[gpga-news] AJC: Should taxpayers subsidize loan guarantees for nuclear power?

[Hugh Esco]

NO: Loans waste money on unsafe industry rife with cost overruns.
http://www.ajc.com/opinion/pro-con-should-taxpayers-322263.html
By Joan King

Americans have never been completely comfortable with nuclear power.

Even before Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, people were uneasy about a
technology that produced radioactive isotopes — subatomic particles
that can’t be seen or felt but can cause cancer.

Nevertheless, the nuclear power plants were built and began producing
electricity. Nuclear power became a part of the nation’s energy mix,
and people became comfortable with it. Nuclear power was still
controversial, and voters forced shutdowns in some states; but there’s
never been a massive call for phase-out as there’s been in Germany.

Instead, some called for a “nuclear renaissance,” but no private
investor will touch it because the nuclear industry has a bad record of
delays and cost over-runs.

Nevertheless, Wednesday President Barack Obama granted $8.3 billion in
taxpayer loan guarantees to the Southern Co. for new reactors at Plant
Vogtle.

According to the Government Accountability Office, the potential for
default on these loans is about 50 percent. This is unacceptable. The
nuclear industry is no longer a young struggling technology. It’s more
than 50 years old, well entrenched and very powerful, but it still
isn’t self-sustaining and it still hasn’t solved its most basic
problems.

1. The industry still has no idea what to do with nuclear waste. The
effort to establish a repository has cost billions and gone nowhere.
Highly dangerous radioactive material is still stored above ground at
nuclear plants across the country.

2. The industry is unable to sustain itself without massive infusions
of federal money, and because of its ties to nuclear weapon technology,
nuclear power does not, and can never, operate in a completely open and
democratic fashion.

The government is forced to oversee and intervene at every step of the
operation, but because we want our homes warm in the winter and cool in
the summer, and because we want to keep our lights on and shops open
for business, we accept this intrusion. Point out the danger to the
economy and open government, and we shrug and change the subject.

We ignore physical warning signs: Tritium leaks were recently
discovered at the Yankee plant in Vermont.

Groundwater contamination around the plant is 40 times higher than the
federal safe drinking water limit, and similar leaks have been found at
least 28 of the nation’s other 104 nuclear plants. The most recent leak
was discovered earlier this month at Plant Oconee just north of the
Georgia-South Carolina border.

Tritium is radioactive. In sufficient concentration it’s carcinogenic.
Nuclear power is not safe, not practical and not clean. It isn’t even
economically viable. But here’s the good news: It’s not necessary!

Even if the nuclear industry gets its subsidies, new plants can’t be up
and running for eight to 10 years. Meanwhile, renewable technology is
coming online every day.

According to the U.S. Department of Energy, renewable energy usage is
rising steadily. For the month of October 2009, renewables’
contribution to the nation’s energy mix exceeded that of nuclear power.

Renewables are ready now. Solar and wind generators can be put to work
in a matter of weeks. According to the American Wind Energy
Association, 9,922 megawatts of wind power came online in 2009. With
figures like this, pretty soon we don’t need any nuclear reactors at
all.

Renewables are transforming the way our country gets and transmits its
energy. And like any new and growing businesses, they generate jobs!

Loan guarantees to the Southern Co. does nothing but put taxpayer
dollars into an old and outdated technology.

Joan King lives in Sautee and is a board member of Nuclear Watch South. 

-- 
Hugh Esco 
http://GeorgiaGreenParty.org