While fuel waste remains a challenge, it is not an insurmountable one.ĭespite these advances, prominent critics of nuclear energy, notably Marc Z. Most of these new reactor designs use molten salts for cooling rather than water, which is more heat efficient and removes the need for expensive and potentially dangerous high-pressure lines. New reactors are smaller and modular, allowing standardized units to be manufactured off-site at a lower cost. The emerging technology - some of which could be on the grid in this decade - addresses many of the significant shortcomings that plagued conventional reactors over the past 50 years. A recent article by Jonathan Rauch in The Atlantic details the work of several well-funded start-ups developing the next generation of nuclear reactors. John Maynard Keynes famously said, "When the facts change, I change my mind - what do you do, sir?" And indeed, the facts about nuclear power have changed considerably. I eventually realized the weight of opinion from writers and leaders I respected was falling decisively on the side of "no nukes." Until it was proven otherwise, renewables were the answer. The technologies have improved at a dazzling rate, driving down the bottom-line cost of electricity to less than that of fossil fuels in many cases.Īs I was drawn into climate activism 10 years ago, I wavered on the nuclear question. There is no fuel cost and no toxic waste. Renewables, especially wind and solar, have obvious advantages.
Spent nuclear fuel remains toxic for millennia, the power plants are targets for terrorists, the capital costs make it uneconomic, and it can take 20 years to design, permit and build a power station. Renewable energy advocates viewed nuclear power as a competitor, and they marshaled some compelling arguments against it. If the goal was to cut carbon, the nuclear option had to be on the table. The lifecycle carbon emissions of nuclear energy, including the mining and processing of uranium, are far less than those of fossil fuels, which release greenhouse gases when burned. One of the reasons Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Plymouth permanently shut down in 2019 was its inability to compete with low gas prices.īut the emergence of the climate crisis changed the equation. Gas, rather than nuclear, replaced New England's retired nuclear plants and aging coal-fired plants, which accounts for the region's overdependence on gas today.
And the regulatory obstacles for gas-fired plants were far less onerous than for a nuclear plant. Fracking took off in the 1990s, making gas cheap and abundant. The growth of natural gas production was another cause of nuclear power's decline. The Seabrook plant exemplified both, with its completion arriving a decade later than projected and its final cost running roughly seven times the original estimate. Moreover, the nuclear industry had been plagued by delays and cost overruns. The Chernobyl disaster occurred in April 1986. had lost its appetite for building nuclear power plants, and Three Mile Island was not the sole reason. Anti-nuclear power demonstrators march toward the front gate of the Seabrook, N.H., nuclear power station construction site Saturday, April 30, 1977. The words "No Evacuation Possible" in foot-high red lettering across a dilapidated barn on a well-traveled road in Newburyport regularly reminded me of the Seabrook controversy and reaffirmed my animus against nuclear energy. Being against splitting atoms slotted into the same ideological bundle. Left-leaning young people like myself embraced a post-Vietnam political orthodoxy that included feminism, environmentalism and resistance to apartheid. When a reactor at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania partially melted down two years later, opposition to nuclear power became a reflex. A nebulous association between nuclear weapons and nuclear plants only added to my indignation. I shared their belief that the Seabrook plant was unsafe, unnecessary and unwelcome. Many New Englanders of a certain age will recall their slogans: "Go Fishing, Not Fission" and "Better active today than radioactive tomorrow.”Īs a wide-eyed college sophomore, I admired the protesters' resolve and their righteous stance against nuclear power. More than 2,000 demonstrators peacefully occupied the New Hampshire building site in May of that year, resulting in one of the largest mass arrests in the nation's history.
I remember distinctly the protests during the construction of the Seabrook Station Nuclear Power Plant in 1977. Facebook Email A pro-nuclear activist demonstrates outside the European Parliament Jin Strasbourg, eastern France.
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