nuclear-news

Obama should dump the nuclear power push and lead renewables movement

“Obama needs to find the political guts to lead us into a clean, green renewal energy future.

Activists Criticize Obama’s Nuclear Power Loan Guarantees By Gloria Tatum, Staff Writer, The Atlanta Progressive News (February 22, 2010)(APN) ATLANTA — President Barack Obama’s announcement last week that he has promised funding in the Fiscal Year 2011 budget for new nuclear power reactors in the US, with some 54.5 billion dollars in federal loan guarantees, has ignited a firestorm of local and national resistance….

“What you may not know about the Vogtle deal is that we taxpayers are not just providing loan guarantees, we’re providing the actual loans, through the Federal Financing Bank,” the Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS) said in a press release. “And you also may not know the Southern Company has not yet accepted the conditions of the loan–and for various reasons, it may not. In other words, it’s not a done deal.”

“I am very disappointed the Obama Administration plans to squander billions of our tax dollars and years of delay to pursue risky and radioactive nuclear reactors. This is a direct theft from the future promise of renewable [energy],” Glenn Carroll, Coordinator of Nuclear Watch South, told Atlanta Progressive News.

“I believe the Administration is wrong to promote such a dangerous and antiquated 1970s technology. It requires massive amounts of taxpayer money over a course of decades to complete a reactor. Then what you’ve got is a radioactive boiler which sucks up as much water as Atlanta, Savannah and Augusta use every single day and then returns it as water vapor, a greenhouse gas. The process produces radioactive waste, which causes cancer and birth defects,” Glenn explained.

“Obama needs to find the political guts to lead us into a clean, green renewal energy future.

Atlanta Progressive News

February 24, 2010 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | general