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Murphy’s Law, written by Barbara Murphy, appears monthly in The Golden Times. The column represents the opinion of the author and is not necessarily the opinion of the publisher.
There Is No Good Reason To Continue
To Pursue Nuclear Energy
In the wake of Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima, why on earth would any government that cares about the welfare of its people approve the construction of new nuclear reactors?
The answer is that no caring government would, but the people who run the United States’ nuclear program apparently don’t care how much nuclear danger the American citizenry is exposed it. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) recently voted 4-1 to allow Atlanta-based Southern Co. to build two new reactors at its existing Vogtle nuclear power plant near Atlanta, GA.
The new reactors are the first to be approved since the 1978 partial meltdown at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania. Radiation released in that catastrophe is still causing cancer deaths and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Chernobyl in Ukraine is a deadzone and is expected to remain so forever. Japanese engineers are far from finishing their research into what caused the Fukushima nuclear plant to fail last year in the wake of a tsunami.
NRC chairman Gregory Jaczko cast the sole dissenting vote on the Georgia reactors, citing the Fukushima catastrophe. “I cannot support issuing this license as if Fukushima never happened,” chairman Jaczko said. He added that no nuclear plants should be built until the Fukushima investigation is completed because it undoubtedly will result in recommendations for many new safety measures that should be incorporated into any new U.S. reactors.
Sadly, though he voted against the new reactors in Georgia, chairman Jaczko’s statements indicate that in the future he might vote in favor of new reactors if he were convinced of their safety. That’s very discouraging because nuclear plants are inherently unsafe. New ones should not be built and existing ones should be shut down.
U.S. Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA) got it right when he said that the NRC “abdicated its duty to protect public health and safety, just to make construction faster and cheaper for the nuclear industry.”
However, don’t count on most Democrats to fight new nuclear plant construction. The head of the party, President Barack Obama, has several times called for expanding the role of nuclear energy as part of a national clean energy strategy. The President is wrong; nuclear energy is not clean energy.
Dr. Helen Caldicott, a physician who is considered the world’s leading spokesperson for the anti-nuclear movement, said in her latest book, “Nuclear Power Is Not The Answer,” that nuclear plants are constantly spewing radiation which endangers nuclear plant works, those that live near the plant, and those that eat food that has been grown in contaminated soil.
A coalition called The Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, reportedly plans to sue to stop construction of the Georgia reactors. Stephen Smith, head of the Alliance, was quoted in news reports as saying the power company that wants to build the Georgia reactors is motivated by “a healthy profit margin guaranteed by the state, not because we need the power but because this is going to help their bottom line by bringing in this major financial asset.”
The power company also reportedly is seeking an $8.3 billion loan guarantee from the federal government to cover any losses. Dr. Caldicott calls electricity produced by nuclear plants “socialized electricity,” because the industry is so heavily subsidized by state and federal governments. But the costs and who picks up the tab (the taxpayers) is unfortunately a lesser concern when it comes to nuclear power.
Dr. Caldicott declares that nuclear energy “creates significant greenhouse gases and pollution and is on a trajectory to produce as much [of these gases and pollution] as conventional sources of energy within the next one or two decades.”
She said U.S. government regulations allow nuclear plants to routinely “emit hundreds of thousands of curies of radioactive gases and other radioactive elements into the environment each year.” She adds: “Thousands of tons of solid radioactive waste are presently accumulating in the cooling pools beside the 103 operating nuclear plants in the United States and hundreds of others throughout the world. This waste contains extremely toxic elements that will inevitably pollute the environment and human food chains, a legacy that will lead to epidemics of cancer, leukemia and genetic disease in populations living near nuclear power plants or radioactive waste facilities for many generations to come.”
In this day and age, Dr. Caldicott warns nuclear power plants are obvious targets for terrorists, inviting assault by planes, truck bombs, armed attacks or covert intrusions into the reactor control rooms. The subsequent meltdown, she said, could induce the death of hundreds of thousands of people in heavily populated areas and these people would die slowly and painfully, some over days and some over years from acute radiation illness.
Considering how very expensive nuclear plants are to build and the horrendous dangers they pose, there is no good reason to build new reactors and every good reason to shut down the existing reactors — most of them aging and accident prone — still in operation.
*
Barbara Murphy, 79, writes about controversial issues each month.
To Pursue Nuclear Energy
In the wake of Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima, why on earth would any government that cares about the welfare of its people approve the construction of new nuclear reactors?
The answer is that no caring government would, but the people who run the United States’ nuclear program apparently don’t care how much nuclear danger the American citizenry is exposed it. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) recently voted 4-1 to allow Atlanta-based Southern Co. to build two new reactors at its existing Vogtle nuclear power plant near Atlanta, GA.
The new reactors are the first to be approved since the 1978 partial meltdown at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania. Radiation released in that catastrophe is still causing cancer deaths and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Chernobyl in Ukraine is a deadzone and is expected to remain so forever. Japanese engineers are far from finishing their research into what caused the Fukushima nuclear plant to fail last year in the wake of a tsunami.
NRC chairman Gregory Jaczko cast the sole dissenting vote on the Georgia reactors, citing the Fukushima catastrophe. “I cannot support issuing this license as if Fukushima never happened,” chairman Jaczko said. He added that no nuclear plants should be built until the Fukushima investigation is completed because it undoubtedly will result in recommendations for many new safety measures that should be incorporated into any new U.S. reactors.
Sadly, though he voted against the new reactors in Georgia, chairman Jaczko’s statements indicate that in the future he might vote in favor of new reactors if he were convinced of their safety. That’s very discouraging because nuclear plants are inherently unsafe. New ones should not be built and existing ones should be shut down.
U.S. Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA) got it right when he said that the NRC “abdicated its duty to protect public health and safety, just to make construction faster and cheaper for the nuclear industry.”
However, don’t count on most Democrats to fight new nuclear plant construction. The head of the party, President Barack Obama, has several times called for expanding the role of nuclear energy as part of a national clean energy strategy. The President is wrong; nuclear energy is not clean energy.
Dr. Helen Caldicott, a physician who is considered the world’s leading spokesperson for the anti-nuclear movement, said in her latest book, “Nuclear Power Is Not The Answer,” that nuclear plants are constantly spewing radiation which endangers nuclear plant works, those that live near the plant, and those that eat food that has been grown in contaminated soil.
A coalition called The Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, reportedly plans to sue to stop construction of the Georgia reactors. Stephen Smith, head of the Alliance, was quoted in news reports as saying the power company that wants to build the Georgia reactors is motivated by “a healthy profit margin guaranteed by the state, not because we need the power but because this is going to help their bottom line by bringing in this major financial asset.”
The power company also reportedly is seeking an $8.3 billion loan guarantee from the federal government to cover any losses. Dr. Caldicott calls electricity produced by nuclear plants “socialized electricity,” because the industry is so heavily subsidized by state and federal governments. But the costs and who picks up the tab (the taxpayers) is unfortunately a lesser concern when it comes to nuclear power.
Dr. Caldicott declares that nuclear energy “creates significant greenhouse gases and pollution and is on a trajectory to produce as much [of these gases and pollution] as conventional sources of energy within the next one or two decades.”
She said U.S. government regulations allow nuclear plants to routinely “emit hundreds of thousands of curies of radioactive gases and other radioactive elements into the environment each year.” She adds: “Thousands of tons of solid radioactive waste are presently accumulating in the cooling pools beside the 103 operating nuclear plants in the United States and hundreds of others throughout the world. This waste contains extremely toxic elements that will inevitably pollute the environment and human food chains, a legacy that will lead to epidemics of cancer, leukemia and genetic disease in populations living near nuclear power plants or radioactive waste facilities for many generations to come.”
In this day and age, Dr. Caldicott warns nuclear power plants are obvious targets for terrorists, inviting assault by planes, truck bombs, armed attacks or covert intrusions into the reactor control rooms. The subsequent meltdown, she said, could induce the death of hundreds of thousands of people in heavily populated areas and these people would die slowly and painfully, some over days and some over years from acute radiation illness.
Considering how very expensive nuclear plants are to build and the horrendous dangers they pose, there is no good reason to build new reactors and every good reason to shut down the existing reactors — most of them aging and accident prone — still in operation.
*
Barbara Murphy, 79, writes about controversial issues each month.