people, other politicians, other parties, and also corporations, and money streams to be found to prop up nuclear. At best, the Green Party should just stay quiet on it.
But, actually, it is an absolute, illogical fraud to think nuclear fits in with any vision of “green.” No one can ever, ever say what to do with nuclear waste. And, that goes to the bottom line of sustainability and public health in the future.
In addition, it is an entire myth that nuclear is any solution to global warming. Nuclear energy is a highly expensive and very carbon intense way to boil water. It is not any solution, in any logical, mathematical, or economic manner that truly adds in the costs and benefits.
Glad you raised the point.
Now, I hope people will dive in and shove this conversation to the bottom of the heap where it belongs.
Peace and justice,
Kimberly Wilder
(For more information and ways to combat silly ideas like that nuclear is helpful, you might go to the NIRS Nuclear Information and Resource Service. They are the cutting edge of research on these topics.)
The European Green Party you’re referring to was in Germany. When the Social Democrats formed a government with the Greens, Joschka Fischer became Germany’s first Green foreign minister. He supported NATO’s bombing of Serbia after he became convinced that the Serbs were committing genocide (preventing genocide is the one legitimate justification for war in the UN charter). This split Greens in Germany and Europe as a whole – was the lesson of the Holocaust “never again genocide” or “never again war”?
Joschka Fischer famously told Colin Powell “sorry, you haven’t convinced me” when the latter was hawking Bush’s plan to invade Iraq. A poll later determined him to be Germany’s most popular politician, tho he has since stepped back from politics.
The Mexican Green Party recently rolled out an ad campaign to reintroduce the death penalty (currently banned in Mexico) for child rapists and kidnappers. Mexico is currently in the middle of an organized crime war, sparked by President Felipe Calderon’s militant crackdown on drug trafficking, and fueled by the US government’s Merida plan and illegal weapons from the North. Over 5,000 people were killed in Mexico last year, and the government is rotten to its core with corruption.
My question is – why does the Mexican Green Party think the death penalty would be any deterrent to criminals who are already dying in the thousands? I’ve heard that the campaign was initiated not by democratic decision, but from from the top as a way to make the Greens stand out in an election year. A much better solution to the organized crime problem would be to legalize and regulate drugs.
More Green drama: Iceland is now governed by a Social Democratic-Green Left coalition, and the Green Left is poised to become the biggest party in upcoming elections. Recently, tho, it was announced that the minister of fisheries, who is a Green Left member, will continue his predecessor’s last-minute expansion of whaling in Iceland. It should be noted that the Icelandic party is not part of Global Greens, but still, I’ve been thinking that Greens from all over should start a petition to reverse that very unfortunate decision.
Regarding nuclear, I agree with Richard Lawson: most Greens would argue that nuclear is not as bad as coal, the “lesser of two evils” if you will, but nuclear vs. coal is a false dichotomy. The lesser of evils is not good enough – that has to be our credo in all we do. The Green movement should not try to appease entrenched interests and the status quo; if we internalize and promote obsolete ways of thinking, what purpose do we serve?
“Smashing” any kind of speech that’s part of a legitimate discussion is dangerous. Isn’t the idea of having a third party to improve the diversity of voices in the political arena?
Personally, I think nuclear should be used if it’s the best option. If it’s cheaper (for governments and consumers and industry) and safer and more effective than conservation, efficiency, and renewables, then it should be used. If not, use the choice that is safest, cheapest, and most effective. As I see it, it is only being considered by environmentalists in order to stop the bleeding of global warming.
Nuclear is nowhere near as destructive as coal. Both have destructive mining processes, but the destruction continues with coal, whereas it is limited with nuclear.
Kimberly – I don’t understand what you’re saying. What is used to heat up that water?
I was also surprised to read Kimberly Wilder advocate the smashing of dissent :)
Ross – nuclear power is produced by turning turbines with steam. The steam is from water boiled by superheated radioactive material.
We shouldn’t ban discussion of nuclear power, but I think it’s reasonable to expect that Green candidates won’t advocate for nuclear power. One of the things I love about the Green party is its respect for future generations, and nuclear proliferation is not my idea of leaving the world better than we found it. We should treat nuclear as an absolute last resort, like war is a last resort to prevent genocide. The worst thing we can do is buy into the industry-promoted line that we have to choose between new coal or new nuclear. We can choose neither, and that’s the most responsible and far-sighted thing to do.
The European Green Party had a good press release recently titled “Nuclear power is the energy of resignation”. Here’s the main point:
“The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, shows that immediate action is needed to address climate change. Global emissions must start decreasing before 2015 to avoid the risk of galloping climate change.
…
No new nuclear plant that is not already being planned can be built in the world until 2020 at the earliest. Wind turbines can be built in a couple of months. Putting one’s trust in nuclear power is giving up the attempts to save humanity from unfettered climate change. “
Nuclear, however, is on a much larger scale than wind and can provide more consistent base load energy. It can also be more appealing to the businesspeople and politicians who will have to be brought on board in order to make progress with this issue, and we need to make progress very very quickly.
I’m not arguing against renewables. But in the US well over 50% of our energy comes from fossil fuels (and about 50% of the total is coal). It’s not a matter of choosing between renewables and nuclear, either – it’s a matter of choosing between fossil fuels and everything else. I think the biggest concern is climate change. If nuclear can effectively address that problem, then let’s go ahead. If renewables can do it better, let’s go with them. I mean, I wouldn’t be complaining if we had a grid that was half nuclear and half renewable, would you? That would be such an unbelievable improvement over what we have now!
Grassroots democracy would suggest that this generation should not bind future generations needlessly, and it’s hard to imagine a more unfair burden that a 240,000 year legacy of radioactivity. Since human beings have only existed on this continent for 50,000 years, it seems insane to discuss creating anything man-made that has the potential lethality of nuclear waste for so long. We have no right to take away future generation’s rights to make decisions because we are using such poisonous technology.
Social Justice is incompatible with nuclear technology. From yellowcake mined on native lands, often under protest, to processing in non-union low wage states like South Carolina, to use and temporary storage in areas where the local economy and political structures were able to suppress opposition, nuclear power violates social justice.
Ecological wisdom doesn’t point to nuclear energy, although this is the one stab that the now pro-nuke Green is taking at the Four Pillars of the international green movement, of which the Green Party is but one expression. What is missing is the wisdom part of that value. Nuclear power is not a wise choice as an economic model or else investors would be pouring the needed billions form their personal reserves. They are not doing so. It is not wise to invest so much capital into a technology which, if a Chernobyl were to happen in the US, would face almost immediate shut downs across the nation. It also seems ecologically unwise to invest so much in a technology which makes targets for terrorists.
Non-violence seems like a no-brainer, but in case you hadn’t noticed, nuclear power always precedes nuclear weapons. It is true that several nations have a nuclear power but not nuclear weapons, the reverse is not true. There are no nuclear weapons states which were not first nuclear power station operators, including us. The “peaceful atom” is utter bullshit.
Decentralization can in no way be said to be served by nuclear power. The toxic nature of the materials involved require high levels of security, offered by a security infrastructure both public and private. The huge quantities of cash required for each project demands that corporations be equal to the task, meaning that they must be huge. This technology also requires a huge and centralized government and educational infrastructure, including regulation which most anti-nuclear activists would suggest are actually designed to promote nuclear business across the whole spectrum, from mining to disposal.
That’s five of the Green Party’s Ten Key Values.
I have no objection to members of the Green Party advocating for nuclear power any more than I object to members of the Green Party calling for support for the war in Afghanistan. I believe both are wholly wrong, and thoroughly non-green. I would consider anyone who held those positions to be unacceptable for party leadership or as a candidate. So, I do want Greens who are pro-nuke to be so publicly, and I will always campaign to keep them from positions of authority in the party.
Ross,
The goal is to stop increasing global concentrations of carbon dioxide by some near future date. Without addressing demand we cannot do what we must, stop burning stuff or any sort.
Nuclear power does not offer a supply of fuel at sustainable prices over the short or long haul. The world’s supplies of fissionable materials is not as plentiful as it once was, which is part of the reason Duke Energy began an experiment in a nuclear reactor near Charlotte, NC using plutonium enriched fuel from dismantled nuclear weapons. They ended that experiment after they got some unexpected results.
We must adopt a policy that looks something like this:
Dramatically reduce demand for power. Dramatically increase the efficiency of buildings of all sorts. Establish a tiered consumption pricing structure so that a reasonable level of power can be supplied at a price all cautious people can afford, and at a higher cost per unit for those who don’t want to be cautious.
You are right. Time is short. This is one reason I would like to see the Green Party adopt a revolutionary approach to policy in this area. To get the ball going very fast we will need the full entrepreneurial spirit of the planet. Whatever government policies are established in this area needs to be as light a touch as possible, as local as possible, and as sustainable as possible.
There are many points to address and I hope that you will bear with me even though I am an interloper and not a Green Party member.
I have a strong desire to leave the world in better shape than I found it, I care deeply about the legacy that we will be leaving our children, grandchildren and hopefully thousands of other generations, and I have worked for social justice and economic fairness throughout my professional career.
I am, unabashedly, a huge fission fan based on close personal experience.
As a young child, my father, a guy who recycled even kitchen scraps and showed me how to build a compost heap, talked to me a length about why his employer was building nuclear power stations to replace oil fired power stations in “The Sunshine State”. We agreed that it was far better to have something that did not need a smokestack. He and his fellow engineers were concerned about the waste, but were strong advocates for recycling it. (This was about 1967.)
I decided quite early that I wanted to study nuclear engineering. Several people told me that the best place to learn about nuclear power was in the Navy, so I ended up spending 12 years operating and maintaining submarine reactors, including a 40 month tour as the Engineer Officer .
I have seen how you can power a 9,000 ship for 14 years with a fuel source that weighs just a bit more than I do and whose residue could fit under my office desk. That power plant provided clean water, propulsion power, lights, heat, fresh air, and all the comforts of home even when sealed up hundreds of feet below the ocean surface. My fellow sailors and I all lived within 200 feet of a reactor for months at a time and felt safe enough to invite our families on board for a visit whenever possible. We also lived in places with a dozen or more of these nuclear power vessels and raised our children there.
The amount of fissionable material in the world is so large as to be almost unimaginable, especially when you know that fission produces more than 2 MILLION times as much energy per unit mass as oil combustion and more than 6 million times as much as wood combustion.
That “waste” that you have been carefully taught to fear is not a burden on future generations – it is an amazing resource since it still contains 95-97% of its initial potential energy. Sure, it will take a bit of effort to turn that material into energy, but if you leave your children a 10,000 acres of productive land, they will have to put in some effort to turn that into a source of income and food production.
Ross had the right idea, but the wrong numbers, when he tried to quantify the challenge of replacing fossil fuel combustion with non fission alternatives. Human society currently produces more than 85% of all of its energy by burning fossil fuels. A good 50% of that comes from 6 BILLION tons of coal every year. Here in the US, our electrical power production consumes about 1.2 Billion tons of coal each year. That would be 0 tons if we had simply continued building nuclear plants until about 1995 at the same rate that we did in 1965-1975.
Before fission was discovered (not invented) fossil fuel’s market share was more like 93% with almost all of the rest being supplied by either hydo or wood with only very minor contributions from wind, solar and geothermal.
In the US, wind, solar, and geothermal together still supply a bit less than 1% of our total energy needs even after decades worth of effort and generous investment by the taxpayers.
Fission can be scaled rapidly; the 104 reactors in the US that currently supply about 30% more energy every year than ALL of the electrical power generators in operation in the country did in 1960 were all built in a burst of activity that only lasted 30 years from start to finish.
My interpretation of many years worth of study to try to understand why so many people do not like nuclear power has left me with a skeptical view.
It seems very likely that a major portion of the fear, uncertainly and doubt that has been widely spread about this amazing source of heat (it can do more than “boil water”) has been initiated by the establishment. Think carefully about how much power and wealth has derived – for at least 170 years – from the control of the extraction, distribution and consumption of coal, oil, and “natural” gas, all of which become far less valuable in a world where fission power is allowed to compete and capture market share.
Thank you for letting me share some thoughts. I hope that they open the door for more conversation and critical thinking. Dogma and mythology have no real place in making good, sustainable decisions that affect the lives of every person on the planet.
Rod Adams
Publisher, Atomic Insights
Host and producer, The Atomic Show Podcast
The engineers still can not deal with nuclear waste, and never will. Wind can create more electricity than nuclear, especially as uranium supplies are limited, and mining it is very dangerous, causing many cancers in miners.
Nuclear power will never be green and I oppose all Greens who support it, but ending dissent will not be very Green either.
Oh, yeah? Greg? If ending dissent is not very green, then why was there a column in your list of resources to Green Party campaigns (when you were GP-US Secretary) that said something like consultants on “Troublesome People”? And, why were you listed as a consultant on that issue?
Funny thing, there has been a lot less trouble, and a lot fewer troublesome people, at national since you stepped way to do your own business.
If we are to tolerate “dissent” on an issue such as nuclear power, should we also entertain discussion on something such as “maybe the death penalty is a good idea?” or “maybe wars for imperialism are good?”
Of course, any party must be open to various points of view. Though, the Green Party in particular has a set of “four pillars” and “ten key values” that are a bottom line foundation for what our party will and will not tolerate.
There will always be industries and people who will try to chip away at those values. Sometimes, it will start with a weasel-y request to allow for debate. And, some people, who do not have a healthy enough sense of suspicion, will fall for it.
Mr. Gerritt, I wonder in what sense you mean the engineers ‘can not deal with nuclear waste and never will’. This is a breathtakingly arrogant assertion. Nuclear engineers know how to deal with the ‘waste’, as it is called, now. It is a straightforward matter to sequester, bind, transmute or use it for various applications. This is not currently done in the US due to opposition from green groups who try to tie up anything to do with nuclear power in legal disputes. The science of dealing with this issue is well established
I understand that some uranium miners contracted cancer in the 40s and fifties due to inadequate ventilation in underground mines due to radon buildup. This is not an issue for modern open-cut mines or leach mines.
Uranium supples are not limited. The quantities of uranium and thorium available are vast beyond imagining, sufficient to power our global civilisation at a much greater level than present usage for geological timescales.
Gregg Jocoy,
Excellent post on nuclear energy in relation to our key values. I would add Community-Based Economics. A community can harness smaller-scale renewables such as solar and wind power, but cannot build or maintain a nuclear reactor. Single homes can be powered through solar panels (there’s a home here in Maryland whose electric meter runs backwards) and neighborhoods and towns can power themselves with nearby wind farms. Once the initial investments are made, the fuel is free and available to all, empowering communities to build their own community-based infrastructure rather than depending on corporations, which you pointed out are the only actors who can build and run nuclear reactors. Communities can then build their own economies based on the energy they can provide themselves locally.
Of course, statistics show that we cannot supply all our current needs with these sources. To do that, we need to turn to Future Focus and Sustainability to find ways to decrease our needs and bring them more into line with what resources our communities can provide.
If the Green Party doesn’t want to advocate at all for nuclear (and even if they want their candidates to be quiet about it without changing their positions), I understand that entirely. Gregg, it seems like you’re right when you say that the GP should take a radical approach – that would push society in general in a more sustainable direction, unless the GP does anything counterproductive. Concerning GP policy, I think it makes sense to oppose nuclear on a party level.
However, when the real world decisions must be made, I think nuclear is a far better option than coal. Of course, nuclear would HAVE to be used in tandem with huge levels of conservation, efficiency, and renewables.
Gregg Jocoy: Your argument from non-violence is exactly the opposite of the truth.
There are no nuclear weapons states which were first nuclear power station operators.
None.
By contrast, there are plenty of nuclear-power-station-using states which have no nuclear weapons.
Nuclear power is the ONLY viable technology we have, at present, to increase electrical generating capacity to charge battery powered autos…. unless one prefers to build new coal/gas fired generating plants.
I don’t think that’s true, either, Jeff. It requires even more subsidies than renewables or conservation or efficiency. Renewables are also growing at a much faster pace than nuclear.
Gregg said:
“…in case you hadn’t noticed, nuclear power always precedes nuclear weapons. It is true that several nations have a nuclear power but not nuclear weapons, the reverse is not true.”
Gregg,
North Korea and Israel have no nuclear power. They have dedicated plutonium production reactors but no power reactors.
The first US power reactors were in the 1950s’. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were in 1945.
Most of the power reactors in the world (all in the US) operate with regular water as the coolant. The nuclear fuel is loaded into the reactor as a batch, is run for 1 to 3 years and replaced. This type of reactor is not suitable for the manufacture of weapons grade plutonium.
Water cooled reactors do create plutonium while in operation but the resulting plutonium has too much Pu-240 to make a reliable bomb. The plutonium may be suitable for recycle back into the reactor (France and Japan do this) but not for weaponry.
Plutonium production reactors depend on putting uranium in a nuclear reactor for a short time (less than 2 months) and removing it. If you leave the uranium in too long it builds up the Pu-240 which messes it up for weapons use.
Bill
“There will always be industries and people who will try to chip away at those values. Sometimes, it will start with a weasel-y request to allow for debate. And, some people, who do not have a healthy enough sense of suspicion, will fall for it.”
Debate is good. I am confident that I can defend my ideas against challenges. I am a Green because they have the best ideas in their platform, not because their dogma jives with my dogma. We should assume good faith when people question Green ideas or strategy, instead of behaving like anyone who disagrees is a saboteur. The best way to scare off new recruits to the GP is to lecture them about the right way to think.
Craig, I’m imagining a blob of uranium as big as the Earth. Guess what. It’s limited and not just by my imagination.
This isn’t a question of nuclear vs. coal. They’re both dirty and too expansive to the planet. No matter how they are mined and their waste is disposed of.
Instead of subsidizing those industries, we should be investing in new renewable sources of energy.
Hey, Green Ferret, it’s all so ironic.
I am being dogmatic, and I am not even in the Green Party anymore.
I guess for me, it is like, if you are going to have the “Peace Party” and then promote war, why would anyone want to join your party.
If you are going to have the “Right to Life Party” and support abortion, then, why bother?
So, I just think it is hysterical that people in the Green Party would even take time to fight about or consider their core issue. Helping the environment. Protecting the earth.
Whatever.
Carry on. Glad I don’t have to. But, wasting breath fighting on your core issue does set you back.
Tomorrow, I have good research to post from a colleague who has the background. I am not an “energy” person first. I just realize that nuclear energy is a no-brainer. It creates hazard waste which doesn’t go away for tens of thousands of years. Therefore, it is not useful. End of story.
Kimberly – Your comparisons are a bit off. If you are a member of the Green Party and your core issue is protecting the environment and the longevity of the earth as a hospitable place for all humans, it is important to learn all you can about the best ways of doing that.
If you take as dogma that solar energy is good, you might reject any information that would lead you to understand that certain aspects of certain types of solar cell manufacturing processes are very dangerous and are currently contaminating large areas in China and putting the laborers in the plant at serious risk.
You might also fail to learn that fission is a natural phenomenon, that the earth has always been radioactive and always will be, that there are ways to isolate materials so they do not cause any harm and that we have been using those rather simple methods for more than 50 years with great success in protecting both people and the environment from harm due to exposure from nuclear power waste products.
Nuclear reactors, once constructed use tiny amounts of material that generally not used for any other purpose, and there is plenty of that material to last for thousands of years. Wind and solar systems, once constructed, use no continuing sources of material, but they also do not work unless the weather is right. It might surprise you to know that per unit energy produced, wind and solar systems require 3-5 times as much steel, concrete, copper, etc. as nuclear plants. Part of the reason is that you have to build so much infrastructure that is idle a good portion of the day, while the AVERAGE nuclear plant in the US has been running at about 90% of its full capacity for the past 6 years.
There is absolutely no doubt that a member of a party whose primary purpose is environmental protection should not become supportive of pollution, but it is possible for a party to realize that their stance against a particular technology just might be working in opposition to the stated goal.
One more thing – why is it that the Green Party in Germany has worked so hard to shut down operating nuclear power plants even when the professionals in with the responsibility for reliable power have made it very clear that the only way they could do that was to increase the use of natural gas from Russia and to build some new coal fired power stations that burn coal imported from as far away as South America? Doesn’t reality ever enter into the discussion?
First of all, you have to read closer, I AM NOT a member of the Green Party.
Second of all, the Green Party existed AFTER the big push against nuclear with Shoreham in Long Island, etc. The wisdom is not dogma of the party, it is of the activist collective.
I would be much more open to hearing rational discussions about drawbacks of solar and other energies, as I would benefits of nuclear. In fact, I am someone who does not think the new lightbulbs are a good idea, overall.
Because I am not up on every issue – and because no one can be – I asked a colleague for more info. He, too, is NOT a Green Party member. He is, like me, someone with green values, who gets it that nuclear is inherently bad and dangerous.
Here are his comments, which cut to the heart of the reason some people are touting nuclear as “carbon-neutral”:
Hi Kim,
Yes! I am emphatically anti-nuclear! But I am not here to save the soul of the Green Party as I am a registered independent. I am willing to do whatever I can to make sure that nuclear doesn’t become part of the energy mix. I see where many supposed environmental groups are saying that nuclear power is carbon-neutral. This is a fallacy, because there are tremendous amounts of fossil fuels used in the mining, milling, and processing of uranium ore. The nuclear lobby has gotten legislation to define carbon-neutral as related to the operation of a nuclear plant, exclusively. And our environmental friends have bought into this and have no problem accepting the vast amounts of money that the nuclear lobby is spreading around.
Best,
Pete
P.S. In New York:
http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idUSN2653767420090226
(excerpt from) Reuters
Constellation N.Y. Nine Mile 1 reactor back at full power
Reporting by Scott DiSavino; Editing by John Picinich. Feb 26, 2009
NEW YORK, Feb 26 (Reuters) – Constellation Energy Group Inc’s (CEG.N) 621-megawatt Unit 1 at the Nine Mile Point nuclear power station in New York returned to full power by early Thursday, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said in a report. The company reduced the unit to about 45 percent of capacity by early Wednesday to fix a condenser leak. The 1,756 MW Nine Mile Point station is located in Scriba in Oswego County, about 90 miles east of Rochester, New York.
Kimberly – nuclear is less devastating than coal. If it’s a choice between the two (which it very well could be in some cases, like in Germany, it seems), then I would take nuclear every time. Of course, money would be better spent on efficiency, conservation, and developing renewable energy. But to say that there is no and never will be any use for nuclear is wrong.
Coal is not radioactive for ten thousand years after the fact.
We can all remember Chernoble.
There was never such a devasting and surreal coal plant disaster.
Hi Kimberley
While your friend Pete no doubt “gets it that nuclear is inherently bad and dangerous”, it might be wise to quesiton whether that attribute makes him the most independent person to ask.
I’d suggest instead that you look at some outside, disinterested body that has conducted an extensive study on this… like say the European Union. Their “ExternE” project tried to capture the external costs in multiple ways of various power options… greenhouse effects among them. The summary is here and Table 6 (p17) of the detailed pdf shows that nuclear is second only to hydro for low greenhouse gas lifecycle costs.
Kimberly,
Coal and, more importantly, coal waste is radioactive for millions of years. Coal has uranium, radium and thorium in it. After the coal is burned, the radioactive residue is concentrated in the fly ash (if it doesn’t go up the stack).
Unlike used nuclear fuel which is very carefully and conservatively handled to protect both the workers and the public, fly ash frequently goes to an unlined municipal waste disposal dump where the radioactive and heavy metal contaminants can leach into the groundwater. Alternately, it may go to a holding pond as was recently demonstrated by a TVA plant.
Coal has killed far more people than Chernobyl. A google search of “london killer fog” will put coal in proper perspective. This one event alone was more deadly than Chernobyl.
Bill
But, Kimberly, nuclear doesn’t cause global warming nearly as much as coal does. Plus, I don’t know much about uranium mining, but coal mining is destroying the Appalachian mountains and poisoning local towns.
Chernoble was a freak accident caused by faulty engineering. And don’t get me wrong – there are huge problems with nuclear. They’re just not as huge as the problems with coal (by the way, there is more radiation present at an operating coal plant than at a nuclear plant).
I’m not saying nuclear is entirely safe. I’m not saying I really want it expanded. But we need to consider reality. There are bad things about every form of energy generation and we desperately need to reduce our consumption, but it’s not realistic to think that we won’t need energy. So we’re going to have to compromise.
What about the recent TVA plant in Tennessee? That was pretty bad.
And what about the problems with birds and bats associated with wind, along with the habitat destruction of building giant wind turbines? Should we abandon wind because of that?
What about the immense amount of materials need to construct a dam and the habitat destruction it causes? And that’s pretty centralized!
Nuclear is a last resort, and we are currently desperate.
And Kimberly, are you really arguing that coal is better than nuclear?
Bill, I don’t think that the radioactivity of coal (ash) is important or particularly harmful. What is important to consider is the total harm picture. Radioactivity is only one possible pathway of human harm, and for an honest debate it should be the total health impact that is considered. Sure radioactivity is low in the vast amounts of coal ash slurry produced by coal power, but there is mercury, arsenic, other toxic heavy metals and all sorts of other ways it can harm people. So I don’t think the isolation of radioactivity is a useful or sensible way to look at the issue. There could be zero radioactivity in coal ash and it would still be the more harmful option.
Chernobyl has always struck me as a supremely ironic accident. The meltdown and steam explosion at reactor 4 occurred not during normal reactor operations, but during a grossly mishandled safety test, assessing a plant capability that almost certainly would never have been required.
“Lou Novak // Feb 25, 2009 at 11:26 pm
Craig, I’m imagining a blob of uranium as big as the Earth. Guess what. It’s limited and not just by my imagination.”
So is the Sun.
“Kimberly Wilder // Feb 26, 2009 at 6:05 pm
Coal is not radioactive for ten thousand years after the fact.”
Actually, it is worse than that. Not only do you have the half-lives of the radioactive materials in the coal that someone decided to pull out of the ground and either put into the air or on the surface of the earth, you have the INFINITE half-lives of the heavy metal toxins that someone has pulled up as well. Nuclear power does a far better job managing its radio-toxins than any fossil system, including natural gas. Radon anyone?
Ronald,
I think it was the German Green Party that caught hell for supporting a war, and it was the Kosovo war in ‘99. Saving those two million Albanians from being violently expelled from their homes was an uncomfortable experience for the Greens. So their political price (it was a coalition government) was phasing out Germany’s nuke plants.
Hence Germany’s long and troubled affair with politically correct energy sources. I say “troubled” because the Germans are finally coming to their senses and realizing that wind and solar really means natural gas (it’s gotta be dispatchable) and that relying on gas means relying on arbitrary and unreliable Russia.
So they’re rethinking the nuclear phaseout. Ten bucks says they abandon it.
Joffan,
Other than those power plants operating without a bag house, I agree with you that the radioactive elements in the fly ash are a minor concern compared with the some of the other toxic metals. I focused on the radioactive metals because many people only associate radiation with nuclear power plants or weapons.
Just as an aside, in China some of the coal in the northwest is so high in uranium that the clinker and fly ash is being processed as a uranium ore. The Chech Republic is looking at doing this also.
Bill
Nuclear power of a flawed failed technology whose time has past. It makes no sense for anyone but the few who will benefit greatly – meaning money.
If we didn’t have a few with a lot of influence that could make lots of money from nulcear power, the disscussion would be over.
Just to add some quantitative numbers to what people have been talking about….
Coal plant emissions cause 25,000 deaths ANNUALLY in the US alone; hundreds of thousands worldwide. Western nuclear power plants have never had any measurable impact on public health. Credible estimates of Chernobyl’s total eventual impact range from ~100 to ~10,000, i.e., about 1% of coal’s ANNUAL worldwide impact. And Chernobyl was a one time event that released far more radiation than a Western reactor is capable of under any circumstances.
US coal plants are the largest single cause of global warming, responsible for ~33% of US emissions. Nuclear power’s net emissions of CO2 (accounting for all parts of the process such as mining, enrichment, plant construction, etc..) are similar to those of renewable sources, and negligible compared to fossil fuels. Nuclear’s net emissions are ~2% of coal’s, and ~5% that of natural gas plants. The point is that emissions are basically negligible for both nuclear and renewables. The results of a typical net emissions study can be found at:
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Magazines/Bulletin/Bull422/article4.pdf
As Joffan points out, scientific studies of the overall public health and environmental risks/impacts of various energy sources (such as ExternE) all show that nuclear’s risks/impacts are tiny compared to fossil fuels, and similar to renewables.
The notion that nuclear waste is unique in terms of longevity and long-term hazard is a myth. Many other waste streams actually pose a far greater very-long-term risk than nuclear waste, since they actually take longer to become harmless (if ever), they are generated in vastly greater volumes, they have a much more dispersible physical form, and they are buried with infinitely less care. It’s not that the long-term hazard is unprecedented; the requirements are unprecedented. No other industry has ever been required to completely contain all of its wastes/toxins, and then guarantee that the wastes will never have an impact for as long as they remain hazardous. Scientists have known for a long time how to dispose of nuclear waste, such that the long-term risk, while not zero, is much smaller than the risks associated with other energy sources and other waste streams.
I can’t believe the coal and nuclear industry arguments I am reading here. Telling me to choose between coal and nuclear is like telling me to choose between the Democrat and the Republican. Neither.
As to the birds killed by windmills. They are a lot fewer than the birds killed by smoke stacks and the damage done to the environment by global warming. Here is an article from Audubon on some of the damage: http://www.audubon.org/bird/bacc/index.html
There is no safe way to deal with nuclear waste. None. Scientists have developed nothing in that area. For those that insist otherwise, post the links here to prove it. I don’t think you can.
Nuclear is not worth it as a power source. It is ridiculously expensive and dangerous. If Solar and wind were subsidized to the same extent nuclear has been we would already have a safe energy economy.
The only point of nuclear nuclear energy is to create nuclear weapons. And I hope that no one here will be arguing in favor of those.
Ian,
Some facts would be helpful. Jim Hopf and others have made cogent, thoughtful posts with real numbers.
I can see the Altamont wind farm from my office window; it barely runs. At a marginal rate 34 cents/Kwh on my electric bill, California’s energy approach is more than an embarrassment, it is failed public policy. The California Energy Commission stopped publishing Wind Performance Reporting Systems Reports in 2000-2001, although required by regulation (California Administrative Code, Title 20, Chapter 2, Subchapter 3, Article 4)
Ian Wilder,
Come on. This “ridiculously expensive and dangerous” energy source is powering half my province (Ontario), and my power costs 5 cents per kilowatt-hour.
There are two nuclear plants just east of Toronto, right next to Canada’s busiest highway. Millions of people live in the area, and those who exercise and have good diets enjoy a level of health unprecedented in human history, and unmatched in societies without sufficient supplies of electricity.
If you want links on how to dispose of nuclear waste, try Googling “nuclear waste disposal” or something similar.
But here’s the kicker: you have to read what you find.
Canada has nuclear energy, and no nuclear weapons. So do Germany, Sweden, Japan, South Korea.
Ian said:
“The only point of nuclear nuclear energy is to create nuclear weapons.”
All of the nuclear power plants in the US (and most of the rest of the world) are light water pressurized and boiling water reactors. These are of no value to nuclear weapons production*. The plutonium created in these reactors is quite unsatisfactory for weapons use.
*The one exception to this is a contract that TVA has with DOE to irradiate capsules for the production of tritium in one of their reactors. This tritium production is in direct support of the weapons program.
Bill
I think it is valid to reconsider and change policy positions if our understanding of the issue has changed or whether progress has been made in respect to its relationship to our values. This kind of discussion is healthy.
Although I have tried to deaden my knee-jerk reaction against nuclear to at least take an objective view of the subject, I still find myself unable to support the expansion of nuclear energy. Besides the serious concerns of waste disposal, which might be slightly improved by reprocessing, nuclear is still much more expensive than conservation, efficiency, and wind when you include the true costs. As the next generation of solar cells draws near, I expect them to overtake nuclear as well. The cost per greenhouse gas reduction is much higher for nuclear than these sources, so every dollar that we spend on nuclear instead of on conservation or wind lowers our ability to combat global warming. The full costs of nuclear are hidden from massive subsidies and are typically twice their initial estimates. Investment banks don’t want to deal with these projects because of their financial impacts. The development time to construct a nuclear power plant is incredibly lengthy and overshadows the time required for wind, solar, and efficiency projects. We can’t sit around waiting for nuke plants to launch.
In terms of the reliability of renewable sources, storage systems such as advanced batteries, ultracapacitors, compressed air energy storage, and pumped water storage can improve wind and solar reliability. When a nuclear power plant goes down, you lose an enormous power supply at once. Although nuclear does have higher capacity factors, when a plant goes down unexpectedly, or even for scheduled maintenance, that’s an enormous load to have to replace.
Distributed generation, through on-site generation and microgrids, would enhance energy security far more than nuclear energy. It is easier for terrorists, natural disasters, and operator error to strike one nuclear power plant than hundreds of wind turbines or thousands of solar panels, unless of course they blotted out the sun or halted the winds.
A sensible, sustainable, and Green energy policy should focus on renewables, conservation, energy efficiency, and distributed generation. Although I do find it important to revisit our positions to make sure they are still in line with our values, in this particular instance, I find our current position to be correct.
For more information, I strongly suggest Amory Lovins’ latest piece on nuclear energy. It lays out a tremendous case against nuclear energy, without even delving into the very real issues of waste and safety.
http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid504.php
I’ve really enjoyed this discussion so far, it has been intelligent and mostly respectful. I also think it is important to have your beliefs questioned on important topics like this.
In my opinion, energy needs to be looked at from a local level, looking at the long term.
Energy need itself needs to be considered: we consume too much, mostly through inefficiency and waste. Poorly insulated homes, unnecessary “electronics” and so many devices constantly plugged into outlets, communities based on car/SUV lifestyles spread out so that to trek from home to school to work to the mall to groceries requires a car, and often a big one to hold all the stuff we buy and commute children and family miles a day.
Long term planning would begin establishing walkable communities, even multiple ones within a larger metropolitan area. In each, one can walk to school, work, shopping and groceries. Mass transit for longer journeys.
New home and business builds would require energy efficiency at least in terms of home heat (for us northern dwellers), incentives and the market would drive more energy efficiencies. Older homes need to be retrofitted, updated to higher standards for insulation – this will take a long time, and will require incentives.
And generally we should become more “localcentric”, closer to the community, and closer to each other. We should be moving more intentionally toward buying local, producing local, eating local, and living local.
Then – when we know what the energy consumption needs in theory of the community we should strive for are, we consider how we can best provide that energy, preferably locally. When we consume less, we will require less, and solar and wind power could satisfy our needs.
Basically, I believe we are living way beyond our means. Nuclear power, with all of its dangers and all of its “benefits”, is just a crutch for a massive energy addiction. We need to start addressing that addiction rather than contribute further to this decline.
PS I am learning a lot about nuclear power from these comments, I appreciate them.
Zeleni,
As I am sure you have noticed, I strongly support nuclear energy I appreciate that you are willing to examine all forms of low CO2 power generation.
My personal preference would be to institute a steep carbon tax and let the marketplace sort out the best way to respond. I think Jim Hansen’s carbon tax and dividend is the best plan around. He happens to support nuclear but his plan is just as valid for a renewables and conservation only approach.
It is true that nuclear gets some subsidies but so do wind and solar. So far, no states have enacted nuclear mandates. State mandates have done a great deal to drive renewables.
The magnitude of the nuclear subsidies have been greatly exaggerated. Most of the “nuclear subsidies” have either gone into the weapons program, research for the nuclear navy or to clean up the environmental messes from the Manhattan project.
Bill
The Green Party of Canada are big proponents of the Carbon Tax.
See:
http://www.greenparty.ca/en/background/06.06.2007b
Well, not sure if my argument got lost or forgotten.
Though, it is a huge, big, government/industry conspiracy lie to say that nuclear is “low carbon.”
The fuzzy math that produces that research is a result of the fact that the nuclear industry pushed through measures so that the government starts counting the “carbon cost” of nuclear only at the site of the reactor.
That excludes all the carbon waste that happens during the mining, milling and transporting of the needed uranium.
That is why the facts are so difficult to refute. Even as we citizens try to keep up learning and educating, we are fighting the combined efforts of the nuclear lobby working with and through our own government’s propaganda machine.
With the inspiration of the Libertarian Party’s idea to have a “free state”, where all the people who love liberty would go live together and create their own rules…I got halfway to a solution…
I just wish we could take everyone who wanted to try the risk of nuclear, and put them on a place far away where the nuclear power plant would be only near their homes. Unfortunately, there is only one earth.
I would rather stop blow drying my hair, keeping the lights on all evening in the winter, and even stop posting on the computer, and just use less energy, than have to spend money on any monstrous-scale new power project, but especially rather than even have to worry what uranium might do to me or my children.
I also think that women have more to think about. We have more soft tissue in our body. We are the first in the line of the cancer waves when nuclear goes wrong…
By the way…do you even trust the current government, military, industrial complex to do things correctly and keep you informed properly? Here in Long Island, we had a reactor at Brookhaven National Lab. For years, they were letting school children walk right by it on tour, and then they realized, years later, it was leaking.
I don’t know who I would trust to create a nuclear plant if I had to trust someone. Maybe a class of altruistic priests. But, not our current government, and not the nuclear power industry.
That is why the facts are so difficult to refute. Even as we citizens try to keep up learning and educating, we are fighting the combined efforts of the nuclear lobby working with and through our own government’s propaganda machine.
To government, nuclear energy means lost fossil fuel tax revenue. The nukes-are-subsidized liars sometimes make up numbers, but they seldom have the imagination to make up ones as big as this loss.
That means to the extent government propagandizes in respect to nuclear energy, it propagandizes against.
Ronald,
I read thru you link on the Green party proposal for a carbon tax in Canada. I could support that but have a few suggestions:
1) $50/ton of CO2 is only equivalent to $16/ton of coal. I’m not sure that will be quite high enough. You may want to shoot for twice that level on a long term basis.
2) $50/ton is pretty regressive. I would suggest that, instead of the government using it as general revenue or for green projects, that 100% rebating on a per capita basis would avoid much of the stress on the populace. It would also, from a political standpoint, make a stiff carbon tax more acceptable.
Bill
Ronald,
You’re right, the Canadian Greens are big proponents of a carbon tax. In the last federal election, they didn’t win a single seat. In fact, in British Columbia, the “greenest” province in Canada, the Greens were just completely trounced.
I humbly submitted my thoughts on why this happened. Greens interested in electoral success might be interested:
http://canadianenergyissues.com/2008/11/28/green-policy-vs-hard-politics-in-north-america-lessons-from-canada%E2%80%99s-left-coast/
Kimberly,
Several studies of life cycle emissions have been conducted of comparative electrical generation technologies. With one exception, they are pretty consistent. Here is some data from a typical one:
(All in tons of CO2 per gigawatt-hour)
Coal: 1,041
Natural gas: 622
Solar PV: 39
Nuclear: 17
Wind: 14
This particular study was a doctoral thesis at the University of Wisconson. Here’s the link: http://fti.neep.wisc.edu/pdf/fdm1181.pdf
The one exception is a “study” by Jan Willem Storm van Leeuwen and Philip Smith. This is not really a study at all but a propaganda piece. It is full of improper assumptions which drive a high CO2 footprint conclusion. It must be read carefully for the bias.
Typical Leeuwen and Smith assumptions:
Nuclear plants are shutdown after 20 years (most in the US are approaching 30 and 1/2 have been liscensed to run for 60 years)
All uranium enrichment uses 100% coal powered energy intensive gaseous diffusion. (gaseous diffusion is a world war 2 technology and is rapidly being replaced with centrifuge technology. French gaseous diffusion is powered by nuclear power.)
All uranium mining assumes the lowest grade of ore. (they ignore all Canadian ore which is very high grade as well as the better mines in Australia.)
Bill
Here’s something interesting from Vermont about an actual nuclear plant. It makes a good argument against nuclear, but begs the question: if this plant were to close in 2012, what would replace it?
http://www.progressiveparty.org/blog/?p=655