Al Gore: "Nuclear Not The Answer"

[RestoreGore]

Thank you, Mr. Gore. I couldn't agree with you more on this. And I had no idea that James Lovelock was so obsessed with nuclear power until I got further into his writings ( his gaia theory is actually something I agree with), and I dismiss them regarding that. Nuclear power will only exacerbate the problem and make this world a truly more dangerous place. There are many other alternate energies that are cleaner and safer.
~~~~

http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/nuclear-not-the-answer-says-gore/2006/11/16/1163266712885.html?from=rss

The truth? 'Nuclear is not the answer'
Email Print Normal font Large font Leon Gettler
November 17, 2006


The climate change campaigner and former US vice-president Al Gore preaches his gospel in Melbourne yesterday.
Photo: Wayne Taylor

NUCLEAR energy is not the panacea for tackling global warming, says one of the world's most celebrated climate change campaigners, former US vice-president Al Gore. Mr Gore also shrugged off Prime Minister John Howard's recent claim that his film An Inconvenient Truth showed "a degree of the peeved politician"."It may be one of those elements that's in the eyes of the beholder," he told The Age yesterday.#

Mr Gore said nuclear power was unlikely to play a significantly bigger role in the climate change battle. "Even if you set aside the problem of long-term waste storage and the danger of operator accident and the vulnerability to terrorist attack, you still have two others that are more difficult," he said.The first problem was one of economics."Nuclear power plants are the costliest to build and they take the longest time and at present they come in only one size — extra large."

The second was nuclear weapons proliferation. "For eight years when I was in the White House, every problem of weapons proliferation was connected to a reactor program," he said. The Prime Minister has recently talked up the prospects of nuclear power plants being built in Australia, arguing the country could not afford to "sacrifice rational discussion on the altar of anti-nuclear theology and political opportunism". Next week an inquiry into nuclear power headed by former Telstra chief executive Ziggy Switkowski is due to deliver its findings.

Mr Gore said it was extremely important that Mr Howard had now acknowledged the damage from carbon dioxide emissions."Let me say I want to be respectful of the Prime Minister's change in rhetoric. "It's not easy to do something like that and … this position might be a way station for him on the real road to Damascus where he actually joins the world community," he said."And he may. I don't know, I can't look into his heart."

More at the link.

Also see:
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,20770595-421,00.html?from=public_rss

[bananas]

1. He's said this three times now

He said this in a Grist Magazine interview and in his NYU major policy address.
From your second link:

<snip>

Mr Gore played down the role on nuclear power in fighting climate change.

"I have never been a reflexive opponent of it," he said. "But I am sceptical that it will play more than a minor role in most countries around the world because, let's face it, there are a lot of problems.

"Even if you wish away the long-term storage of the waste or the possibility of a reactor operator error. You still have economics and the costs of these things are very high.They only come in one size: extra large. It takes a long time. It costs a lot of money."

<snip>

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,20770595-421,00.html?from=public_rss

[RestoreGore]

3. And?

Then I agree with him three times.

[bananas]

9. I agree too, I'm glad he's continuing to talk about it.

It's really the only rational position to take.
I particularly like the way he phrases this:
"Even if you wish away the long-term storage ..."

[NNadir]

2. Well, we'll see what "unlikely" really means.

It is impossible to address climate change without nuclear power.

Anyone who thinks that any thing but "extra large" is necessary, probably is banking on half of an exajoule of solar whatever to save us.

Al Gore grew up with a father who regularly went to Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Here for instance is a photograph of John Kennedy, Jackie Kennedy, Al Gore Sr. and the great late nuclear pioneer Alvin Weinberg in the control room of a reactor at Oak Ridge.



Now, either Al Gore will fail or succeed in arresting global climate change. Whether he succeeds or not will depend on whether - if he takes power - he remembers his dinner conversations as a boy.

I want Al Gore to be President of the United States. Of course, we will see what he means when he says ""I have never been a reflexive opponent of it (nuclear power)," which is also quoted in the article.

Of course all of the people here who keep citing Al Gore in this "Appeal to Authority" argument referring to Al Gore are reflexive opponents of nuclear power. They hear what they want to hear. Of course, I already knew this. Only people who can only hear what they want to hear could seriously believe that climate change can be addressed with a few solar cells and wind mills. It can't.

"Reflexive nuclear opponents" are people who cannot do simple comparisons. But I'll bet a zillion dollars that Al Gore can do simple comparisons as well as he can do political posturing. I'm quite sure that he knows that the anti-nuclear position has been internationally rejected with respect to climate change and nuclear power. It cannot be escaped by rational people, and Al Gore is rational.

[RestoreGore]

4. Nuclear power is immoral

I have always believed that and always will regardless of what Al Gore would think about it.

[NNadir]

6. Compared to what?

This assertion is nonsense. The immorality of various energy sources, in terms of moral tragedy, is measurable.

It can be found here, for instance, as I frequently point out: http://www.externe.info/expoltec.pdf

Millions of people die each year from fossil fuel and other combustion based activities, including millions who died last year. The number of people who have died from nuclear power in the last year is essentially zero. If there is some moral lesson in this, you are interpreting it very, very, very, very strangely.

Nuclear power saves lives, millions of them each year.

I have insisted for many decades that the demonetization of nuclear power is not only irrational, but it is, in fact, one of the most immoral quests of which I have ever heard. It seems that the people who focus on the alleged immorality of nuclear power have never heard of deaths from air pollution, or deaths from agricultural collapse etc.

You constantly evoke the importance of water - and by the way I appreciate that very much. I think you are right. The threat to our water is enormous. I would think that you would have a passing acquaintance with the events that destroyed 75 miles of Big Sandy River in Kentucky. If not you should look it up.

Here's a picture of the river to help you:



I would add that the largest threat to our water comes from the disappearance of our glaciers. The glaciers are not disappearing because of the nuclear power industry, which is fast becoming the new world standard.

In order to demonetize nuclear energy, people who are not very aware of energy issues attempt to view nuclear energy in isolation from its alternatives. They insist that only nuclear must be perfect to be allowed. In the meantime they give a pass to many other types of operations all of which are more dangerous.

Nuclear power does not have to be perfect to be better than all of its alternatives. It only needs to be better than all of its alternatives. It is. It is regrettable that one must state such obvious tautologies to get it through peoples thick heads, but it seems that is how it is.

[RestoreGore]

7. Chernobyl...

Indian Point...Three Mile Island... Just to name a few. Nuclear power plants are dangerous threats to humanity. People living near them have seen cancer rates rise, water quality diminished, and nuclear programs always result in those countries having access to nuclear materials to make weapons. Nuclear weapons need to be banished from the face of the Earth, and power plants should be closed down in order to make way for safer alternatives. Solar power is the best alternative along with biofuels that can be made from sources that do not waste water and use valuable food crops needed to feed people. And I don't see nuclear energy as an alternative, I see it as a threat to mankind and always will. But there is money to be made in the nuclear industry, which is why Dick Cheney backs it so much as well. I don't.

[NNadir]

8. This is nonsense typical of all such statements.

Chernobyl cannot be viewed in isolation from all other energy operations.

You have zero evidence for the remarks about Indian Point and I note that zero people were killed at Three Mile Island.

The remarks on Indian Point are too ridiculous to dignify with a response.

At the very same time you assert these things about events that occurred two decades ago, you are purposefully ignoring deaths from all other energy operations.

I love to tell this story, because it's pretty telling about the moral position of the anti-nuclear argument. I pleaded with people on this website to give a shit about these 65 Mexican miners:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x43122

These guys, of course, didn't die twenty years ago like the 31 firemen and operators at Chernobyl. They died this year, in February. Of course they are not even close to being the only people killed in coal operations. Tell me again, so I can understand it clearly, why Chernobyl is at your fingertips and these lives aren't. Is this about ethics and morality? Really?

I note in passing, not that you are really aware of nuclear technology, that not all nuclear reactors are alike, any more than all boats are alike. The sinking of the Titanic did not prevent the construction of the Queen Elizabeth II. No one will ever again build a reactor with a positive void coefficient, and the number of reactors with negative void coefficients that have caused a loss of life outside the boundaries of the plant is zero. The number of people who die each year while coal is burned while people talk year after year about the wonderful renewable future - without actually delivering it - numbers in the millions. In fact, it can be easily shown that the number of people who have died from air pollution since 1980 is greater the number of people killed by Stalin and Hitler combined. So much for an ethical position...

The connection between nuclear weapons and nuclear power I have addressed many times and I note they are not anymore logical than calling for the banning of oil because oil is used to make napalm and to power jet bombers. (For the record, I do favor banning oil, but not primarily because of napalm or jet fighters and jet bombers.) Over 50 nations have nuclear power programs. Only 9 nations have nuclear weapons and of those, two (North Korea and Israel) do not have significant commercial nuclear power.

I have noted many times that solar energy is a mindless panacea for wealthy people who want to comfort themselves as they do nothing serious about energy pollution. I remind you that there has never been a series of anti-solar activists who oppose the expansion of solar power. Everybody wants solar power, in fact. A great way to be popular is to say "I like solar power!!!!" All of this has been true for almost 50 years, stretching back into my childhood. Therefore it is difficult to account for the fact that solar energy still doesn't account for 1% of the world's electricity, unless solar power is merely an excuse for rich brats to avoid confronting the implications of their western lifestyles. Solar power is largely exactly what it has been for 50 years - a pipe dream. The first solar powered satellite was launched in 1958, years before the first space based nuclear reactor. If it's so great, why hasn't it become a world standard? Why is it still mostly talk? Could something about it be unrealistic or is it all a big plot by bad guys?

Biofuels are known to be far more dangerous than nuclear power (solar power is moderately more dangerous than nuclear power.) (See the externE report.) Four million people died this year from from biomass burning, but somehow you have a fetish for the Chernobyl deaths (which number far less than 1000) that took place twenty years ago. I would also think that someone who is actively concerned with water quality would have some measure of concern over the vast dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico from agricultural run-off, but I guess not.

I am really sick of hearing the ridiculous "guilt by association" argument that continuously says "Dick Cheney!!!" Maybe you should hang-out more with Professor "JPak," who also takes this sort of poor thinking seriously in spite of my many links to the website that discusses in clear terms, the nature of desperate argument. http://www.fallacyfiles.org/guiltbya.html

You may not have noticed this, but one of the biggest advances for the worldwide cause of complete nuclear ignorance was Dick Cheney's ridiculous nonsense about the Niger uranium and Saddam Hussein. I immediately knew this was nonsense because my impressions of nuclear technology do not come unfiltered directly from my television set. I have actually studied the issue of nuclear technology in some detail for some decades. To do this, I have relied in part on the primary scientific literature and not, notably, the Greenpeace and ratical.org website.

Two hundred and thirty new nuclear reactors are under discussion, on order, or under construction. The vast majority of these are in nations that don't give a fuck about what either you or Dick Cheney think about nuclear power. Therefore the Dick Cheney = Nuclear argument is full of holes, 36 of them to be precise, 36 being the number of nations not ruled by Dick Cheney that either have nuclear power plants or announced an intention to build nuclear power plants. I suppose you will announce that Belgium and Switzerland and Finland are about to acquire nuclear weapons under the supervision of Dick Cheney?

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/reactors.htm

Nuclear disarmament is indeed a moral choice, as is the choice to build nuclear weapons. It is exactly the same as the choice to manufacture napalm. However it is not true that napalm can be destroyed by passing it through automobile engines. It is true however that nuclear weapons cores can be destroyed by passing them through nuclear reactors. Indeed, in the 1990's this was the mutual choice of the US and the Russians. Most of the uranium-235 in US nuclear reactors was originally in Soviet nuclear weapons. The treaty to make this happen was negotiated with the direct participation of Al Gore. The text of this treaty reads in part:

...2. 'management of plutonium' means the transformation of plutonium into spent fuel or other forms equally unusable for nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices, and may include conversion of plutonium and its manufacture into MOX fuel, use of MOX fuel in nuclear reactors, and immobilization of plutonium in various forms...

...a) conversion of metallic plutonium into oxide suitable for the manufacture of MOX fuel for nuclear power reactors of various types;

b) stabilization of unstable forms of plutonium...

http://www.acronym.org.uk/dd/dd28/28usruss.htm

This is hardly a document written by a person who has a visceral and irrational hatred of nuclear power. I think it is a good treaty because among other things, it makes weapons grade material into reactor grade material. This is desirable and sensible.

I note in passing that the only way to destroy weapons grade plutonium is to fission it in a nuclear reactor. If you know anything about reactor physics - and clearly you don't - you will understand that such use makes the reassembly of a nuclear weapon with the residual denatured plutonium very, very, very problematic.

The fact is that the anti-nuclear position is essentially at the same level as the anti-evolution argument. It is faith based and not all connected to data. It is discredited and is not taken seriously by anyone except for people with a particularly dogmatic mindset.

And you wish to lecture me on morality...???...

I have really enjoyed your writings on water. I am surprised to see this side of you which is so readily irrational. Oh well, what can be said? I'm an old man. It isn't the first time I've seen dubious compartmentalization. I am really disappointed to learn of your critical thinking skills. I thought they were much higher.

[jody]

10. One political group agrees with you, see "Rethinking Nuclear Power" link below.

"Rethinking Nuclear Power", published 2001-04-23.

Energy politics can make strange bedfellows because that's the John Birch Society. :shrug:

[NNadir]

11. It wouldn't matter if it was the Nazi Party.

Nations across the political spectrum - living under all sorts of governments and under all sorts of economic systems - recognize the need for nuclear power.

This is not a political point, but a technical one.

Politics can decide whether any particular technology is used for ethical purposes or for unethical purposes, which explains, in the nuclear case, the difference between Finland and say, North Korea. But technology in and of itself is morally neutral.

There are only a few sources of greenhouse gas free primary energy available on earth. The largest, by far, and the only one that is proved to be industrially scalable on such a scale as to eliminate fossil fuels, is nuclear energy.

A great deal of historical attention has been paid to the Farm Hall Transcripts in which the activities of Nazi era nuclear scientists during World War II were recorded. Included in this group were Werner Heisenberg and Otto Hahn (who was credited with the discovery of nuclear fission in a slight to Lise Meitner). Heisenberg always claimed that his wartime activities in the nuclear sphere were intended to make a power reactor and not a bomb. He thus claimed moral superiority to the allies, who obviously made a bomb.

I'm not sure I buy Heisenberg's possibly self serving claims, but it is known that his only surviving diagram from the war era is in fact a design more appropriate to a reactor than a bomb. He showed it to Niels Bohr during the war, and the matter of what he was trying to do - and what he was trying to say to Bohr - has been one of intense controversy and discussion ever since. Again, I'm not sure Heisenberg was leveling with the world. But maybe he was. Were he, it would have been possible for scientists working under the Nazis, a group of notorious moral bestiality of seldom equaled proportions, to have engaged in a single case - the case of applying nuclear technology - more ethically than the defenders of the right, represented by the allies.

In my view, it is incredibly immoral - given the nature of what is already known and easily measurable - to oppose nuclear power. On the other hand it is incredibly immoral to support nuclear weapons. These two positions are entirely consistent, since the only way to have nuclear disarmament is to embrace the Clinton-Gore policy of running weapons grade fissionable materials through a reactor. It makes no difference to me whatsoever what the John Birch Society, Dick Cheney, or Kim Il Sung say about any of this. It is poor thinking to appeal to either "guilt by association" or "appeal to authority" arguments. One should decide issues based on the facts associated with them.

[jody]

12. Now, now, I was just making the very point you expanded upon so eloquently. I see

no other viable energy source than some form of nuclear energy meet the world's greed for energy.

Nuclear processes fuel our sun throughout its life so perhaps nature is right after all.

[Porcupine]

13. Some people are reflexive proponents of nuclear power.

Positing that somehow nuclear power will somehow replace services provided by fossil fuels. Insisting that people cannot learn to conserve despite considerable evidence to the contrary and ignoring the very ticklish problem that all nuclear power plants produce concentrated toxic wastes.

I have yet to hear of country A threatening to bomb country B's windmills or solar panels. Not so with nuclear power plants. Likewise in the developing world the benefits of nuclear power never seem to extend to the poor in their slums or in rural villages. Governments seem quite happy to build nuclear power plants before they commit to providing clean drinking water for their citizens.

Nuclear power finally promotes growth beyond the sustainable resources of this planet's ecology. Eliminate all other reasons and this alone is sufficient reason to oppose more nukes.

[jpak]

5. Al Gore is correct - as usual...

:)