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Environment

Nuclear PowerDead On Arrival

May 3, 2010 | A version of this story appeared in Volume 88, Issue 18

THE 1980S witnessed a virtual worldwide collapse of orders for new nuclear power plants. The 1970s were marked by frequent technical mishaps, serious accidents, huge cost escalations, and a rapid decline in public acceptance of nuclear power. Since 1978, more than 18 European nations have abandoned the use of nuclear energy.

Austria (1978), Sweden (1980), and Italy (1987) voted to oppose or phase out nuclear, while Ireland prevented a nuclear program there. Poland stopped construction of a nuclear plant. Belgium, the Netherlands, and Spain decided not to build new plants and intend to phase out nuclear power. Germany has agreed to shut down all nuclear power plants by 2020. Switzerland has had a moratorium on construction of nuclear power plants for 10 years. Even France has switched to solar energy.

What do they know that we don't? Electricity planners are now favoring faster and cheaper renewable energy over commitments to massive centralized nuclear power stations.

As a former nuclear engineer for GE, I know nuclear energy's dirty little secrets. The reasons for the collapse of nuclear power systems include safety problems, inability to dispose of nuclear waste, stratospheric plutonium contamination, and potential for the uncontrolled proliferation of fissile materials by terrorists.

In the late '80s and early '90s, Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, Monju Reactor in Japan, Russia's Ural Mountains nuclear contaminations, and the high cancer rate in children downwind of the Chernobyl incident have sounded the death knell of the nuclear industry. As serious as these problems are, there is a more fundamental failure of nuclear energy to establish itself as an economically competitive means of generating electricity.

According to Energy Central, the U.S. utilities network, the cost of nuclear-generated electricity is 15 cents per kWh. In addition, nuclear power plants are too costly to build; the cost of a 500-MW nuclear power plant has risen from $1.1 billion in 1987 to more than $8.5 billion today with a nine-year permitting and construction schedule. A recent federal loan guarantee of $8.1 billion is a waste of money. Thus, nuclear fission power is no longer an option.

Warren Reynolds
Escondido, Calif.

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