Nuclear power is the short term answer

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Fred Pearce bemoans the weak response of environment groups to the British Government's nuclear plans I remember when environmental campaigners were the thrusting young radicals, brave speakers of the truth. Charles Clover: Earthlog Ten UK nuclear power stations by 2020 The new generation of nuclear power stations What happened? Most of the responses from the major groups to the Government's plans to revive nuclear power were tired, threadbare and cowardly. Nuclear power, said Greenpeace director John Sauven, "can only deliver a 4 per cent cut in [carbon] emissions." advertisement Others had different figures, but the implication was that because nuclear couldn't solve all our energy problems, it should be ignored. That is as fatuous as arguing that because the wind doesn't blow every day, we shouldn't develop wind power. "The earliest a new nuclear power station could come on stream is around 2017," says the Green Party's Caroline Lucas. Indeed so. But since when was global warming a problem that ceased in 2017? New nukes won't do much to meet early international carbon emissions targets, for sure. But, if you think about it, doesn't that rather undermine another green argument that nuclear will somehow stop us developing renewables? Tony Juniper over at Friends of the Earth called the nuclear decision "irrational because the economics do not stack up." I've never heard him make that criticism of solar or wave power. Of course Juniper is right that nuclear power generates "radioactive waste that will remain deadly for tens of thousands of years." But, unlike the deadly carbon dioxide being produced at the rate of billions of tonnes a year, spent nuclear fuel can be buried out of harm's way. The sainted Tom Burke - former director or FoE and environmental adviser to successive Conservative environment ministers - says: forget nuclear, go for coal. Coal, that is, with its carbon emissions captured and buried underground. Tom, dear boy, it is preposterous to suggest that this technology is available off-the-shelf today. Even its friends say it requires another decade of R&D before it is commercially viable. Some of the green arguments have a horribly circular logic to them. Gordon Brown will never be able to build nuclear; even Thatcher failed, Sauven says. Omitting to mention that it was largely opposition from environment groups like his that hobbled her plans. Similarly the very high costs sometimes quoted for handling nuclear waste are, in part, a consequence of the environment hue and cry itself. In an ideal world, few of us would start from here. It would probably have been better if we had spent the last half century investing R&D budgets in renewables rather than nuclear. But we are where we are. And, as a result of that investment, nuclear is a proven way of generating large amounts of electricity at competitive cost and with low carbon emissions. Right now, climate change trumps all other environmental concerns. And that requires a rethink from green campaigners. Even if, as I suspect, the future really does lie in renewable energy, it is cavalier in the extreme to ignore what nuclear can offer in the meantime. I quite often give public talks about climate change. The question from the audience that I dread is my attitude to nuclear power. Not because I don't want to answer, but because there is a high chance that the next 20 minutes will become an argument about the nuclear issue, during which climate change is forgotten. I do sometimes wonder if some environmentalists are interested in saving the world at all.

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Fred Pearce is not normally one of the journalists who refuses to allow the facts to get in the way of a good diatribe. That makes his bizarre characterisation of my views on coal and nuclear all the more regrettable. I did not say forget nuclear, I said that no matter how hard the nuclear industry tries it cannot help with climate change. What is more I laid out the factual reasons why. They can be found at www.e3g.org. Furthermore, I have been quite clear that the world will use a huge amount of coal and that it MUST make this coal use carbon neutral. This will be very expensive, but carbon capture and storage is an imperative not an option for dealing with climate change. I'm sorry if these views don't meet Fred's journalistic desire for novelty but I am in the business of solving problems not simply writing about them. If Fred has any bright ideas about how else we deal with the 2GW a week of new coal fired power stations being built in China alone every week I would be glad to know what they are.
Posted by tom burke on January 20, 2008 11:24 PM
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So let's get this straight. You patronise Tom Burke with a 'dear boy' for suggesting we rely on Carbon Capture & Storage, a technology that can't be deployed for a decade.

But Caroline Lucas is a fool for saying nukes are a bad idea because the can't be on-stream for, er, ten years.

See your contradiction there at all?

If you want to know why Lucas thinks that deadline counts, have a word with your boss, Charles Clover. As he explained,">link, 'anyone who actually reads the report published by the Inter-Governmental Panel for Climate Change will have seen the chilling prediction that we have until 2015 - in effect, tomorrow - to get the world's greenhouse gas emissions on a declining path or incur dangerous climate change'.

You claim that 'nuclear is a proven way of generating large amounts of electricity at competitive cost and with low carbon emissions'. Getting a figure for its cost isn't easy; figures vary wildly, seemingly according to the disposition of the person telling you.

But the truth can be found in this fact; if it's so cheap, why are none being built anywhere on earth without government subsidy?

E.On said they'd be interested in doing some in future, but let's look a little closer and ask who is going to insure it. Watch the commercial investments disappear if they need to insure themselves.

Not a problem with offshore wind, that.

Nuclear power cannot be a short-term answer, for the simple reason that it cannot be on-stream in the short term, and then once it's built it will be used for a long time.

Not content with emitting all the greenhouse gases we can, it seems we want to bequeath to our descendants the maximum quantity of radioactive waste we can make, too.
Posted by Merrick on January 20, 2008 7:43 PM
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The end of the Megatons to Megawatts US-Russian deal in five years' time will leave half of the US nuclear stations without fuel and will put the US and France in competition for dwindling supplies of uranium from Canada and Australia.

Primary mining production fell 15% and 20% in Canada and Australia in 2006 over 2005 and the secondary supplies (which with the mining meet the current demand) end in 2013.

Because of tight uranium supplies France is already importing electricity from Germany which includes some wind power. Otherwise some of the lights would be going in in France.
Posted by John Busby on January 19, 2008 2:48 PM
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This article tells it all. question is whether UK has the ability to build the a modern nuclear plant to plan. See what is happening in Finland where they are having to relearn how to do the job. The UK is even more backward they the Finns are in the nuclear business.
Posted by Bryan McHugh on January 19, 2008 1:03 PM
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Let's see. What timeframe has been tossed around as the "tipping point" from which things will go non-linear in terms of warming?

Seems like it was something like ten-years a year or two ago. And that optimistic evaluation is probably long gone given more recent reports on the speed at which this calamity is approaching.

So remind us again, why technologies that are not going to be able to impact until long after that tipping point date should be a priority, or even a consideration, at this stage of the game? Who exactly is being cavalier here?
Posted by Dennis Keim on January 19, 2008 6:55 AM
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Dear Fred

Your last question is one that I have been asking for some time. What is that the environmentalists really want ?

And frankly I don't know though I doubt that their ambitions are as small as "saving" the planet.

The major reason I am a global warming skeptic is because every time I check out the background to the flavour of the day stories promoted by the warming lobby I find their conclusions to be overstated. Sometimes vastly so.

Occasionally you'll read a conclusion that flies in the face of reason. But question it and you're cast as the flat earth ignoramus.

Case in point the Cartaret Islands.
These are going under water but not due to the reason given, rising sea levels due to Global Warming.

But rather because they are the top of an extinct volcano that is subsiding coupled with coastal erosion caused by the inhabitants previous habit of using dynamite to blow holes in their protective coral reef.

But dare to question the warmers story and the yelling starts. The only plausible conclusion that I can draw from this is that the other sides arguments are so weak that they can't stand objective scrutiny.

The Peer Review process is a case in point. It has been severely damaged by the actions of the Warmers.

A small cadre of, in their minds, the Great and the Good of Climatology review each others papers and say that they have merit.

This is often done without the benefit of the the reviewer actually seeing the background data or understanding how it has been manipulated to get the conclusion that was drawn. And the data is ALWAYS manipulated, it has to be.

You should read, if you have not done so already, some of the discussion threads in Steve McIntyre's Climate Audit blog to see the extent of this kind of dubious activity. It is extremely widespread in Climate Science.

His major issue is getting researchers to release background data to him. What are they so afraid of ?

Is their concern more about being found to have made a data interpretation error or is it in finding the truth ?

It is normal good scientific practice to have to prove your hypothesis. Not to obstruct access to the data while asking people to take your word for it.

A good scientist should always be Skeptical and being a scientist myself I wear the badge with pride.









Another sign of this is that one side in a discussion is apparently seek to suppress contrary information and promote only their view of the "truth" the alarm bells should ring in the head of any reasonably informed person.





Posted by pablo an ex pat on January 18, 2008 9:15 PM
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Pearce remembers when "environmental campaigners were the thrusting young radicals"?

Maybe there was such a time, but none of those radicals ever opposed nuclear energy. That has alway been the province of petrodollar sellouts.
Posted by G.R.L. Cowan on January 18, 2008 7:16 PM
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