What I cannot understand is the current enthusiasm for nuclear power
(well, I can understand it for the power companies--it's a cash cow
for them). It's really a dumb way to boil water. I probably agree
that coal-generated power is worse, but its a close call. And the
only reason that coal-generated power is so cheap is that we aren't
paying the full cost of using coal--we're leaving that for our
children and grandchildren to worry about. If the power companies had
to pay the full cost of the environmental damage done by coal the
cost of coal-derived electricity would be high enough that almost any
other source would be cheaper.
For all it's problems though, we don't have to worry about accidents
at coal plants, or any other large electric power source, which can
have such catastrophic consequences as can happen at a nuclear power
plant. Even though the odds of one of those happening are low, they
are not zero, which is why we require that anyone wanting to build a
nuclear power plant has to jump through some pretty difficult and
expensive safety hoops. Even so, that doesn't bring the odds of a
catastrophic accident to zero, and if we go on a building binge the
cumulative odds of one will grow to the point that it becomes likely
that there will be one or two of them in the world in the next 50-75
years, and considering the world-wide reaction to Chernobyl, that's
one or two too many.
It's true that no energy source is totally risk free, but only
nuclear power hold a threat over everyone in the vicinity of a plant
(i.e., 10-20 mile radius) and a risk of serious radiation being
distributed over a hemisphere (the radioactive cloud from Chernobyl
made it around the world at least twice). Fortunately, we have not
had a Chernobyl-sized accident in this country, but one can read any
number of books about Three-Mile-Island to realize just how close we
came at TMI (I recommend Sam Walker's excellent narrative history of
the event "Three Mile Island: A Nuclear Crisis in Historical
Perspective"--just about as objective as any I've seen on the
subject). TMI got all the attention, but we have had other accidents
that didn't make as big a splash but which came nearly as close (See
"We Almost Lost Detroit", by John G. Fuller, about a very close call
at the Fermi Reactor outside of Detroit).
It is also important to realize that the oft-heard statement that "no
one died at TMI" is simply myth. No one was killed outright by what
happened, but the radiation released (both intentional and
unintentional) was larger than was ever made public (see "A
Reevaluation of Cancer Incidence Near the Three Mile Island Nuclear
Plant: The Collision of Evidence and Assumptions," by Steve Wing,
David Richardson, Donna Armstrong and Douglas Crawford-Brown,
published in "Environmental Health Perspectives," January 1997. All
four are with the School of Public Health at the University of NC,
Chapel Hill), and as a result there have been and will continue to be
deaths from radiation induced cancer among those living in the area
at the time. The problem is, of course, that we don't know who those
people are, because cancers don't leave a fingerprint behind
indicating what caused them, but we do know that cancer incidence nd
death rates among the population in the vicinity of TMI in 1979 are
and will continue to be higher than they would be had TMI not
occurred.
It is, of course, true that no source of energy for human use is
without it's environmental impact, including deaths (although, except
for nuclear and coal, most of those deaths occur to construction
workers during the building of the facility, or during the mining and
processing of coal or uranium). Typically, however, most deaths occur
among the workers who build or maintain the facility, or mined the
material used as its fuel. Presumably, those people understand and
accept the risks involved with their jobs. Nuclear plants and coal
plants, however, are different. The emissions from both of these
plants will ultimately affect the general populations in the area,
whether they are aware of the risks or not. Several recent studies
cite increased cancer risks among the populations surrounding
"properly" functioning nuclear plants, both from radiation leaked
into the air, and radioactive materials leaked into the water need
for operation of the plants, and subsequently finding its way to the
local ground water, and drinking water supplies.
And only nuclear power generates waste products that will be lethally
dangerous for a hundred-thousand years. And of course coal generates
vast quantities of waste that we have to do something with. We need
to build no more nuclear or coal plants until that problem is fixed.
Yucca Mountain is probably a dead issue now. I'm happy about that (it
was probably the worst of all the sites considered--flawed geology,
unexpected access to ground water if the waste material leaks,
seismic fault lines in the area, the list goes on and on), but we are
now left with nowhere to put the waste except in the storage pools
and surface casks at the various plants around the country. Not a
good idea. Clearly, we cannot build any more nuclear plants until
that problem is solved, and as long as we have any operating nuclear
plants (and we cannot just shut them all down now or the electric
grid will collapse) the problem will continue to get worse, so we do
need someplace to put all that stuff. But we aren't alone. No country
in the world with nuclear power plants has solved the problem, and
none is even close to a solution.
OK, so if we can't build any more coal or nuclear power plants, what
do we do? The obvious answer is in the renewables. Study after study
has shown that the US has enough potential energy from wind or solar
power (and geothermal, but that's a way down the road) to meet all
our energy needs, and a dramatic increase in efficiency can meet all
of our new power needs for the next twenty years. This is a very
doable thing. California has kept its per capita energy use nearly
constant for 35 years, while the national energy use has grown by
about 50%. This has happened through a series of innovative programs
whereby power companies are rewarded for encouraging efficiency among
their rate payers, stiffening building coeds to mandate higher energy
efficiency in new homes and buildings, insisting that appliances sold
in the state meet stringent efficiency standards, and encouraging
utilities to use stepped rates and time of use pricing for their
energy products. These are actions that every state can pursue, and
doing it will obviate the need for any new coal or nuclear plants to
meet demand until solar and wind sources can be built up to meed
demand and the distribution grid improved to handle the demand for
long distance power transmission that will be needed if we are to
exploit the wind resources of the eastern slope of the Rockies and
off our ocean shores and the solar resources of the southwest.
There are many other things that can be done to make the US a world
leader in clean and efficient energy provision--an action that we
must take if we are to get the world to take the problem as seriously
as we all must. But happily, coal, oil, natural gas and nuclear
energy do not have to be a part of the solution.
Oh, and by the way, the studies also show that it doesn't have to
cost us an arm and a leg. For an example of what could be done, here
is a link to a study recently released that shows how North Carolina
could meet its energy needs without resorting to any new coal or
nuclear plants and actually shutting down a bunch of its older,
dirtier coal plants:
<http://www.ncwarn.org/docs/reports/ncw_report_r8.pdf>. I know both
of the authors of this report andcan testify that they are very
straight shooters. This report is authoritative.
So-called "global warming" is just a secret ploy by wacko
tree-huggers to make America energy independent, clean our air and
water, improve the fuel efficiency of our vehicles, kick-start
21st-century industries, and make our cities safer. Don't let them
get away with it!!