Atomic power merits new look

Friday, June 13, 2008 9:58 PM CDT

There is an option in the energy dilemma that has gained some new attention and which is deserving of a second look. That option is nuclear power.

It has been anathema since the radiation leak at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania and especially since the accident at Chernobyl, yet nuclear power does not consume massive quantities of fossil fuels and thus does not produce large amounts of greenhouse gases.

That makes this source of energy very attractive at a time when global warming is almost palpable and when we have to speedily find new energy sources if we are to maintain our current lifestyle while not cannibalizing the planet.

The governor’s global warming task force acknowledged as much last week when its members suggested studying the nuclear option coupled with an increased reliance on renewable energy derived from sources such as wind power. Indeed, people who have studied the energy issue say repeatedly that there is no magic cure, that we need and will probably end up with a combination of energy sources including wind, solar, biomass, perhaps nuclear, and of course conservation practices that make the most of what we produce.

In October 2007 there were 435 operating nuclear power plants on the planet with another 29 under construction. Although the United States has the largest number of operating plants, 103, it derives just 19 percent of its power from nuclear energy. France derives the largest percentage, 78.

There are unknowns to deal with.

There is waste, the spent nuclear fuel rods which remain dangerously radioactive for thousands of years. Here there is slight progress. On June 3, after many years of tests and hearings, the U.S. Department of Energy submitted its license application to build and operate a nuclear fuel depository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada where old rods would be entombed beneath miles of rock.

There is the cost of constructing the plants and the question of safety, of security against potential terrorism, and of how safe is safe enough when the aftermath of one accident may last hundreds of years. There is the question of whether the nuclear power industry should receive special treatment, thus shifting the cost and the responsibility for problems from companies and shareholders to society at large. That the industry will ask for this is almost certain, given recent history.

No matter what we do, human activity affects the planet. Nuclear power has had its problems and generated fear, yet current science tells us that dependence on coal may have produced a larger, longer-lasting, and more widely experienced set of problems. Our task should therefore be minimizing the harm we cause so that our descendants have as decent a place to live as we can provide. From that standpoint nuclear energy isn’t perfect, but it may be a worthwhile interim solution until we work out the next technology.

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