Archive for the ‘Debate of the Week’ Category

By William Tucker
The Vermont State Legislature has voted not to re-license Vermont Yankee. The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection is insisting that Oyster Creek close down if it does not build cooling towers. New York State is doing the same at Indian Point, which provides New York City with one-quarter of its electricity, as is California with San Onofre and Diablo Canyon.

When told that all these plants play a critical role in providing these state with electricity, the bureaucrats and environmentalists wave these concerns aside and insist the reactors can be replaced by wind and solar.

People who understand energy are assigned a simple role in these controversies. They must defend these aging reactors at all costs. Yes, Vermont Yankee has leaked small quantities of tritium but it poses no danger to the public. Yes, Oyster Creek warms Barnegat Bay slightly but there is no serious threat to fish life. Yes, Indian Point warms the Hudson, but putting up cooling towers would require a yearlong shutdown and make the two reactors unprofitable. (And why hasn't the Department of Environmental Conservation required cooling towers at an almost identical coal-and-gas plant across the Hudson at Bowline Point?)

In the coming years, countless hours and millions of dollars will be spent in court and before regulatory agencies trying to defend these reactors.

So the question is:  How damaging would it be to the U.S. nuclear energy revival if one or more of these plants were to close? Sure, Vermont would lose one-third of its electricity and have to go to Canada begging for hydro. Sure, New York City would lose 2,000 megawatts and suffer brownouts and blackouts during summer peaks. Sure New Jersey would seriously have to investigate covering its entire 125-mile coastline with 45-story windmills. (What a nice background that would make for the Jersey Shore!)

But that's the whole point. American society has become dangerously divided into two groups — people who understand how electricity works and people who hardly know anything about it. Increasingly, it's the people who don't know that much who are running the show. The authors of the Waxman-Markey Bill seriously think passing a renewable standard of 17 percent will set us on the road to energy utopia. Speaking on Meet the Press two years ago, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi described natural gas as a "cheap, clean alternative to fossil fuels."  A few weeks ago I had the chance to quiz one of the chief litigators in the New York Attorney General's office who is diligently trying to close Indian Point because ­as he put it "it's in the wrong place."  When I asked where he thought New York City was going to find a replacement 2,000 megawatts, he gave a weak smile and said, "That's not our problem."

The whole premise of energy generation has become that a small cadre who understand technology are assigned the task of providing for the public while everyone else hounds them for allegedly disturbing the environment. Orchestrating this opera bouffant is a caste of environmentalists who insist that their form of energy generation will have no impact on nature and that covering the Tehachapi Mountains with 40-story windmills will only enhance the scenery.

How important is the battle with nuclear opponents over a small percentage of the U.S. nuclear operating fleet?  Will one or more closures cause a ripple effect in the current fleet with opponents moving onto other targets?  Or is the priority to just concentrate on building new ones as soon as possible or maybe multi-tasking? 

How about adding your opinion to the debate?

William Tucker is editor-at-large of Nuclear Townhall and author of Terrestrial Energy: How Nuclear Power Will Lead the Green Revolution and End America's Energy Odyssey.