Nuclear Power: Environmental Scourge or Climate Change Mitigator?

In his presentation at the Institutional Investor Summit on Climate Risk in May, Harvard University professor and National Commission on Energy Policy co-chair John Holdren stated that nuclear power might be a valid energy alternative to mitigate climate change. Greenpeace founder Patrick Moore said the same thing in testimony before the Congressional Subcommittee on Energy and Resources. So did Whole Earth Catalog founder Stewart Brand in an article in the May edition of Technology Review from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and Gaia theorist James Lovelock in a May op-ed in The Independent.

Climate change is significantly altering the landscape of environmentalism, to the degree that former nuclear power opponents are shifting to supporting it due to its minimal emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs), the primary cause of climate change. Socially responsible investment (SRI) firms have traditionally screened out companies involved in nuclear power.