CASEnergy > Environmental groups reassess nuclear regarding cl

Concerns about global climate change have altered environmental groups’ attitudes toward nuclear power, said Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace who now runs the Vancouver-based communications consulting firm Greenspirit Strategies.

The debate over global warming is causing environmentalists to specifically reevaluate their opposition to nuclear energy, something he did years ago, Moore said. Moore has become outspoken in his support of nuclear energy, along with a growing number of international environmentalists who believe that any significant reduction of carbon dioxide emissions will only be possible by increasing baseload nuclear generation.

The advocacy group Environmental Defense, for example, is now “open to allowing technologies that reduce carbon dioxide levels,” Moore said May 15. He said the majority of the environmental movement no longer strongly opposes nuclear power because it would be “logically inconsistent” with the calls to lower greenhouse gas emissions.

Mark Brownstein, managing director of business partnerships with Environmental Defense, joined Moore May 15 in speaking about the role of nuclear power in the US at a two hour symposium sponsored by the Clean and Safe Energy, or CASEnergy Coalition. Brownstein, unlike Moore, does not outright support nuclear. But he said his group also is not trying to “bury” nuclear power. “All energy options need to be on the table,” he said.

Brownstein said his organization takes a “pragmatic approach” to environmental issues. It supports a cap on carbon emissions, with a ceiling further reduced over time.

Environmental Defense believes a cap would stimulate the development of new technologies and allow market forces to dictate which generating sources will be used to avoid or lower greenhouse gases emissions, he said.

Brownstein said his group does have concerns about nuclear waste disposal: nuclear plant safety, particularly as they age; and the potential for proliferation.

Moore asserted` that disposal of nuclear waste faced only political, not technical, hurdles.

Others who spoke at the symposium openly embraced nuclear power. Renze Hoeksema, director of federal affairs at DTE Energy, said his company is planning to apply to NRC for a license to build another nuclear reactor at its Fermi site in Michigan, a move that would allow it to keep nuclear as a future option. Jim Hunter, utilities director for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, said his organization represents workers at about 65% of the nuclear power plants operating in the US. “Our people know and understand” nuclear power, he said.

Keith McCoy, vice president of energy and resources policy for the National Association of Manufacturers, said its members are concerned about the environment but believes there needs to be a mix of energy sources. He said the US needs to accelerate the licensing of nuclear power plants, which may be possible by using identical “blueprints” for reactors of the same technology.

Membership

CASEnergy, an organization advocating nuclear power that was launched last year, is headed by Moore and former Environmental Protection Agency Administrator and New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman. Funded by the Nuclear Energy Institute, its members are predominantly large energy companies, businesses, universities, labor organizations and economic development organizations and elected officials. But individual environmentalists and civic leaders also have joined.

Moore said the coalition’s focus is to provide education about nuclear energy at the local and state level. He said there are only three energy sources for baseload — fossil, hydroelectric and nuclear. But hydro is “largely built to capacity in the US,” and wind and solar are “inherently intermittent” and cannot provide baseload capacity, he said.

Moore questioned how anyone who favors reducing carbon emissions could be against nuclear power. Utilities, in fact, are “hedging their bets” that fossil plants will become increasingly more expensive to operate, particularly if the US adopts stricter pollution controls or cap-and-trade emission requirements.

Whitman said the US needs to increase its portfolio of renewable energy sources and can reduce its energy consumption through conservation. But neither option can supplant the need for nuclear baseload power, she said.

South Carolina Representative James Clyburn, the Democratic Majority Whip, said in a keynote address at the symposium that he believes that nuclear power has to be a “significant part” of the nation’s energy mix. He said his daughter, who serves as a commissioner for the South Carolina Public Service Commission, has told him that she has found from her experience at public hearings that residents have the “tolerance level” for living with additional plants built in the state.

South Carolina Electric & Gas and Santee Cooper plan to submit a license application to NRC later this year to potentially build and operate two more units at the Summer site. Duke said it expects to seek regulatory approval of a site in Oconee County, South Carolina for future plant construction.

Clyburn Sees ‘Significant’ Role for Nuclear Power in Energy Debate
Geof Koss
CongressNow
May 15, 2007

House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.), the third-ranking Democrat in the House, today said expanding the use of nuclear power will be a key topic in the unfolding debate over climate change and energy security.

“We must develop a smorgasbord of energy choices,” Clyburn said today at a forum about nuclear power in the Capitol. “I believe nuclear has to be a significant part — who knows, in some places it could be the centerpiece — of the smorgasbord.”

Clyburn made the remarks at a discussion entitled “The Role of Nuclear Energy in Addressing Our Nation’s Energy Challenges” hosted by the CASEnergy Coalition, led by former Republican New Jersey governor and EPA administrator Christine Todd Whitman and Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace. The group is promoting nuclear as a clean and safe energy solution.

His remarks highlight softening Democratic opposition to nuclear power as an energy source in the face of global warming and concerns over U.S. dependence on foreign energy supplies.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) raised eyebrows this year when she testified before the House Science Committee that she was open to considering nuclear power because of concerns over climate change. Nuclear energy does not emit any carbon dioxide emissions, the leading cause of climate change.

However, Clyburn noted that disposal of highly radioactive nuclear remains a significant obstacle to new nuclear power, and suggested that the waste might be better dealt with at the power plants where it is currently stored.

Moore, who left Greenpeace in the 1980s after becoming disillusioned with the group’s policies, said the solution to the nuclear waste problem lies in recovering and reusing uranium from spent nuclear fuel.

“Other countries have solved this problem and are moving forward,” he said. “There is no technical obstacle to dealing with the spent nuclear fuel.”

The Bush administration has proposed a similar domestic initiative, but it has garnered a mixed reaction from lawmakers, who have been reluctant to provide the White House’s funding request in recent years.

Separately, Clyburn downplayed Pelosi’s July 4 deadline for the House to debate comprehensive climate change legislation. “We said we would present [a bill] to the country by July 4,” he said.