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Page added on November 4, 2013
Experts say nuclear power needed to slow warming
Some of the world’s top climate scientists say wind and solar energy won’t be enough to head off extreme global warming, and they’re asking environmentalists to support the development of safer nuclear power as one way to cut fossil fuel pollution.
Four scientists who have played a key role in alerting the public to the dangers of climate change sent letters Sunday to leading environmental groups and politicians around the world. The letter, an advance copy of which was given to The Associated Press, urges a crucial discussion on the role of nuclear power in fighting climate change.
Environmentalists agree that global warming is a threat to ecosystems and humans, but many oppose nuclear power and believe that new forms of renewable energy will be able to power the world within the next few decades.
That isn’t realistic, the letter said.
“Those energy sources cannot scale up fast enough” to deliver the amount of cheap and reliable power the world needs, and “with the planet warming and carbon dioxide emissions rising faster than ever, we cannot afford to turn away from any technology” that has the potential to reduce greenhouse gases.
The letter signers are James Hansen, a former top NASA scientist; Ken Caldeira, of the Carnegie Institution; Kerry Emanuel, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; and Tom Wigley, of the University of Adelaide in Australia.
Hansen began publishing research on the threat of global warming more than 30 years ago, and his testimony before Congress in 1988 helped launch a mainstream discussion. Last February he was arrested in front of the White House at a climate protest that included the head of the Sierra Club and other activists. Caldeira was a contributor to reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Emanuel is known for his research on possible links between climate change and hurricanes, and Wigley has also been doing climate research for more than 30 years.
Emanuel said the signers aren’t opposed to renewable energy sources but want environmentalists to understand that “realistically, they cannot on their own solve the world’s energy problems.”
The vast majority of climate scientists say they’re now virtually certain that pollution from fossil fuels has increased global temperatures over the last 60 years. They say emissions need to be sharply reduced to prevent more extreme damage in the future.
In 2011 worldwide carbon dioxide emissions jumped 3 percent, because of a large increase by China, the No. 1 carbon polluting country. The U.S. is No. 2 in carbon emissions.
Hansen, who’s now at Columbia University, said it’s not enough for environmentalists to simply oppose fossil fuels and promote renewable energy.
“They’re cheating themselves if they keep believing this fiction that all we need” is renewable energy such as wind and solar, Hansen told the AP.
The joint letter says, “The time has come for those who take the threat of global warming seriously to embrace the development and deployment of safer nuclear power systems” as part of efforts to build a new global energy supply.
Stephen Ansolabehere, a Harvard professor who studies energy issues, said nuclear power is “very divisive” within the environmental movement. But he added that the letter could help educate the public about the difficult choices that climate change presents.
One major environmental advocacy organization, the Natural Resources Defense Council, warned that “nuclear power is no panacea for our climate woes.”
Risk of catastrophe is only one drawback of nuclear power, NRDC President Frances Beinecke said in a statement. Waste storage and security of nuclear material are also important issues, she said.
“The better path is to clean up our power plants and invest in efficiency and renewable energy,” Beinecke said.
The scientists acknowledge that there are risks to using nuclear power, but say those are far smaller than the risk posed by extreme climate change.
“We understand that today’s nuclear plants are far from perfect.”
12 Comments on "Experts say nuclear power needed to slow warming"
J-Gav on Mon, 4th Nov 2013 11:56 am
Tomorrow’s nuclear plants will also be “far from perfect.”
James Hansen’s reaction to environmentalists who want to phase out fossil fuels and promote renewables:
“They’re cheating themselves if they keep believing this fiction that all we need is renewable energy such as wind and solar.” Question: All we need for what? If he means to continue consuming as we do today and to allow some emerging economies to move closer to our standard of living (for a very short time), he’s correct. But what he doesn’t mention is what’s really necessary in my view i.e. that the only reasonable approach to our predicament is a major downsizing of our energy/ecological footprint. Had we begun doing this back when Carter (following the Club of Rome)suggested it, we could have made that transition considerably less painful. Unfortunately, that’s not the case and we’re likely to pay dearly for it.
Charlie Bucket on Mon, 4th Nov 2013 1:28 pm
I could have swore I was at Peakoil.com and not the Onion!
BillT on Mon, 4th Nov 2013 3:16 pm
Like replacing beer with vodka…
GregT on Mon, 4th Nov 2013 3:19 pm
Electric power generation, whether by alternate means (so called renewables), or nuclear, will not solve our energy predicament. The vast majority of fossil fuels are used for transportation. Alternate energy infrastructure would, at most, replace a small percentage of fossil fuel use in electric power generation only. They will not fix the environment, they will not grow our food, and they will not allow the continuation of modern industrial society.
Our population is in overshoot. No matter what we do, our population is going to be drastically reduced. The longer we drag this out, the worse the ‘cull’ will be. There is no easy way out of this mess.
We need to end the age of industrialism voluntarily, and face the consequences of what we have already done to the Earth. If we continue doing what we are, it appears highly likely, that the human race will no longer walk the face of this planet.
Our choices are not pleasant, but it would appear that only one of them has a future, for some of us.
Northwest Resident on Mon, 4th Nov 2013 4:01 pm
We need more nuclear power plants like we need rat poison in our coffee. Here’s what we really need: 1) Far fewer people, 2) A return to sustainable living on a local level — hard as that might be for those who have grown fat and lazy off of the energy-intensive input economy that has brought us to this bordeline extinction moment, 3) Immediate shutdown of all those hundreds and thousands of widget factories that are consuming enormous energy and dumping piles of pollution — all to create gadgets that will end up in the landfill or in your favorite river soon enough. It is time to power down — not build the nuclear disasters of the future.
RICHARD RALPH ROEHL on Tue, 5th Nov 2013 1:47 am
Experts [sic] say nuclear power is needed to combat global climate oscillation?
Whores of a brothel are experts too! They’re experts on how to service a cock. It is my opinion that these so called experts are criminally insane.
BillT on Tue, 5th Nov 2013 2:04 am
Richard. Insane? No. Well-paid shills/pimps is my guess. But then intelligence is NOT confirmed with a degree or three.
Roman on Tue, 5th Nov 2013 3:54 am
Best way to cool the planet is to nuke a bunch of volcanoes.
GregT on Tue, 5th Nov 2013 4:00 am
“Best way to cool the planet is to nuke a bunch of volcanoes.”
Or cities…………..
deedl on Tue, 5th Nov 2013 7:46 am
“Those energy sources cannot scale up fast enough”, what a nonsense. Renewables scale up faster than nuclear. In the next ten years Great Britain, which is switching to more nuclear, will get a single reactor online. Compare this to the renewable capacities that went up in Germany during the last ten years. There is a difference of one order of magnitude, so nuclear is a dead horse.
TemplarMyst on Tue, 5th Nov 2013 3:31 pm
Well, okay, if you all say so. I’ve posted before on this. There’s a 40 year lag between GHG emission and effect.
So if you stopped emitting today you still have to endure forty years of increasing weather chaos. This is just getting started, folks.
Go into a low energy paradighm, and you won’t have juice to draw down the GHGs, and you won’t have juice to survive the chaos.
If die-off is in fact you’re solution, fine, but I think Hansen et al are just trying to do something that might, albeit somewhat dangerously, give their grandchildren a chance.
I think their approach is just a reflection of their desperation. I think they see the numbers more clearly than most, that’s all.
jedrider on Wed, 6th Nov 2013 10:56 pm
What this says to me is that ‘Hansen’, a verifiable ‘expert’ in global warming thinks our goose is cooked.
His prescription is betting that climate change trumps nuclear radiation dangers over some time scale.
I think that dealing with one menace at a time is a better strategy. So how many coal plants will we need in order to build all the nuclear reactors we need? Isn’t dealing with Fukushima requiring fossil fuels as we speak but delivering nothing in return?