Stephanie Cooke’s latest opinion piece for the New York Time calls the nuclear revival a fantasy. But it is actually time to burst the anti-nuclear bubble.
This is more of a death rattle than a position piece. Repeating tired talking points in an editorial is how you know things are ending.
The NYT also did a glowing profile of Mady Hilly, so at least they are putting out multiple viewpoints for people to choose from. That’s how I know the pro nuke side is winning.
One other thing you might do is emphasize the positive qualities of nuclear energy. I believe that the climate is changing and that human beings are part of it, but I don’t see an apocalypse. For those who see apocalypse or those who view things like I do, nuclear energy is a positive.
Nuclear energy requires far less land freeing up more open spaces and habitat for wildlife. Nuclear energy is dispatchable which provides better predictability for people who might want to create more businesses and hence create more jobs. Nuclear jobs pay well, which is good for the local economy.
You might point to things like the Decouple podcast or some of their videos, such as this one
In Trope 2 Cooke highlight beyond wind and solar, "hydro and geothermal". One would argue that all the easy hydro has been done. In fact environmentalists would like to restrict or reverse existing hydro in the US which is one of the few solutions that has a chance to fill in the gaps from intermittent wind and solar. With the current US regulatory framework, it is hard to imagine new pumped hydro being deployed in a timely manner, look at the timeline to date on the Eagle Mountain Hydroelectric Pumped Storage Project which submitted it's final licensing request in 2009.
I would back off a little on the caustic rhetoric. I have been pro Nuclear for a long time so I believe your major talking points. Those that are anti-nuclear to the bone will not be changed by any arguments you make. The convertible are those without strong antinuclear opinions. Words like unhinged, trope, utterly memory-holed, utterly absurd feel less like intellectual arguments and more like attacks.
And now for something that is critical about your post. I agree with you 100% on the benefits and need for lots of new nuclear power plants. And perhaps you are correct that building more is possible. But just because something should and could happen does not mean it will happen. The cost of Vogtle 3 and 4 was staggering, and the cost of VC Summers units, which ultimately was abandoned, bankrupted a Westinghouse division, caused SCE&G to sell itself to Dominion, and sent two officers of SCE&G to jail. Combined, the VC Summers and Vogtle results are not too encouraging for others to pursue a new large plant. I hope I am wrong, but color me skeptical that it can happen.
One question, which I ask out of ignorance, not as an attack on your post. You say, and I have seen others say something similar, that concern about disposal of radioactive wastes is a "tired trope" and "scaremongering." I assume that you don't mean nuclear waste is not harmful, but rather that there are safe ways that nuclear waste can be disposed. I have a somewhat different concern. I understand that it is possible to safely dispose of nuclear waste, but that doing so requires us to actually act to provide for safe long-term disposal. Yucca Mountain is dead, and I am not aware that the government is trying to find some other more suitable site. The on-site waste disposal facilities at nuclear plants are only intended to be temporary disposal sites. Don't we need to do something, or am I just missing a basic point?
The anti-nuclear movement is promoted by the fossil industry. Without a factor of 100 improvement in energy storage, wind and solar will have to be backed up by gas plants.
The NYT Climate Forward column has never had the word Nuclear in their column; neither pro nor con. Sadly, NYT is anti-nuclear and blindly renewable without noting the need for gas plant backup.
This is more of a death rattle than a position piece. Repeating tired talking points in an editorial is how you know things are ending.
The NYT also did a glowing profile of Mady Hilly, so at least they are putting out multiple viewpoints for people to choose from. That’s how I know the pro nuke side is winning.
Interestingly, they used the same photo to illustrate both!
It's still aggravating as hell! Too many remain misinformed by the tropes Angelica points to.
One other thing you might do is emphasize the positive qualities of nuclear energy. I believe that the climate is changing and that human beings are part of it, but I don’t see an apocalypse. For those who see apocalypse or those who view things like I do, nuclear energy is a positive.
Nuclear energy requires far less land freeing up more open spaces and habitat for wildlife. Nuclear energy is dispatchable which provides better predictability for people who might want to create more businesses and hence create more jobs. Nuclear jobs pay well, which is good for the local economy.
You might point to things like the Decouple podcast or some of their videos, such as this one
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jM-b5-uD6jU&list=PLyouH0mkPJXEYBa_DHtD9eVWo8ExIUNA-&index=1&pp=iAQB
I dare say Angelica is well informed of the Decouple podcast, given that she writes The Decouple Dispatch. https://decoupledispatch.substack.com/about :)
In Trope 2 Cooke highlight beyond wind and solar, "hydro and geothermal". One would argue that all the easy hydro has been done. In fact environmentalists would like to restrict or reverse existing hydro in the US which is one of the few solutions that has a chance to fill in the gaps from intermittent wind and solar. With the current US regulatory framework, it is hard to imagine new pumped hydro being deployed in a timely manner, look at the timeline to date on the Eagle Mountain Hydroelectric Pumped Storage Project which submitted it's final licensing request in 2009.
I would back off a little on the caustic rhetoric. I have been pro Nuclear for a long time so I believe your major talking points. Those that are anti-nuclear to the bone will not be changed by any arguments you make. The convertible are those without strong antinuclear opinions. Words like unhinged, trope, utterly memory-holed, utterly absurd feel less like intellectual arguments and more like attacks.
They are "wake up and smell the coffee" jolts.
Thank you for your succinct rebuttal of anti-nuclear power stalwart Stephanie Cooke's NYT OpEd.
And now for something that is critical about your post. I agree with you 100% on the benefits and need for lots of new nuclear power plants. And perhaps you are correct that building more is possible. But just because something should and could happen does not mean it will happen. The cost of Vogtle 3 and 4 was staggering, and the cost of VC Summers units, which ultimately was abandoned, bankrupted a Westinghouse division, caused SCE&G to sell itself to Dominion, and sent two officers of SCE&G to jail. Combined, the VC Summers and Vogtle results are not too encouraging for others to pursue a new large plant. I hope I am wrong, but color me skeptical that it can happen.
One question, which I ask out of ignorance, not as an attack on your post. You say, and I have seen others say something similar, that concern about disposal of radioactive wastes is a "tired trope" and "scaremongering." I assume that you don't mean nuclear waste is not harmful, but rather that there are safe ways that nuclear waste can be disposed. I have a somewhat different concern. I understand that it is possible to safely dispose of nuclear waste, but that doing so requires us to actually act to provide for safe long-term disposal. Yucca Mountain is dead, and I am not aware that the government is trying to find some other more suitable site. The on-site waste disposal facilities at nuclear plants are only intended to be temporary disposal sites. Don't we need to do something, or am I just missing a basic point?
The anti-nuclear movement is promoted by the fossil industry. Without a factor of 100 improvement in energy storage, wind and solar will have to be backed up by gas plants.
The NYT Climate Forward column has never had the word Nuclear in their column; neither pro nor con. Sadly, NYT is anti-nuclear and blindly renewable without noting the need for gas plant backup.
Thank you for this post Angelica,
I was recently chatting with Gene about energy density and EROI.
This humble note may be of interest:
https://tucoschild.substack.com/p/energy-density-and-why-we-need-nuclear