Now this is interesting. James Lovelock, the British scientist — and Green — who formulated the Gaia hypothesis is arguing that climate change has become such an urgent threat to civilization that we need to immediately adopt nuclear power.
A few choice tidbits:
With six billion [people on Earth], and growing, few options remain; we can not continue drawing energy from fossil fuels and there is no chance that the renewables, wind, tide and water power can provide enough energy and in time. If we had 50 years or more we might make these our main sources. But we do not have 50 years; the Earth is already so disabled by the insidious poison of greenhouse gases that even if we stop all fossil fuel burning immediately, the consequences of what we have already done will last for 1,000 years.
We have no time to experiment with visionary energy sources; civilisation is in imminent danger and has to use nuclear – the one safe, available, energy source – now or suffer the pain soon to be inflicted by our outraged planet.
Opposition to nuclear energy is based on irrational fear fed by Hollywood-style fiction, the Green lobbies and the media. These fears are unjustified, and nuclear energy from its start in 1952 has proved to be the safest of all energy sources. We must stop fretting over the minute statistical risks of cancer from chemicals or radiation. Nearly one third of us will die of cancer anyway, mainly because we breathe air laden with that all pervasive carcinogen, oxygen. If we fail to concentrate our minds on the real danger, which is global warming, we may die even sooner, as did more than 20,000 unfortunates from overheating in Europe last summer.
This will surely send a shock wave through the climate change/clean energy community. I agree with Lovelock that there is little but our fear of nuclear power preventing us from going down the “hard” energy path. However, I’m not sure whether I agree whether that fear is well-placed. Lovelock convieniently leaves out any discussion of the real problem with nuclear energy– the waste, which we can’t store and we can’t treat.
Lovelock’s call for nuclear power makes it even more critically important for advocates of a “soft” energy path to put forth a credible, realistic plan for meeting our energy needs with non-nuclear, climate-friendly fuels. This is a massive undertaking, but if it can’t be done, I’m afraid that the Lovelocks of the world will band together with the nuclear industry to ram reactors down our throats.
And the “usual (Green) suspects” need to make sure that their voices are not the ones crying out for renewables. The call for clean energy has to come from individuals and organizations that do not have a long track record of protesting nuclear power and cannot be easily dismissed as fear-mongers.
The best thing about Saturdays are the simple pleasures: A