nuclear-news

Misinformation and spin about nuclear power

Speaking truth to (nuclear) power | Uppity Wisconsin 19 Jan 2010 As the state’s Clean Energy Jobs Act starts working its way through the legislature, coverage of the nuclear power issue — one of the more contentious piece of the huge bill — is increasing. That’s a positive;; public education and debate is good. But there’s a big helping of misinformation and spin being served up as part of the menu.
The headline in this Capital Times article assures us that the bill is not a “green light” for nuclear power.

That’s true, to a degree. If the bill passes, construction won’t start next week or next year. But there is no question that passage of the bill as it stands, with changes in the state law regulating nuclear power, will make it much easier to build a new plant here.

Current law says that before any new reactors can be approved, a federal waste facility must be ready to handle the high-level radioactive waste from the plants. The proposed bill would eliminate that requirement.

That is a major change, and removes the only objective measure of whether there is a safe, long-term waste disposal plan. The change would simply let the Public Service Commission approve a utility’s plans for the waste, which most likely would be to store it next to the reactor. That’s what is already happening at Point Beach and Kewaunee, the state’s two operating commercial reactors. And that’s not a long-term solution.

By the way, the high level radioactive waste produced by these reactors is dangerous to humans and the environment for hundreds of thousands of years. (A mere 15,000 years ago Wisconsin was covered by glaciers.) There is no safe, permanent was to dispose of it.

The Cap Times story seems designed to assure us that there won’t be any more nukes in the state whether the bill passes the way it is or not…………

The story also assures readers that “nuclear power does not create global warming carbon emissions.” Nuclear power is not carbon-free electricity. At each stage of the nuclear fuel cycle, from uranium mining, milling, enrichment to construction, decommissioning and waste storage, nuclear power uses fossil fuels and contributes greenhouse gas emissions that accelerate global climate change. Compared to renewable energy, nuclear power releases four to five times the CO2 per unit of energy produced.

Available renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies are faster, cheaper, safer and cleaner strategies for reducing greenhouse emissions than nuclear power.

Speaking truth to (nuclear) power | Uppity Wisconsin

January 20, 2010 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | media, USA | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear secrecy, nuclear spin