Compare a nuclear power plant to a coal power plant.  As Caldicott mentions, a nuclear power plant generates 20-30 tons of nuclear waste a year.  This waste has to be controlled very carefully, and is generally stored locally in monitored pools.  Losing even a pound of this material is a very big deal, and a lot of money and effort is spent every year to prevent that.

A coal plant, on the other hand, generates about 5 tons of uranium and 13 tons of thorium (a nuclear decay product of uranium) a year.  Most of this is just dumped on the ground in unlined pits, and eventually makes its way into the water table.  A small fraction of it is released directly into the air.  Imagine the incredible stink there would be if a pound of nuclear fuel was vaporized and released into the atmosphere by a nuclear power plant accident.  Now consider that a coal plant releases about 10 pounds of uranium directly into the air every year.  

And we breathe this stuff.  A recent study found that two coal power plants in Massachusetts alone kill 124 people every year.  Across the US, approximately 30,000 people a year die prematurely due to particulate emissions, primarily from coal fired power plants.

Compare their safety records as well.  A quick search of the net provided about a dozen coal dust explosions, coal power plant worker deaths, and coal train fatalities.  Now look at the worst nuclear power plant accident in US history, where two safety systems failed simultaneously and then operators turned off a third.  The fatality count at three mile island - zero.

There are a lot of problems with nuclear power.  Where to put the waste is a big one.  But we don't have the choice of not using any power - indeed, many of the solutions proposed by environmentalists (like hydrogen and CO2 sequestration) require massive new sources of power.  Nuclear is not a great solution, but it is far, far better than coal.

--bill von

More importantly, we have to greatly lower our energy usage.  The vast majority of things that energy is used for, starting with BUSINESS USAGE, is not at all necessary.  Realistically  electricity itself is not a necessity, because it's a human invention that didn't exist 150 years ago.

Jeff Hoffman

Her weapons stuff is interesting.  She wants to put the genie back in the bottle.  Good luck with that.  Her sexual rantings about missiles and generals was quite titilating.  Grist might have to get a rating pretty soon if this type of sexuality is splashed about its pages.

Caldicott should come into the 21st Century.  Nuclear power plants can safely provide us with emission free electricity.  The spent fuel can be reprocessed and reused as a renewable fuel.  The warheads she complains about can be converted to MOX fuel and utilized in nuclear power plants to produce smog-free and greenhouse gas-free electricity.

Environment Man

In last October's American Scientist, Eric Loewen wrote an article about a new (well, under used) style of reactor based on liquid lead as a coolant.  He claims it addresses almost all the criticisms of existing nuclear plants, to wit: The coolant is not under pressure, and so is safer to operate; it operates at a higher temperature and thus produces waste that is dangerouse for much shorter times (300 years vs 10,000 years); its wastes are isotopes that are not usable for nuclear weapons; It can use as fuel existing nuclear plant wastes, converting the waste from long term dangerous to short term dangerous; and finally that it can produce large amounts of hydrogen.

Now 300 years is still a long time, but obviously this design, if accurately portrayed, is a much better choice than existing water-cooled nuclear plants.  Can Ms. Caldicott's group offer specific criticism of this plan?  I certainly don't want any more nuclear plants of the type we have now, but I don't know how to counter an argument that plant designs are better now and we should give it another shot (as opposed to burning coal.)

Pete Jacobsen

Our National Healthcare Plan: Don't Get Sick!

Agreed, but that's in effect what we are doing.  It's like opposing the democratic party - it has the effect of bolstering the republicans.

>Realistically  electricity itself is not a
> necessity, because it's a human invention that
> didn't exist 150 years ago.

True.  But disinfected water and antibiotics are also human inventions, things we'd be pretty unhappy without.  If our approach as environmentalists is "live your lives cold, miserable and unhappy!" I don't think we'll have much success.

Let's look at it from a practical perspective.  If we could get US electrical consumption reduced by 20%, we'd be doing an outstanding job, and could close a lot of power plants.  If you are an anti-nuke above all else, that means closing all the nuclear power plants and leaving every single coal fired power plant open.  You wouldn't have reduced uranium released into the environment by one bit, since coal plants are responsible for all that.  We'd be in no better shape.  We'd still have 30,000 people a year die from coal particulate emissions.

Now, closing all coal fired and all nuclear power plants would be great.  That means reducing our energy needs by 70%.  Could you do that?  Use 70% less electricity than you're using now, drive 70% less?  That's a nearly impossible target to meet.  Given that we have to settle for less, at least in the forseeable future, we do the environment much more good by shutting down coal plants than by shutting down nuclear plants.

--bill von

"Caldicott should come into the 21st Century.  Nuclear power plants can safely provide us with emission free electricity."  YOU should come into the 21st century, where humans have destroyed 90% of the natural forests and grasslands, around half the wetlands, have polluted every bit of land, air, and water, and are causing the sixth great extinction, the first to be caused by a species.  Demand and consumption of things like electricity is one of the main causes of these problems.  Your solutions will do nothing to fix the severe ecological harm caused by uranium mining, which I notice that most commenters don't mention.

Opposing nukes is NOT "in effect" supporting coal, unless that's what the person or group is actually doing.  That's the point of view of those stuck in the dominant paradigm, just like the people who couldn't bring themselves to vote for a third party candidate because they were so afraid of Bush.  The effect of opposing both nukes and coal could easily be to start a movement toward renewables, but this is very unlikely to happen with the attitude that we must choose from the lesser of two evils.  Again, we should support relatively clean energy sources, not nukes or coal, but the main thing is we must greatly reduce our consumption.

"If our approach as environmentalists is 'live your lives cold, miserable and unhappy!' I don't think we'll have much success."  Is that how you view traditional indigenous people?  What an insult to them, and how uninformed of you!  No, that's not my approach.  Humans do need to greatly lower both our consumption (including ceasing consumption of things that cause significant ecological harm by consuming them) and population, which are the root causes of all environmental problems, but I've never said that everyone must stop using electricity completely or immediately.  However, if you set your goals too low, you won't accomplish anything meaningful even if you're successful.  Our goals in this regard should be to rid the planet of all nukes AND coal powered plants.

"If you are an anti-nuke above all else..."  I never even implied that I'm anti-nuke above all else.  I'm pro-wilderness and -wildlife above all else.  However, there is no such thing as a safe amount of radioactivity, so that any amount added to the background levels is harmful.  Mining coal or uranium adds radioactivity to our environment, so it's all very harmful, not to mention the direct harm of digging into the Earth, which I, as taught by traditional indigenous people, oppose on moral gounds.

Finally, no one has even mentioned the fact that plutonium is THE MOST TOXIC substance known, period.  If you support nukes, you add more of this unnatural crap to the planet.

Jeff Hoffman

Not at all.  The indigenous people I've met (primarily in sub-Saharan Africa) were among the happiest people I have met.  I'm talking about americans, who use more energy than anyone else on the planet.  An approach that they must forego 70% of their energy usage (laundry detergents, vehicles, antibiotics, fresh food etc) will simply not work very well.  Much better to plan how to get more done with less energy, and how to generate that energy more cleanly.

>However, if you set your goals too low, you
> won't accomplish anything meaningful even if
> you're successful.  Our goals in this regard
> should be to rid the planet of all nukes AND
> coal powered plants.

Again, you are proposing reducing our energy usage by 70%.  How do you propose to do this?  How would you alter your own life to meet this goal?  It is a good goal for the US at large, but it is unreasonable for anything but the very far future.  For us and our children, we need to make the best choices for both the near and the far future.

>However, there is no such thing as a safe
> amount of radioactivity, so that any amount
> added to the background levels is harmful.

Not true at all.  Low levels of radiation are actually beneficial.  Indeed, people exposed to no radiation at all suffer from diseases like vitamin D deficiency, and there is evidence that low level radiation stimulates our cell's natural anti-mutagenic system, a system critical to repair damage to our cells caused by reactive oxygen species in our bodies.

This should not come as a suprise to anyone.  We evolved on a planet that has a low level of background radiation from the uranium in the dirt, the ionizing radiation from the sun and the high energy radiation from deep space.  Our bodies are designed to work best in such an environment.  It is, of course, important not to increase it too much, but the statement that "no amount of radiation is safe" is not true.  A certain level of radiation is not just safe, it's how our bodies are designed to work.

>Finally, no one has even mentioned the fact
> that plutonium is THE MOST TOXIC substance
> known, period.  If you support nukes, you add
> more of this unnatural crap to the planet.

Of course.  But we are better off looking at a pound of plutonium from 10 miles away, buried in a cask, than breathing in a pound of uranium released by a coal power plant.

There is no doubt that nuclear power is not the best form of power out there.  Every form of power, from solar to wind to natural gas to coal to nuclear, has drawbacks.  But nuclear is far, far preferable to coal.  The 30,000 people whose lives were cut short this year by coal plants would likely agree.  It is hard to compose a philosophical objection that trumps that many lives lost.

--bill von

All isotopes and compounds of plutonium are toxic and radioactive. While plutonium is sometimes described in media reports as "the most toxic substance known to man", there is general agreement among experts in the field that this is incorrect. As of 2003, there has yet to be a single human death officially attributed to plutonium exposure. Naturally-occurring radium is about 200 times more radiotoxic than plutonium, and some organic toxins like botulism toxin are still more toxic. Botulism toxin, in particular, has a lethal dose in the hundreds of pg per kg, far less than the quantity of plutonium that poses a significant cancer risk. In addition, beta and gamma emitters (including the C-14 and K-40 in nearly all food) can cause cancer on casual contact, which alpha emitters cannot.

Orally, plutonium is less toxic than several common substances, including caffeine, acetaminophen, some vitamins, pseudoephedrine, and any number of plants and fungi. It is perhaps somewhat more toxic than pure ethanol, but less so than tobacco and many illegal drugs (some such as LSD and marijuana are negligibly toxic). Considering the pure chemical toxicity it probably ranks with lead and other heavy metals.

That said, there is no doubt that plutonium may be extremely dangerous when handled incorrectly.

Jdhlax: Just because Ralph Nader says it's so doesn't make it fact. Given a choice between eating plutonium and hemlock, which would you pick?

"I'm talking about americans, who use more energy than anyone else on the planet."  In other words, Americans are gluttonous pigs who need to greatly reduce their consumption.  Environmentalists should not support destroying the Earth with mining in order to support this disgusting lifestyle.

"[Y]ou are proposing reducing our energy usage by 70%.  How do you propose to do this?  How would you alter your own life to meet this goal?"  First, cover all roofs with solar panels.  Eliminate wasteful use of electricity, such as streetlights (guess what, it's supposed to be dark at night, and stars are much more pleasant than streetlights!) and office buildings that leave lights on.  (These are just examples, there are many more ways that electricity usage should be cut.)  Make replacement of incandescent lights with more energy efficient ones mandatory.  Finally, set maximum levels of electricity use for all buildings.

As for myself, I use very little electricity.  This computer doubles as a work computer, I watch almost no television, and I only use a small light in the room I occupy.  I have a friend who lived totally without electricity for many years here in the Bay Area.  (She finally ran an extension cord up to her home in order to use her computer to do environmental work at home; she's a workaholic.)  Remember, this is a luxury, not a necessity, and the sources of it are very environmentally destructive.

There is no safe level of exposure to ionising radiation (i.e., radioactivity).  According to Dr. Helen Caldicott, who's a physician and expert in these matters, "[i]t only takes one radioactive atom, one cell and one gene to initiate a cancer."  Every scientist and physician I've ever heard on the subject says this.  The only possible beneficial effect of low levels of radioactivity is that of evolution, which scientists theorize MIGHT be caused in part by low levels of radioactivity.  However, this natural, background radioactivity also injures and kills people if the level is too high.  People who don't spend enough time in the sun can suffer from lack of vitamin D, but this is not caused by a lack of radioactivity.  I know nothing of the studies that show that low levels of radioactivity stimulate our cell's natural anti-mutagenic system, but this sounds very suspiciously like a nuclear industry funded study, which would therefore not be credible.

Da silva:

"Just because Ralph Nader says it's so doesn't make it fact."  That's true, but just because you say it's true doesn't make it true either, and Ralph Nader has a lot more credibility with me than someone who claims that plutonium is not that toxic.  Beside, I didn't get this from Nader, even though he has been by far the best candidate in the last two presidential elections.  This is a well known fact that has been repeated by scientists.  It only takes one milligram of plutonium to kill an adult human.

You also deceitfully conflate naturally occurring toxins with plutonium, almost all of which is produced by humans.  Naturally occurring bacteria and chemicals are part of the planet.  Plutonium need not be produced, and is only part of the planet because people put it here.

Finally, while it's true that alpha emitters cannot penetrate skin, they can be inhaled and will cause harm once that happens.

Jeff Hoffman

Jeff Hoffman

For what it's worth, I like Ralph too, but he and anyone else who goes around re-stating this "well known fact" is doing us all a disservice.

There are plenty of good reasons to be leery of nuclear power. But you can make the case without resorting to un-truths.

>First, cover all roofs with solar panels.

Good idea, but that's not reducing power usage in the short term, it's increasing it.  The glass, silicon and aluminum needed to produce a solar panel takes a lot of energy to create.  Where does it come from?

>Eliminate wasteful use of electricity, such as streetlights. . . .

OK.  Let's say you get a tremendous amount of political capital, sufficient to remove all streetlights (and then weather the storm when fatalities at night go up.)  Even after that massive effort, you have reduced power usage by only 8% -  you can't even close half of all nuclear power plants in the US.

Or let's say you pass a law that says all homes in the US have to be solar powered.  We will ignore for the moment where you get the energy to produce the panels.  Now you have reduced power by 16% - you STILL can't close all the nuclear power plants in the country, and you have to leave coal power plants running full blast.

When you talk about reducing energy usage by 70%, you're not talking about turning lights off at night.  You are talking about doing without aluminum, trash collection, recycling, sewers, water, glass, rubber, textile mills, fertilizer, food transportation, hospitals, schools, telephones, the internet etc.  There's no free lunch.  We have to get rid of the basics too, because that's where that energy is going - to make aluminum, and pump water, and make clothing.  

Nor should we try to eliminate those things.  The reason we can buy solar panels is that we have a strong economy, so people can buy them, and we have spare energy, so factories can make them.  Take away any one of those things and environmentalism will cease to exist; it is basically a rich person's pursuit.

Does that mean we shouldn't try?  Not at all!  But even if we do an outstanding job (say, we can reduce power usage by 20%) we have to choose between the lesser of two evils, coal or nuclear.  And coal is worse than nuclear.

>There is no safe level of exposure to ionising
> radiation (i.e., radioactivity).  According to
> Dr. Helen Caldicott . . .

Helen Caldicott is an anti-nuclear activist.  My wife, who is a physician but is neither employed by the nuclear industry or by the anti-nukes, thinks that there are safe levels of ionizing radiation.  She has even had training in how much is safe and how much is unsafe.  I have several friends who are intact now because radiation was used to help fix them.

>However, this natural, background radioactivity
> also injures and kills people if the level is
> too high.

Exactly.  There is too much radiation and there is too little.  Bricks have a higher than background level of radiation, as do most basements and most granite.  Most coal does too.  Smoke detectors and CRT's emit radiation as part of their operation.  But none of these things are hazardous, because the level is not too high.

Now, take coal fired power plants.  They DO emit high levels of radiation.  They emit pounds of thorium and uranium every year directly into the air, and we end up breathing it in.  They are responsible for 30,000 deaths a year from the stuff they emit from their stacks.

Now look at nuclear power plants.  No fatalities of the general public due to commercial nuclear power plant accidents.  No emission of radiation.  Sure, we have the waste to deal with, but we do deal with it - we don't just pump it into the air.  It's not perfect, but it's much better than coal.


--bill von

Lumping together nuclear weapons and nuclear power  as "nukes" is terribly dishonest. Would you lump your mom and a murderer together ? Both use knives, one for cooking the meal and the other for killing people.

Please listen to a real scientist for a change about the possible effects of radioactivity.

http://www.phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/book/BOOK.html