Harding: Nuclear Industry an Unreliable Source

[Oscar]

Published in the Regina Leader Post on September 1, 2007

Nuclear Industry an Unreliable Source

A Canadian Nuclear Association (CNA) official criticized my August 8th letter “Nuclear energy’s dirty secrets” (see Colin Hunt, “Nuclear critic is challenged”, August 17th).

Using a Japan industry study, he asserts that nuclear is second lowest in grams of carbon per kWh – even lower than solar or wind. These calculations don’t consider the full nuclear fuel system.

The most comprehensive study (van Leeuwen and Smith) concludes that under the most favourable conditions, nuclear emits one-third the C02 of a gas-fired plant. Uranium enrichment also emits other greenhouse gases (GHGs) such as fluorine and chlorine.

There is a more compelling case against nuclear as the magic bullet for global warming.

A 2003 MIT study found that to increase nuclear capacity threefold by 2050, a power plant had to be built every 15 days from 2010 on. This is unrealistic. If it happened, nuclear electricity would only grow from 16% to 20% of total electricity worldwide and GHGs would still increase.

Nuclear is clearly a non-starter and no-brainer.

Hunt goes further out on a limb, saying background radiation “has never been demonstrated to cause any harm whatsoever”.

In fact, radon gas is responsible for ½ of background radiation and, after smoking, is one of the major causes of lung cancer. BEIR VII’s 2005 report concludes, “it is unlikely that there is a threshold (of radiation) below which cancers are not induced.” So why would we want the nuclear industry to increase radiation?

Hunt says I “decline to provide any evidence” that uranium still goes into weapons.

The 1987 UN World Commission on Environment and Development and the 1993 Joint Federal Provincial Panel on Uranium Mining in Saskatchewan indicate that existing safeguards don’t prevent uranium going into weapons. More references are in my upcoming book.

Hunt persists, saying I’m wrong that uranium will soon be exhausted. Actually I said it “will run out not long after oil.” The present high price for uranium will make mining lower grade ores lucrative, but this will require more fossil fuels while creating more GHGs and radioactive wastes. Since there are more effective and far less risky ways to reduce GHGs - such as co-generation, wind and solar – they are the wise and moral way to go.

Hunt is unrepentant, saying that nuclear utilities have “found it to be among the lowest cost options for supplying electricity.”

This is because huge government subsidies, including from weapons technology, have favoured nuclear. As much as ½ the real costs – coming from decommissioning reactors and storing wastes - are being deferred to our grandchildren, who won’t be getting any electricity from these plants. Energy economists looking at full costing (e.g. the 2005 New Economics Foundation study) conclude that nuclear is underestimated by a factor of three; i.e. costing 14 cents (U.S.) a kWh, not the 5 cents the industry broadcasts.

As CNA’s Director of Research and Publications, Hunt’s research is clearly motivated for promotional purposes. His ill-informed response confirms that the CNA is not a trustworthy source of information.

Dr. Jim Harding
Fort Qu'Appelle, SK

*Harding is a retired professor of environment and justice studies and author of the forthcoming book Canada’s Deadly Secret: Saskatchewan Uranium and the Global Nuclear System.

[Oscar]

NUCLEAR NOT SUSTAINABLE

Peace River Record Gazette: Dr. Jim Harding - Oct. 14, 2007

Dear Kristy Lesh,

I have been closely watching the controversy over the Energy Alberta-AECL proposal to build nuclear plants in your Peace River area. While some local politicians may think this presents great economic opportunities, I think the "golden egg" will again prove to be a myth.

Without huge subsidies, nuclear power might not even survive in today's energy market. It's no coincidence that private investors avoid nuclear, and that the government must guarantee the industry's liability for it to get insurance. We should never forget that the AECL's internal documents admit their Candus are no more or less safe than many other designs.

Ontario's Energy Probe has estimated that, accounting for debt and interest, subsidies to the AECL since 1958 total $75 billion. Without the many hidden subsidies going to nuclear the direct cost to the ratepayer would go up by 300%. The taxpayer is paying this rate indirectly when other less-cost alternatives are possible..

Cost projections have consistently been underestimated. The Ontario Darlington plant, the one built in Canada, went over budget by a whopping 380% - going from $2.5 to over $13 billion. Decommissioning radioactive reactors and trying to deal with the accumulating spent fuel (toxic for 800 generations) will push nuclear costs even higher, especially for our grandchildren.

Then there's the matter of whether the AECL will even construct the proposed Advanced Candu Reactor (ACR). The AECL has a litany of failed designs, and this one would be extremely controversial, as it would use reprocessed spent fuel from U.S. light water reactors. This is presently not allowed in Canada, and, interestingly, has been banned in the U.S. due to the proliferation risks its carries. Many observers believe the ACR may be a Trojan Horse for launching an international nuclear waste dump in the Canadian West.

And let us not forget that there are serious health risks from the nuclear fuel system, which the industry, like the tobacco industry, denies or obscures. While the Canadian Nuclear Association (CNA) officially denies the risks of low-level radiation, scientific bodies like the Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation (e.g. BEIR VII)) disagree. The U.S. Surgeon General now considers low-level radiation from radon gas to be the second cause of lung cancer.

After reviewing 17 studies covering 136 nuclear sites in 7 countries, including Canada, it was concluded that children 9 and under living near these nuclear facilities were 24% more likely to die of leukemia. (This is reported in the European Journal of Cancer Care.)

Furthermore, the nuclear industry's claim that they are not connected to the nuclear weapons industry is patently false. As just one example, Saskatchewan uranium enriched in the U.S. provides a large amount of the depleted uranium (DU), which is used to make DU weapons, which have been used since the 1990s in the Middle East. These weapons spread cancer-causing uranium aerosols (lasting billions of years) into war zones, which return to being villages, gardens and family homes. Again it is the children who are most victimized by illnesses. Using such indiscriminate weapons should constitute a "war crime." They make a mockery of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which the Canadian (and Saskatchewan) governments continually hide behind.

I realize that the nuclear industry presently tries to market itself as the magic bullet for global warming, but nothing could be further from the truth. The nuclear fuel system is not carbon-free (or "clean", as the CNA says). As just one example, Saskatchewan uranium is enriched at two huge dirty coal plants at Paducah, Kentucky.

Furthermore, several reputable studies have found that to replace enough coal to make a significant dint in its greenhouse gases (GHGs), a multi-billion dollar nuclear plant would have to be built somewhere every week from 2010 to 2050. This is simply not going to happen, and the costs and risks would never justify such action. Anyway, using nuclear to produce heavy oil, with three times the GHGs of other oil, which is what this Alberta Energy-AECL plan would likely come down to, exposes the nuclear industry's "environmental ticket."

Greenhouse gases are reduced more quickly, and more cheaply, by going with sustainable energy. Energy efficiency and renewables are already producing more electricity worldwide than nuclear, and the trend is increasing. We in the Canadian West are unfortunately being blinded to these facts and opportunities by our economic dependency on non-renewables like fossil fuels and uranium.

With Alberta industry using more than half of the electricity produced there, there are clearly lots of options for cutting waste, using co-generation and building up the renewables, which already produce 1600 MW in the province. That is the safe, economic and moral way to go.

We have had our own experience with the AECL and a private consortium when they tried to establish a Candu-3 industry here in Saskatchewan in the early 1990s. Once people looked closely and rationally at their astonishing claims, and found out what they omitted to tell us, their nuclear balloon burst quite quickly. I suspect that if Albertans ask the hard questions the same thing will happen there.

Regards,

Dr. Jim Harding,

A retired professor of both environmental and justice studies, and have just now released a new book called Canada's Deadly Secret: Saskatchewan Uranium and the Global Nuclear System (Fernwood, 2007).