Patrick Moore is on the nuclear bandwagon.

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Patrick Moore, the founder of Greenpeace, is going nuclear. For those who doesn't know the inners of Greenpeace history, Moore was one of the cofounders of the world famous nature protectionist organization and they truly fighted to protect our environment in the first years following its foundation. Then the red mafia took over the organization and made it infamous. (They paid seal hunters to make videos of them killing baby seals, they attacked nuclear waste cargo ships, putting the cargo at risk, they faked the numbers of people who died on Chernobyl,,, etc...)

Moore posted an article in The Washington Post, where he says that nuclear energy is the way to go.

Spoiler :

In the early 1970s when I helped found Greenpeace, I believed that nuclear energy was synonymous with nuclear holocaust, as did most of my compatriots. That's the conviction that inspired Greenpeace's first voyage up the spectacular rocky northwest coast to protest the testing of U.S. hydrogen bombs in Alaska's Aleutian Islands. Thirty years on, my views have changed, and the rest of the environmental movement needs to update its views, too, because nuclear energy may just be the energy source that can save our planet from another possible disaster: catastrophic climate change.

Look at it this way: More than 600 coal-fired electric plants in the United States produce 36 percent of U.S. emissions -- or nearly 10 percent of global emissions -- of CO2, the primary greenhouse gas responsible for climate change. Nuclear energy is the only large-scale, cost-effective energy source that can reduce these emissions while continuing to satisfy a growing demand for power. And these days it can do so safely.


I say that guardedly, of course, just days after Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced that his country had enriched uranium. "The nuclear technology is only for the purpose of peace and nothing else," he said. But there is widespread speculation that, even though the process is ostensibly dedicated to producing electricity, it is in fact a cover for building nuclear weapons.

And although I don't want to underestimate the very real dangers of nuclear technology in the hands of rogue states, we cannot simply ban every technology that is dangerous. That was the all-or-nothing mentality at the height of the Cold War, when anything nuclear seemed to spell doom for humanity and the environment. In 1979, Jane Fonda and Jack Lemmon produced a frisson of fear with their starring roles in "The China Syndrome," a fictional evocation of nuclear disaster in which a reactor meltdown threatens a city's survival. Less than two weeks after the blockbuster film opened, a reactor core meltdown at Pennsylvania's Three Mile Island nuclear power plant sent shivers of very real anguish throughout the country.

What nobody noticed at the time, though, was that Three Mile Island was in fact a success story: The concrete containment structure did just what it was designed to do -- prevent radiation from escaping into the environment. And although the reactor itself was crippled, there was no injury or death among nuclear workers or nearby residents. Three Mile Island was the only serious accident in the history of nuclear energy generation in the United States, but it was enough to scare us away from further developing the technology: There hasn't been a nuclear plant ordered up since then.

Today, there are 103 nuclear reactors quietly delivering just 20 percent of America's electricity. Eighty percent of the people living within 10 miles of these plants approve of them (that's not including the nuclear workers). Although I don't live near a nuclear plant, I am now squarely in their camp.

And I am not alone among seasoned environmental activists in changing my mind on this subject. British atmospheric scientist James Lovelock, father of the Gaia theory, believes that nuclear energy is the only way to avoid catastrophic climate change. Stewart Brand, founder of the "Whole Earth Catalog," says the environmental movement must embrace nuclear energy to wean ourselves from fossil fuels. On occasion, such opinions have been met with excommunication from the anti-nuclear priesthood: The late British Bishop Hugh Montefiore, founder and director of Friends of the Earth, was forced to resign from the group's board after he wrote a pro-nuclear article in a church newsletter.

There are signs of a new willingness to listen, though, even among the staunchest anti-nuclear campaigners. When I attended the Kyoto climate meeting in Montreal last December, I spoke to a packed house on the question of a sustainable energy future. I argued that the only way to reduce fossil fuel emissions from electrical production is through an aggressive program of renewable energy sources (hydroelectric, geothermal heat pumps, wind, etc.) plus nuclear. The Greenpeace spokesperson was first at the mike for the question period, and I expected a tongue-lashing. Instead, he began by saying he agreed with much of what I said -- not the nuclear bit, of course, but there was a clear feeling that all options must be explored.

Here's why: Wind and solar power have their place, but because they are intermittent and unpredictable they simply can't replace big baseload plants such as coal, nuclear and hydroelectric. Natural gas, a fossil fuel, is too expensive already, and its price is too volatile to risk building big baseload plants. Given that hydroelectric resources are built pretty much to capacity, nuclear is, by elimination, the only viable substitute for coal. It's that simple.

That's not to say that there aren't real problems -- as well as various myths -- associated with nuclear energy. Each concern deserves careful consideration:

· Nuclear energy is expensive. It is in fact one of the least expensive energy sources. In 2004, the average cost of producing nuclear energy in the United States was less than two cents per kilowatt-hour, comparable with coal and hydroelectric. Advances in technology will bring the cost down further in the future.

· Nuclear plants are not safe. Although Three Mile Island was a success story, the accident at Chernobyl, 20 years ago this month, was not. But Chernobyl was an accident waiting to happen. This early model of Soviet reactor had no containment vessel, was an inherently bad design and its operators literally blew it up. The multi-agency U.N. Chernobyl Forum reported last year that 56 deaths could be directly attributed to the accident, most of those from radiation or burns suffered while fighting the fire. Tragic as those deaths were, they pale in comparison to the more than 5,000 coal-mining deaths that occur worldwide every year. No one has died of a radiation-related accident in the history of the U.S. civilian nuclear reactor program. (And although hundreds of uranium mine workers did die from radiation exposure underground in the early years of that industry, that problem was long ago corrected.)

follow the link for the complete article.




LINKY

Wisdom, like good wine, comes with age.
 
Patrick Moore? What? The TV Astrologer?

pmoore.jpg
 
It's nice to see that not everyone associated with Greenpeace is a nut. :goodjob:
 
Patrick Moore, the founder of Greenpeace, is going nuclear. For those who doesn't know the inners of Greenpeace history, Moore was one of the cofounders of the world famous nature protectionist organization and they truly fighted to protect our environment in the first years following its foundation.
He finally sold out. I wonder how much he cost? Theres no way that a person who's been dealing with environmental issues for well over thirty years can come out and endorse nuclear energy, unless somebody made him an offer he couldnt refuse.
 
Bozo Erectus said:
He finally sold out. I wonder how much he cost? Theres no way that a person who's been dealing with environmental issues for well over thirty years can come out and endorse nuclear energy, unless somebody made him an offer he couldnt refuse.

Or maybe he's actually researched it and understands it rather than going on just age old stigma like you're doing.
 
nuclear is an excellent option

1) none of those "greenhouse gases"
2) vents steam
3) if the fuel was nuclear when it was in the ground and radioactive long before we dug it up, radioactive after we dug it up, and radioactive when we put it back in the ground what is the big deal?
4) 98% of nuclear "waste" is recyclable back into nuclear fuel (though it has to be shipped to France to do so since Carter shut down our recycling plant, thanks Jimmy)
5) A) it's not coal [which have lots of, but is dirty no matter how clean it is]
B) it's not hydro [no screwing up river systems]
C) not solar [works day AND night, plus we don't have to pave the state of New Mexico to meet energy needs]
D) not wind [works when the wind doesn't blow, and when the wind blows too fast, and isn't a giant bird blender in the sky]
E) not Natural Gas {expensive to due lack of adequate supply and even if supply needs were met the distribution system is sorely sorely wanting)
 
I've been wondering for some time now if I am the victim of a good PR campaign. I pretty much agree with each point in the above post (Crighton), except #3, which is maybe a little simplistic.
 
Solar and wind are fine, as long as they are supplemented by another source. We use more electricity during the day (when the sun is shining) and the weather patterns and sunlight are extremely predictable, in the timeframes we need.

This means that when the clouds are coming, the local plant can be revved up. Solar and wind also have an advantage in transmission loss. It is MUCH easier to put solar and wind close to where the demand is, instead of piping it around the country (and thus losing energy due to resistance losses).

Finally, nuclear has a wicked capital cost - which is never mentioned, and only the operating cost is mentioned.

I LIKE the nuclear option, but I think that we should use alternatives to offset our nuclear consumption. Heck, if we could use more solar and wind, then the coal plant would be sufficient to supplement our needs.
 
sysyphus said:
Or maybe he's actually researched it and understands it rather than going on just age old stigma like you're doing.
Anyone whos more concerned about C02 than they are nuclear waste, isnt reality based.
 
Though advertised as a Green, it seems Mr. Moore fell of the wagon at least 20 years ago: link. Since then, he's been an advocate/apologist of the timber and mining industries and,rather bizzarrely, the Argentinian Junta of the 1980s (responsible for 30K+ deaths and disappearnces, by most accounts).
Without taking any opinion on the pros and cons of nuclear energy, I think it's pretty safe to dismiss the significance of Mr. Moore's comments on the issue on the basis of his supposed credentials.
 
Anyone whos more concerned about C02 than they are nuclear waste, isnt reality based.

CO2 that's being uncontrollably pumped in huge quantities into the air we breathe versus nuclear waste that's buried deep in the ground after spending years in water become less and less radioactive, far from any population centers? Hmmm.
 
Eli said:
CO2 that's being uncontrollably pumped in huge quantities into the air we breathe versus nuclear waste that's buried deep in the ground after spending years in water become less and less radioactive, far from any population centers? Hmmm.
By using nuclear power, all youre doing is forcing future generations to deal with the consequences of your energy needs, instead of dealing with them yourself. I know that in the Bush Era, its become fashionable to transfer burdens to future generations, but by pushing them thousands of years into the futre, I think youre getting carried away. Dont you think you owe anything at all to the people who come after you?
 
El_Machinae said:
If people lived longer, they'd know they owe it to themselves!

(Booyah!)
But why should they be more responsible if theyre owing things to themselves, rather than their great grandkids? Have we become so selfish, that we believe the future is a servant to our momentary Now?
 
Why do I have a duty to someone who may or may not exist? I frequently failed my duty to 'future people' but make up for it by not creating more!

(Yes, we're selfish. You know that. To think otherwise is the truely naive position)
 
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