"Go nuclear or go home"

[caraher]

I'd posted on Facebook a piece about the divide between liberals and conservatives in how they process facts on issues like climate change, and predictably my right-wing nutjob brother fulminated against social science as a display of raw liberal arrogance. But as part of his typical shotgun-style response he tossed in the line above, "Go nuclear or go home," while tossing in his gripe that Democrats aren't advancing real solutions to climate change anyway.

This reminded me of something I've thought for a long time - that the real tragedy of all the infighting that happens over nuclear vs. solar and wind is that we get stuck with more fossil fuels in the meantime. It's just the wrong debate. On one hand, if only for the sake of argument, let's assume the correctness of the claim that the optimum energy portfolio from a technical perspective is wind, waves and solar, and that resources put into nuclear are, from a climate and economic perspective, a step away from this optimum solution. On the other hand, suppose the nuclear boosters who deride wind and solar are right, and, from a technical perspective, the optimum portfolio should be dominated by nuclear power.

I think both of those views, which seem to drive a lot of the long-term debate here, are of at best academic interest, because they neglect the political reality that neither view has any chance of gaining political ascendancy in a time frame relevant for mitigating the worst effects of climate change. In all likelihood, the true optimum, reflecting political realities, almost certainly involves replacing fossil fuels with some mix of nuclear and WWS renewables, even if such a "compromise" portfolio is far from optimum in purely scientific and economic terms. The element of time is very important - how bad things will get depends crucially on both how high the peak in carbon emissions is and on how soon we can get past that peak. Perfection not only can wait, it has to wait!

This is not to suggest, for instance, that the nuclear industry simply be given free rein as part of some kind of implicit bargain to gain support for WWS renewables. We should definitely demand that, for instance, the relicensing process for plants operating decades longer than their designers originally envisioned is not a mere rubber stamp. Instead, what I suggest is that we focus much more on leaving fossil fuels behind, as step one, than on taking potshots at the fossil fuel alternatives that seem less promising than the choices we personally favor. Right now the momentum for seriously addressing climate change in Congress is at less than zero, and if it takes building a few more nuclear power plants than I'd like to see to break the logjam and provide cover for right-wing politicians to acknowledge climate science facts, that's far preferable to the present state of affairs where fracking, "clean coal" and oil from tar sands are the energy diet our politicians are now serving us.

[Confusious]

1. I agree nt

[bananas]

2. Several problems with that - first, we already tried it, and it didn't work.

We actually went further than what you suggest - we passed climate legislation which encouraged new nuclear.
The federal loan guarantees for new nuclear were a result of bipartisan climate legislation.
As realistic cost estimates for nuclear came out, bipartisanship ended, and Republicans went into extreme denial about global warming.

edit to add: the loan guarantees were just one of many items given to encourage new nuclear.

[CRH]

3. Nuclear continues to have a fatal flaw, ...

Even if Nuclear power generation could be demonstrated, as a viable interim solution to the planet altering GHG pollution, only a solution to the fuel waste would make it palatable to the public.

The industry has had 60+ years to research and develop a means of securing nuclear waste, not just in the US, but throughout the world. There has been much written on deep geological disposal, transmutation technologies, the reuse of spent fuel until the waste was miniscule. Yet after all these years, the global industry and supporting sciences, have been unable to find a solution.

Instead, in many countries wastes are stored in cooling pools, often beyond their intended stay, then in some cases stored in dry casks that in a few short years leak. Some countries employ the 12 mile rule, an out of sight out of mind dumping of nuclear waste into the ocean, rolling the dice against many decades/centuries of risk.

The nuclear industry and proponents have consistently misled the public, environmental and governmental bodies, creating a breech in trust that would be critical for nuclear to progress into the future. If nuclear energy was pursued on the level needed to ameliorate the GHG problem, the accumulation of waste would be exponential in comparison to the past. Without a solution to waste disposal, "trust us", will not be well received even in the face of corrupting the stability of the climate and ecosystems of the planet.

It is easy for nuclear proponents to infer that anyone who is skeptical of a nuclear solution, to be scientifically illiterate or a fairy dust boob incapable of rational thought. But the fact remains, after 60+ years the sciences and industry have been unable to present a viable solution to the waste, or the opposition would not be formidable, in the face of a catastrophic business as usual status quo.

If proponents want a business as usual energy intensive human population in the future, and it is desired that nuclear be a bridge technology to carbon free energy solutions, solve the waste problems. Otherwise it might be best to spend our energies and money in preparation for a less energy intensive future and converting to new socioeconomic models.