Brown’s Vision for a Nuclear Britain
Chancellor faces backlash over energy
LONDON - Gordon Brown is to face down sceptics in his party and give the go-ahead for a new generation of nuclear power stations, which will be built across the country.
In a move immediately condemned by environmental organisations, the Prime Minister-elect will give the green light to the plans that will show that he is backing Tony Blair’s support of the nuclear industry. 
Boosted by a new poll, which shows Brown pulling ahead of David Cameron on the issue of competence to run the country, the Chancellor will signal his support this week for a dramatic renewal of the nuclear power programme that will see the building of up to eight new stations, possibly within 15 years.
Alistair Darling, the Trade and Industry Secretary, who is a close Brown ally, is understood to have been told that the Chancellor will offer his unequivocal backing for the government’s energy white paper, to be published on Wednesday.
Darling will make clear that Britain will have to embark on a major renewal of nuclear power if it is to guarantee power supplies while delivering a 60 per cent cut in carbon dioxide emissions by 2050. ‘This is a really urgent problem,’ Darling told The Observer
A major push to harness wave power and build hundreds of new wind farms - many of which will be based offshore - are also likely to be approved. ‘A mix of energy supply is right,’ Darling said of his plans to boost low-carbon energy, particularly offshore projects where there are fewer planning hurdles.
Although Darling insisted that no formal decisions had been made, it is clear that nuclear and wind will provide a significant part of future energy needs. He said: ‘The global demand for energy is going up. We’ve got to come to a decision one or way or another this year. If you didn’t do anything [then in 10 to 15 years] you’d come perilously close on very cold days or very hot days to seeing interruptions in supply.’
Greenpeace last night condemned his plans. A spokesman said: ‘Reaching for nuclear power to solve climate change is like taking up smoking to lose weight. Is it a simple answer? Yes. Is it an effective answer to the climate change crisis? Absolutely not.’
Brown was given a taste of a potential rebellion by his own MPs last night when a former environment minister expressed unease. Elliot Morley, the MP for Scunthorpe, said: ‘Nuclear may or may not have a role to play in the new energy mix. My worry is that this will direct resources and investment away from new low-carbon technology, growth in renewables and energy efficiency. I am not sure nuclear is the best investment at this moment.’
Most of the new nuclear plants are likely to be built on the sites of ageing power stations. ‘It is more likely than not that they would be on existing sites,’ Darling said. ‘However, that does not mean every existing site is appropriate. Because of advances in technology I suspect you’d probably need fewer sites than you would in the olden times.’
Darling said Britain was in a ‘race against time’ to shore up its energy supplies because nuclear power plants, which currently generate 19 per cent of electricity, are due to be phased out. By 2020, if nothing is done, the figure will fall to 7 per cent.
Alongside this, many of the largest coal plants will have to be closed to comply with European Union regulations. Officials judge that without a significant new power station building programme this combination of coal and nuclear closures will force Britain to rely on environmentally unfriendly gas-fired power stations and imports from unstable regions such as the Middle East and Russia for up to 90 per cent of its energy.
A strong opponent of nuclear power when he was first elected to Parliament 20 years ago, Darling says he now believes that Britain has no option but to remain nuclear. ‘I respect the views of someone who says they don’t want nuclear in any circumstances whatsoever. Fair enough. Right, tell me what the alternative is. If there was an easy answer that had low carbon, no cost, no eyesores somebody would have found it. ‘
A new Ipsos MORI poll gives Brown a clear lead in competence at running the economy and Britain’s public services. A majority of people, 54 per cent, believes Brown is better placed to run the economy, compared with 27 per cent for Cameron.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007
Nuclear need not be the disaster some people paint it as. It’s not the first choice, for sure, but until the “nice” renewables of tidal and solar power, nuclear is the best choice. Even the uber environmentalist James Lovelock supports it. Take a look at his (superb) book The Revenge of Gaia.
Nullius, nuclear waste will be harmful for millions of years and will grow over time. If you want nuclear power so freaking much get an explaination ready for future generations who will have to deal with the huge and growing costs of nuclear waste and who will see their standard of living decline as a result. All so you can continue to play your damn video games ,or what ever other luxury that nuclear energy makes possible for you. The second law of thermodynamics makes this problem unavoidable, lower consumption of non-renewable energy souces doesn’t mortgage off the standards of living for future generations, maybe that should go into your thought process.
Lower consumption of non-renewable energy sources would certainly buy some time to adapt to a completely new way of life for developed countries. Civilization as we know it is unsustainable. A population of 6.7 billion people is almost certainly unsustainable in the long run and the long run is only several decades. ‘Standards of living’ are currently measured by consumption. Future generations will have a much lower ’standard of living’ regardless of what is done now. We are caught in a vise with one jaw being the depletion of fossil fuels and the other jaw being global climate change. Those jaws are closing and the pressure will increase steadily.
just read dr. helen caldicott’s Nuclear Energy Is Not the Answer, if you think that new nuclear plants are a good idea. it’s a non-solution. the risks and toxicity of nuclear power outweight greatly the risks of global warming even. the real solution is efficiency and conservation–immediately. the conservatives (backed by nuclear power corporations, one of their major constituencies in terms of political power) are using global warming as a means to sell nuclear power.
the real solution is phasing out all nuclear power plants, and making up that small percentage of electricity with renewables and efficiency. end of story.
Until building new nuclear power plants becomes economically viable
without government subsidies, and the nuclear industry demonstrates
it can further reduce the continuing security and environmental risks of
nuclear power—including the misuse of nuclear materials for weapons and
radioactive contamination from nuclear waste—expanding nuclear power is
not a sound strategy for diversifying America’s energy portfolio and reducing
global warming pollution. NRDC favors more practical, economical, and
environmentally sustainable approaches to reducing both U.S. and global
carbon emissions, focusing on the widest possible implementation of
end-use energy-efficiency improvements, and on policies to accelerate the
commercialization of clean, flexible, renewable energy technolgies.
The most economically efficient way to address
the economic, environmental, and security risks
of new nuclear power plants is to internalize the
costs of avoiding or mitigating these risks in the
market price of electricity and fuels. The United
States can do this effectively by first regulating
both carbon dioxide emissions and the unique
risks posed by the nuclear fuel cycle, and then
letting the “invisible hand” of the market deliver
the lowest-cost technologies for providing energy
services that meet minimum universal criteria for
environmental sustainability, public health, and
energy security.
The nuclear industry rejects this “level
playing field” approach. Despite the public
expenditure of some $85 billion on civilian
nuclear energy development over the last half
century, nuclear industry lobbyists continue to
aggressively seek and obtain additional federal
subsidies, so that investors in new nuclear
power plants can earn a return on what would
otherwise be a dubious commercial investment.
Meanwhile, these subsidies displace government
funding that could otherwise be directed toward
cleaner, more competitive technologies with a
much wider market potential for reducing global
warming pollution. The fastest, cleanest, and most
economical solutions to global warming will come
if energy efficiency and renewable energy compete
on a playing field that has been “leveled” by
regulatory and taxation schemes that compel the
pricing of polluting energy alternatives at closer
to their true costs to society and the environment,
not merely at their immediate costs of extraction
and combustion.
http://www.nrdc.org/nuclear/plants/plants.pdf
In addition so risks (potentially geographic/catastrophic) there is the centuries-long waste problem, association with nuclear weapons industry, need for subsidy, etc. as others point out.
In the US, at least, we have a largely incompetent/politicized government run by party hacks. Imagine the disaster if Bush was able to stock the nuclear regulatory commission, etc. with his people.
But even if nuclear were to run perfectly well, it’s THE MOST autocratic form of energy. Nobody wants a plant in his backyard, nobody wants nuclear waste anywhere around, the management is always federal, distant, top-down, never community owned.
As for Lovelock, his background is chemistry & medicine, not environmental science or activism. His Gaia theories were interesting, but a lot of the machine-like/systems theories that attempted to explain complex/chaotic natural systems turned out to be somewhat a passing fad. Some of that was tried in the 19th century also. It turns out that nature is far more sublime, complex — and nothing is permanent anyway, so a discussion which hinges on the earth’s ability to maintain some sort of homeostatis is in error right off the bat.
I have nothing to add other than I am given the opportunity to listen to the arguments of people who seem to be well informed on this particular article.
I will say that I don’t think nuclear energy is a wise, long term solution. There are just too many risks and potential for environmental catastrophy. We must put our research and best minds at solving the energy problems with clean, renewable sources of energy.
You cannot turn on dime 6.7BN mass of humanity. Even less so planetary climate. There is no “risk” of collision course of those two movements not happening. It is plain fact. So, to talk now about potential risk of nuclear thechnology in some distant future is to miss the whole business of risk assessment. In a short run fission technology is the only fissable solution save from forceful sterilisation of all with annual incomes under $100,000 and imposition of energy rationing even on majority of those as well.
If we are lucky we may have time for either
maturation of nuclear fussion technology or maturation of humankind.
If latter is beyond our dreams, which is most likely, authonazia administered by Doctor Bush will be the most desirable cure of planetary cancer a.k.a. humanity.
Horrifying.
And let us recall that it was Eisenhower’s “Atoms For Peace” program that spread the nuclear discoveries around the world.
There is NO SAFE NUCLEAR POWER!!
Just today, on Lila Garrett’s “Connect the Dots” (KPFK-Los Angeles), her guest from Bridge the Gap discussed the leaching of radioactive metals illegally dumped in landfills into the ground water supply. And, more, the USE OF RADIOACTIVE WASTES in children’s playground and furniture!!
NO ONE has discovered a way to contain these wastes, and governments are unwilling to clean up the mess they’ve made either in the US or the former USSR.
This doesn’t EVEN go into the problem with securing the radioactive materials from the so-called evil-doers who are increasingly difficult to differentiate from the people who are supposed to be protecting the public.
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