<![CDATA[Grist - Comment Feed for This White House science adviser thinks America should embrace nuclear power]]> Grist Comment Feed en Comment #1 by Jim Riccio Greenpeace http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-12-obama-adviser-nuclear-power/ Fri, 12 Jun 2009 13:00:11 -0700 http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-12-obama-adviser-nuclear-power/1 Mr Tindale is dead wrong if he thinks that nuclear power is a "bridge technolgy" to abate climate change. If we are to abate the catastrophic impacts of climate chage we need solutuions that are fast and affordable.  That rules out nuclear power. 

Former Senator George Mitchell pointed this out in his book World on Fire over a decade ago.  Mitchell wrote that "for nuclear power to offset even 5% of global warming emmissions would require that worldwide nuclear capacity be nearly doubled from today's level.  That means that nuclear power is simply not a medium term option for slowing global warming."

If Mr Tindale's "Climate Answer" is to build nuclear reactors as a "bridge technology" he is truly building a bridge to nowhere!

 

]]> Mr Tindale is dead wrong if he thinks that nuclear power is a "bridge technolgy" to abate climate change. If we are to abate the catastrophic impacts of climate chage we need solutuions that are fast and affordable.  That rules out nuclear power. 

Former Senator George Mitchell pointed this out in his book World on Fire over a decade ago.  Mitchell wrote that "for nuclear power to offset even 5% of global warming emmissions would require that worldwide nuclear capacity be nearly doubled from today's level.  That means that nuclear power is simply not a medium term option for slowing global warming."

If Mr Tindale's "Climate Answer" is to build nuclear reactors as a "bridge technology" he is truly building a bridge to nowhere!

 

]]> Comment #2 by randino http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-12-obama-adviser-nuclear-power/ Fri, 12 Jun 2009 17:03:04 -0700 http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-12-obama-adviser-nuclear-power/2 I think we need to have a sample of the Kool Aid being served at the White House analyzed.  First the abomination of the mountain top removal coal mining.  Now the Nuke Nuts raise their hideous heads. 

What really gets me is this assumption that energy use will increase by leaps and bounds in the US. Says who?  If there ever was a line that had utility lobby written all over it, this is it.  No one dares say conservation.  No one dares speak about energy efficiency.  Nope.  Those are off the table. We assume that what was will always be, and that trends operating today will continue into infinity tomorrow.  If this is sanity, please let me go mad.

Randy Cunningham

]]> I think we need to have a sample of the Kool Aid being served at the White House analyzed.  First the abomination of the mountain top removal coal mining.  Now the Nuke Nuts raise their hideous heads. 

What really gets me is this assumption that energy use will increase by leaps and bounds in the US. Says who?  If there ever was a line that had utility lobby written all over it, this is it.  No one dares say conservation.  No one dares speak about energy efficiency.  Nope.  Those are off the table. We assume that what was will always be, and that trends operating today will continue into infinity tomorrow.  If this is sanity, please let me go mad.

Randy Cunningham

]]> Comment #3 by Nemo http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-12-obama-adviser-nuclear-power/ Sun, 14 Jun 2009 01:14:15 -0700 http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-12-obama-adviser-nuclear-power/3  

 

The Rocky Mountain Institute has evaluated new nuclear power for climate change mitigation.  The analysis can be found at the following web page:

 http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid467.php

FORGET NUCLEAR

"This non-technical summary article compares the cost, climate protection potential, reliability, financial risk, market success, deployment speed, and energy contribution of new nuclear power with those of its low- or no-carbon competitors. It explains why soaring taxpayer subsidies aren't attracting investors. Capitalists instead favor climate-protecting competitors with less cost, construction time, and financial risk. The nuclear industry claims it has no serious rivals, let alone those competitors-which, however, already outproduce nuclear power worldwide and are growing enormously faster.

Most remarkably, comparing all options' ability to protect the earth's climate and enhance energy security reveals why nuclear power could never deliver these promised benefits even if it could find free-market buyers-while its carbon-free rivals, which won $71 billion of private investment in 2007 alone, do offer highly effective climate and security solutions, sooner, with greater confidence."

"New nuclear power is so costly that shifting a dollar of spending from nuclear to efficiency protects the climate several-fold more than shifting a dollar of spending from coal to nuclear. Indeed, under plausible assumptions, spending a dollar on new nuclear power instead of on efficient use of electricity has a worse climate effect than spending that dollar on new coal power!

If we’re serious about addressing climate change, we must invest resources wisely to expand and accelerate climate protection. Because nuclear power is costly and slow to build, buying more of it rather than of its cheaper, swifter rivals will instead reduce and retard climate protection."

 

The White House science adviser should study this article and, maybe, enlist RMI as a consultant to show them how climate change should be mitigated.  New nuclear power plants are not the answer.

]]>  

 

The Rocky Mountain Institute has evaluated new nuclear power for climate change mitigation.  The analysis can be found at the following web page:

 http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid467.php

FORGET NUCLEAR

"This non-technical summary article compares the cost, climate protection potential, reliability, financial risk, market success, deployment speed, and energy contribution of new nuclear power with those of its low- or no-carbon competitors. It explains why soaring taxpayer subsidies aren't attracting investors. Capitalists instead favor climate-protecting competitors with less cost, construction time, and financial risk. The nuclear industry claims it has no serious rivals, let alone those competitors-which, however, already outproduce nuclear power worldwide and are growing enormously faster.

Most remarkably, comparing all options' ability to protect the earth's climate and enhance energy security reveals why nuclear power could never deliver these promised benefits even if it could find free-market buyers-while its carbon-free rivals, which won $71 billion of private investment in 2007 alone, do offer highly effective climate and security solutions, sooner, with greater confidence."

"New nuclear power is so costly that shifting a dollar of spending from nuclear to efficiency protects the climate several-fold more than shifting a dollar of spending from coal to nuclear. Indeed, under plausible assumptions, spending a dollar on new nuclear power instead of on efficient use of electricity has a worse climate effect than spending that dollar on new coal power!

If we’re serious about addressing climate change, we must invest resources wisely to expand and accelerate climate protection. Because nuclear power is costly and slow to build, buying more of it rather than of its cheaper, swifter rivals will instead reduce and retard climate protection."

 

The White House science adviser should study this article and, maybe, enlist RMI as a consultant to show them how climate change should be mitigated.  New nuclear power plants are not the answer.

]]> Comment #4 by vbstenswick http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-12-obama-adviser-nuclear-power/ Sun, 14 Jun 2009 05:35:28 -0700 http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-12-obama-adviser-nuclear-power/4 While I do not oppose nukes, I also believe that the projections of load growth are just the utilities why of keeping control.  The interim technology should not be nuclear but waste heat.  A generous feed-in-tariff for electricity from waste heat would halt all new power plants nationwide.  This is the bridging technology to engineered geothermal, ocean power, intermittent power with energy storage.

]]> While I do not oppose nukes, I also believe that the projections of load growth are just the utilities why of keeping control.  The interim technology should not be nuclear but waste heat.  A generous feed-in-tariff for electricity from waste heat would halt all new power plants nationwide.  This is the bridging technology to engineered geothermal, ocean power, intermittent power with energy storage.

]]> Comment #5 by johnpdeever http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-12-obama-adviser-nuclear-power/ Tue, 16 Jun 2009 10:07:55 -0700 http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-12-obama-adviser-nuclear-power/5 Merely to boil water while producing a poison (nuclear waste) that lasts 250,000 years -- longer than our civilization will -- is wrong, even insane.  But the anti-nuke argument I find most persuasive goes like this: "Fine.  Let private power companies build nuclear power plants ONLY if and when they will assume all the inherent risks."  The unfair (and recently renewed) Price Anderson Act gives companies no-fault government insurance against liability for nuclear incidents at  power plants.  As Public Citizen points out, "No other government agency provides this level of taxpayer indemnification to non-government personnel."  So: Want nuclear? Let it try to compete without this unfair subsidy.

More here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price-Anderson_Nuclear_Industries_Indemnity_Act

 

]]> Merely to boil water while producing a poison (nuclear waste) that lasts 250,000 years -- longer than our civilization will -- is wrong, even insane.  But the anti-nuke argument I find most persuasive goes like this: "Fine.  Let private power companies build nuclear power plants ONLY if and when they will assume all the inherent risks."  The unfair (and recently renewed) Price Anderson Act gives companies no-fault government insurance against liability for nuclear incidents at  power plants.  As Public Citizen points out, "No other government agency provides this level of taxpayer indemnification to non-government personnel."  So: Want nuclear? Let it try to compete without this unfair subsidy.

More here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price-Anderson_Nuclear_Industries_Indemnity_Act

 

]]>