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Obama Faces Hungry Nuclear Industry

ENERGY-US: Obama Faces Hungry Nuclear Industry

By Matthew Cardinale
ATLANTA, Georgia, Dec 15 (IPS) – As Democratic President-elect Barack Obama prepares to take office in a few weeks, he faces a hungry nuclear industry that wants to be included in his energy plan.

At least 31 new plants have been proposed throughout the United States, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s (NRC) website. Twenty-six of these are already going through the NRC’s environmental impact review and site approval process………………………………“Nuclear power represents more than 70 percent of our non-carbon generated electricity. It is unlikely that we can meet our aggressive climate goals if we eliminate nuclear power as an option,” Obama and Vice President-elect Joe Biden wrote in their energy plan.

“However, before an expansion of nuclear power is considered, key issues must be addressed including: security of nuclear fuel and waste, waste storage, and proliferation.”

This assumes that nuclear fuel and waste storage are the only problems with nuclear power, however.

As previously reported by IPS, nuclear power also uses vast amounts of water and releases low levels of radioactive pollution, which one study has correlated with increased cancer rates in Burke County, Georgia.

“One thing I haven’t seen them point to, which is the real sticker on this, is the problem of economics. The nuclear executives that want to build don’t want to use their own money. You see them hat in hand here in Washington [seeking] loan guarantees. I can’t see Congress doing that given we’re in the hole financially,” Jim Riccio, a nuclear policy analyst for Greenpeace, told IPS.

The Green Party of the United States said in a statement that it “rejects President-elect Barack Obama’s reckless support for new nuclear power plants, as such an agenda poses unacceptable health and environmental risks and would be fiscally irresponsible in the extreme.” .

ENERGY-US: Obama Faces Hungry Nuclear Industry

December 15, 2008 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | politics