A Dozen Years after Fukushima, Nuclear Power is Still a Death Wish - CounterPunch.org

A dozen years after four atomic reactors exploded at Fukushima, the plant STILL daily irradiates 150 tons of water which must be treated and stored forever.

Thousands of tons more of such lethal liquid are still held in rotting tanks. The Japanese government wants to dump them in the Pacific, but local resistance is fierce. The build-up will continue for countless years to come, with gargantuan quantities of deadly liquid ever-readier to destroy our oceans….and perhaps, eventually, human life, whose irrational addiction to atomic power has yet to abate.

As of March 10, 2011, the official industry line was that no US-designed commercial reactor could explode. Chornobyl blew up on April 26, 1986, sending deadly radioactive clouds throughout the Earth.

But the commercial reactor producers hid behind Chornobyl’s Soviet design, saying no such thing could happen to reactors designed by GE or Westinghouse.

The next day a massive offshore quake shook the six GE-designed reactors at Fukushima, severely damaging four of them. Some experts believe Unit One was on its way to melting before the giant tsunami wreaked havoc…followed by four massive explosions.

Cores at Units 1-2-3 melted, creating massive quantities of hydrogen, which ignited. A mushroom-shaped cloud suggested possible fission from the high-intensity fuel in Unit 3.

Hydrogen from Unit 3 seeped into the then-shut Unit 4 and exploded, leading to an extremely dangerous loss of coolant in the spent fuel pool.

In concert, the four blown nukes spewed at least 100 times more radioactive cesium than was released by the Bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Japan’s prime minister contemplated evacuating Tokyo’s 15 million people. Prevailing winds blew most of the radiation into the ocean—-towards California…

more: A Dozen Years after Fukushima, Nuclear Power is Still a Death Wish - CounterPunch.org

Opinion | Nuclear Power Still Doesn’t Make Much Sense - The New York Times

The case for next-gen nuclear is getting harder to make as the price of solar, wind, and batteries plummets. In this well-reasoned op-ed by @fmanjoo, @mzjacobson describes this as an "opportunity cost" we cannot afford in the face of a climate crisis. https://t.co/QoHbp2nHa9

— Jay Turner (@_jay_turner) September 16, 2022

Opinion | Nuclear Power Still Doesn’t Make Much Sense - The New York Times

NIRS Publishes White Paper on Reactor Shutdowns and Phaseout Plans | NIRS

NIRS published a white paper on strategies states can use to manage shutdowns of nuclear reactors responsibly and cost-effectively. Nuclear Reactor Closures: Practical, Cost-Effective Solutions for Communities and the Climate, takes lessons learned from reactor closures and state subsidy programs. It proposes proactive, cost-effective ways for states to plan for shutdowns, while protecting workers and local communities through economic transition and accelerating renewable energy growth and greenhouse gas reductions.

NIRS Publishes White Paper on Reactor Shutdowns and Phaseout Plans | NIRS

nirs.org

Should We Subsidize Nuclear Power to Fight Climate Change? - Scientific American Blog Network

That’s what some are advocating, but the arguments in favor of doing so are flawed

Last month, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) put out a reportentitled The Nuclear Power Dilemma: Declining Profits, Plant Closures, and the Threat of Rising Carbon Emissions that calls for offering subsidies to unprofitable nuclear power plants. Not surprisingly, it has been widely welcomed by nuclear advocates, who interpret the report as essentially saying “yes to nuclear power” in order to reduce carbon emissions.

But that interpretation misses the many important but less prominent insights in the UCS report… read more

Conclusion: "All these factors undermine the report’s central assumption that nuclear plants will be replaced by fossil fueled plants. To be fair, the UCS report does call for periodically assessing whether continued support is necessary and cost effective. But such support might already not be cost effective. All told, the economic basis for subsidies is uncertain at best; more likely, it is flawed. Either way, it may be best to get onward with the transition from fossil fuels and nuclear power to renewables."

Should We Subsidize Nuclear Power to Fight Climate Change? - Scientific American Blog Network

Annual dose of empirical data shows nuclear power in continued decline – Report tracks global success of renewable energy | Beyond Nuclear International

Annual dose of empirical data shows nuclear power in continued decline

By Linda Pentz Gunter

When arguing the case for or against nuclear energy, you can go with the masters of spin and omission or you can go with the empirical data. We prefer the latter. And for that, there is the welcome annual edition of the World Nuclear Industry Status Report.

After that, the job becomes easy. There IS no case for nuclear power. It’s fundamentally over. Yet governments — mainly those of nuclear weapons states — cling on to it even as their fingers are loosened one at a time from the ledge. They refuse to fall. Why?

These questions are largely answered in the 2018 edition of the WNISR which rolled out in London, UK on September 4, and is available for download — in full or as an executive summary — from the WNISR website… … …

more: Report tracks global success of renewable energy | Beyond Nuclear International

We Need Renewable Energy, Not Nuclear Power! | NIRS

The nuclear industry is back at it again: promoting dirty, dangerous, expensive reactors at the public’s expense. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is reviewing an “Early Site Permit” application for up to a dozen reactors in Tennessee – with potentially no evacuation plans. This would be a dangerous precedent.

This time, the industry wants us to believe the “solution” is small, modular reactors – or SMRs. Their idea is to design each reactor smaller, and combine a bunch of them into one big power plant. However, these reactors aren’t really “small” and putting a bunch of them in one place only means more potential for disaster. The Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant only had three reactors operating when disaster occurred in 2011. They all melted down.

You’d think that would have taught NRC a lesson. But no – NRC is considering exempting SMRs from longstanding emergency planning requirements, even eliminating the need to have evacuation plans for nearby communities in the case of a meltdown.

Even worse, NRC is flatly ignoring the reality that there is no justification for nuclear power. NRC is supposed to consider both the need for electricity and the alternatives to a nuclear power plant, but its review of the Tennessee Valley Authority’s application ignores both. TVA’s demand for electricity is declining, not growing, and solar, wind, and energy efficiency are far cleaner, safer, and more affordable than the theoretical, untested SMRs.

Send a public comment to NRC, demanding that the agency withdraw its Draft Environmental Impact Statement, and conduct a new, objective study.

SIGN NOW!

No Nuclear-and-Coal Bailout Now - Not Any Day!

The Trump admininstration has postponed a decision on the controversial dirty energy bailout -- but not for long! The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) was supposed to render a decision on December 11, 2017, but has delayed action on the bailout for 30 days, until January 10, 2018, so that two recently appointed FERC commissioners have time to review the record.

This delay is an important victory in its own right -- FERC was poised to go along with the adminstration until just days ago. But don't be fooled: we haven't stopped the bailout yet! 

The Trump administration is still demanding a bailout for coal and nuclear power plants as soon as possible, a massive subsidy, which would potentially cost electricity consumers billions of dollars every year. FERC commissioners could do something just as bad or worse come January.

Please join NIRS in telling FERC: get off this slippery slope to dirty energy. America needs you to reject subsidies, incentives, preferences, and bailouts for nuclear and fossil fuels, and figure out how to make the transition to clean, safe, 100% renewable energy as quickly and affordably as possible.

SIGN NOW

Tell FERC One More Time: Stop the $100+ Billion Nuclear-Coal Bailout! | NIRS | #DirtyEnergy #NuclearFreeCarbonFree #DontNuketheClimate

Make Your Voice Heard!

Department of Energy (DOE) Secretary, Rick Perry, has proposed an unprecedented bailout for nuclear and coal power plants that will raise people’s energy bills and undermine renewable energy.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) is fast-tracking the DOE’s radical proposal and plan to adopt it in 60 days. Public comments were due October 23rd, exactly three weeks after the plan was announced, and we delivered over 11, 420 comments to FERC. 

The proposal calls for subsidies for old, outdated, and very polluting nuclear and coal plants under the guise that they promote electric grid reliability. 

Here are the basics:

     • The DOE wants FERC to bailout power plants that have 90 days of fuel onsite (-- a meaningless idea fabricated to justify subsidies for nuclear and coal).

     • FERC would guarantee the profitability of those coal and nuclear plants by charging consumers prices for their electricity that cover each plant’s operating costs, plus a "return on investment."

     • The bailout would cover 43 reactors in thirteen states—nearly half of the nuclear industry—and over 60 coal plants.

     • The purported basis for the proposal is to ensure the reliability of the electrical grid, but the DOE’s own report published in August found that wind and solar energy strengthened the affordability, reliability, and resilience of the grid.  

This bailout will raise electricity costs by billions of dollars a year and ratepayers across the country will ultimately foot the bill for supporting these expensive plants. And worst of all – it will block renewable energy and increase greenhouse gas emissions.

FERC is taking a final round of public comments until November 7. And we need to deliver another 11,000 comments to them! Even if you already signed a petition or sent a comment, please do so again for this final round.  

It is still important to voice our opposition and the time to act is NOW! And after that, pass it on to your friends and to your contacts on facebook, twitter, Instagram, etc.

Stay tuned for more actions to take as we build this campaign to save our 100% Clean Energy Future!

SIGN NOW!

Background Information:

NUCLEAR SUBSIDIES

• NIRS Report: Too Big to Bail Out: The Economic Costs of a National Nuclear Power Subsidy
  NIRS analysis shows that the nationwide cost of a proposed nuclear subsidy program could cost over $280 billion by 2030.
• GreenWorld:  The Astronomical Cost of New Subsidies for Old Reactors: $280 Billion
  A national nuclear bailout would be climate backwards: blocking renewable energy and diverting massive amounts of money to prop up aging, uneconomical reactors.
  
• New York Just Proved Why Bailing Out Nuclear Power Is a Bad Idea
  New York's recently approved 12-year, $7.6 billion nuclear subsidy program will cost 3 times as much as the state's plan to achieve 50% renewable energy by 2030.

• Union of Concerned Scientists: Nuclear Power: Still Not Viable without Subsidies
  Government subsidies to the nuclear power industry over the past fifty years have been so large that in some cases it would have cost taxpayers less to simply buy kilowatts on the open market and give them away.
• NIRS: Killing the Competition: The Nuclear Power Agenda to Block Climate Action, Stop Renewable Energy, and Subsidize Old Reactors

100% RENEWABLE ENERGY

• Environment America: We Have the Power: 100% Renewable Energy for a Clean, Thriving America
• Institute for Energy and Environmental Research: Carbon Free and Nuclear Free: A Roadmap for U.S. Energy Policy
• Greenpeace: Energy (R)Evolution: A Sustainable Energy USA Outlook
  Study shows U.S. can get to 98% renewables by 2050
• 100% Renewable Energy for All: A sustainable world energy outlook 2015
  Report finds that the world can be powered by 100% renewables by 2050. 
• SUN DAY Campaign: Watts Bar 2: Winning the Battle while Losing the War
  New Electrical Generation from wind and solar is 21 times greater than that expected from the US's first nuclear reactor in 20 years.
• Pew Research Center: Public opinion on renewables and other energy sources

MULTIMEDIA

• Don't Nuke the Climate: lessons from Japan and Germany. Featuring Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute.
• Paris and Onward: the Path Forward to a Nuclear-Free, Carbon-Free energy future
  With Dr. Mark Jacobson of Stanford University and The Solutions Project; and Dr. Arjun Makhijani of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research

ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS OF NUCLEAR POWER

• #NuclearIsDirty Presentation Series
• Fact Sheet: Nuclear Power and Climate: Why Nukes Can't Save the Planet
• Briefing Paper: Nuclear Energy is Dirty Energy

ENERGY TRANSITION

• Oil Change International: The Sky’s Limit: Why the Paris Climate Goals Require a Managed Decline of Fossil Fuel Production
• Labor Network for Sustainability: Climate, Jobs, and Justice Project: A plan for a just transition to a climate-safe economy
• Alliance for a Green Economy (AGREE) and NIRS: Replacing FitzPatrick: How the Closure of a Nuclear Reactor Can Reduce Greenhouse Gases and Radioactive Waste, While Creating Jobs and Supporting the Local Community

SIGN NOW!

Help Save Our Clean Energy Future! #nonukes :: Don't Let #DirtyEnergy Trump the #Climate

Don't Let #DirtyEnergy Trump the #Climate 

Stop the $100+ Billion Nuclear and Coal Bailout

The Trump administration is planning radical actions to advance a dirty energy agenda. Pulling America out of the Global Climate Agreement and ditching the Clean Power Plan are not enough for President Trump. He and his administration want to promote fossil fuels and nuclear power—and to block solar, wind, and the clean energy revolution Americans want and need. 

The Department of Energy wants to expand coal and nuclear power, keeping us tied to two of the dirtiest and most poisonous energy sources ever created. Energy Secretary Rick Perry has issued a report absurdly stating that nuclear and coal are vital to national security. President Trump and Secretary Perry are pushing for a massive coal and nuclear bailout as part of a new policy for “Energy Dominance”. 

This would be a farce if they weren’t serious about it. For decades, dirty energy promoters have tried to sell their poison power under the banner of “energy independence”. But we can’t get more truly independent than generating power from the free sun shining on our rooftops and winds blowing through the fields—not to mention the vast amount of free “negawatts” we never use with smart energy efficiency and conservation.

No—President Trump’s plan is to make Americans pay more for dirty, dangerous coal and nuclear power plants. A nuclear and coal bailout will likely cost hundreds of billions of dollars—dollars that could be used to create a 100% clean energy transition. President Trump refuses to spend a fraction of that amount to support global climate action, but he can’t wait to give mountains of our hard-earned cash to dirty energy executives who have created global warming and nuclear waste.

We have to stop it!

The 2016 election was not a referendum for climate denial and dirty energy. Americans want good jobs and clean air and water and healthy food and communities. 

If the president really wants to revive our economy, create jobs, revitalize local communities, and boost small businesses—then clean energy is the only way to go. Our green energy economy can create millions more jobs than dirty energy could ever provide again. Solar and wind are already creating ten times as many jobs as coal and nuclear for the amount of energy generated. 

The time is now to stop Trump’s dirty energy agenda. Please join us—sign the petition opposing the nuclear and coal bailout. 

And after that, pass it on to your friends and to your contacts on facebook, twitter, Instagram, etc.

Stay tuned for more actions to take as we build this campaign to save our 100% Clean Energy Future!

SIGN NOW

www.NIRS.org
www.facebook.com/nirsnet
www.twitter.com/nirsnet

Stop the Nuclear Tax Bailout -- End the “Nuclear Renaissance” | NIRS

Stop the Nuclear Tax Bailout -- End the “Nuclear Renaissance”

The nuclear industry is trying to ram through another multi-billion-dollar bailout to keep the fantasy/nightmare of nuclear power alive. This time, through Congress. Stopping this bill (HR 1551) could end the so-called “Nuclear Renaissance” once and for all.

Utilities in Georgia and South Carolina are building four new reactors that are all billions of dollars over budget and years behind schedule. The problems were predicted before the utilities broke ground, but the extent of their failure is truly remarkable. The reactors are less than half-way built and have already bankrupted Westinghouse, the largest builder of reactors in the world – proving that nuclear power is a failed technology with no future.

HR 1551 would try to ensure these reactors get built by guaranteeing them $5.2 billion in federal tax breaks that are scheduled to expire in 2020. Because of the massive construction delays in building the reactors, none of them are expected to be online before then.

Please contact your Senators today and tell them to vote "NO" on HR 1551.

SIGN NOW

MORE BACKGROUND

Some or all of the four new reactors being built in the U.S. could be cancelled soon, despite billions of dollars in state and federal subsidies. The two reactors at Plant Vogtle in Georgia have already received $8.3 billion in taxpayer-guaranteed loans, and ratepayers in both states are paying steep rate hikes to cover the financing costs of the projects.

But one of the subsidies – the Nuclear Production Tax Credit – could expire before costing taxpayers a dime. Utilities can only take the tax credit for electricity the reactors actually generate, and it appears none of them will be completed before the program expires by law in 2020. If that happens, it willg taxpayers over $5 billion.

Georgia Power, SCANA, and Westinghouse are begging Congress to rush through a bill (HR 1551) that would NOT ONLY eliminate the 2020 expiration date, but give $2.6 billion in federal tax credits to tax-exempt state utilities and cooperatives that are 50% co-owners of the new reactors. 

The bill would allow the non-profit utilities to transfer the credits to the for-profit utilities and Westinghouse. 

The House of Representatives passed HR 1551 through last week, and Senate Majority Leader McConnell is pushing for a Senate vote this week, before the American public can find out about it. And President Trump has already said he will sign the bill. 

The whole scheme amounts to a $5 billion bailout to four dirty, dangerous reactors – using a new and still-unproven design – that have already had major construction and manufacturing problems.

For more information:

Press Statement by NIRS and Friends of the Earth

Letter to House of Representatives from thirteen environmental organizations

SIGN NOW :: Stop the Nuclear Tax Bailout -- End the “Nuclear Renaissance” | NIRS

Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS)

Consumer Watchdog, Environmental Organizations Demand Congress Reject Nuclear Bailout

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE | JUNE 20,2017

Expert contact: Ben Schreiber, (202)-222-0752, bschreiber@foe.org Communications contact: Patrick Davis, (202) 222-0744, pdavis@foe.org

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Thirteen environmental and consumer watchdog organizations representing millions of members today sent a letter to the House of Representatives urging members to oppose bill H.R. 1551, which aims to bail out the nuclear industry after troubled investments in new reactor projects in the southern U.S.

Last week, H.R. 1551, a bill to amend the IRS code and modify tax credits to nuclear power facilities, passed the House Ways and Means Committee by voice vote. House leadership placed this controversial, fast-tracked legislation on the suspension calendar for this week and the bill is expected to be brought to the floor today.

The legislation comes as Southern Company and SCANA push to get the government, via U.S. taxpayers, to foot even more of the bill for the utilities’ failed bet on nuclear reactors. The projects have been beset by extreme cost overruns and completion schedules have doubled. Westinghouse’s decision to construct four new nuclear reactors for utilities in Georgia and South Carolina has not only bankrupted the company, but also placed its parent company, Toshiba, in an extremely precarious financial position. If enacted, this bill would grant an additional $2.6 billion to the failing projects by making tax-exempt co-owners eligible for federal tax credits, and permitting them to transfer the credits to for-profit corporations.

“These four reactors, two at Southern Company’s Plant Vogtle and two at SCANA’s V.C. Summer, have been under construction since 2009 and were supposed to be operational by now, but are nowhere near complete,” said Ben Schreiber with Friends of the Earth. “Both projects have already benefitted from state and federal incentives, yet their customers have suffered from rising electric bills. There is no reason to burden these customers further or make U.S. taxpayers shoulder any more of the costs for these failed experiments. Congress should ensure the utilities’ shareholders take on some of the risk, not assure yet another multi-billion dollar taxpayer-financed nuclear bailout.”

The letter explains that:
The failures to bring any of the four reactors online within the fifteen-year period of the tax credit program demonstrates that the technology is an even greater failure than the first generation of reactors, and it will never be widely commercialized. It is simply not a justified or worthy investment of taxpayers’ money to grant the owners of these reactors the extraordinary relief of billions of dollars in subsidies for projects that hold no promise for the U.S. energy sector. It should not be forgotten that Southern Company’s expansion of Plant Vogtle has already received substantial taxpayer support through the $8.3 billion in federal nuclear loan guarantees and the public/private cost-sharing support during the permitting and licensing process.

“We urge Congress to give the American people a break and stop throwing billions of dollars in wasteful and ineffective subsidies at these boondoggle nuclear projects," said Tim Judson, executive director of the Nuclear Information and Resource Service. "The industry promised that $20 billion in loans and payouts from taxpayers would revive nuclear power and lead to a 'Nuclear Renaissance.' But all that money and more has only managed to get four reactors less than half- built in ten years, and bankrupted their manufacturer with billions of dollars in cost overruns. Not passing this bill will save taxpayers at least $5 billion dollars. It's time for Congress to give the American people a break.”
Find the letter here.

###

Friends of the Earth fights to create a more healthy and just world. Our current campaigns focus on promoting clean energy and solutions to climate change, ensuring the food we eat and products we use are safe and sustainable, and protecting marine ecosystems and the people who live and work near them.
Founded in 1978, Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS) is the information, networking and outreach center for organizations and individuals concerned about nuclear power, radioactive waste, radiation and sustainable energy issues. NIRS works to advance the transition to clean, efficient, renewable energy; advocates for responsible and environmentally just solutions to radioactive and toxic waste; and fights to protect the public from the effects of radioactive contamination. We provide policy expertise and informational resources on energy and radioactive waste, and monitor policy developments on the national and state levels.
Founded in 1985, the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy promotes responsible energy choices that work to address the impacts of Global Climate Change and ensure clean, safe, and healthy communities throughout the Southeast. Learn more at www.cleanenergy.org.



SEE ALSO: Stop the Nuclear Tax Bailout -- End the “Nuclear Renaissance” | NIRS

Three Mile Island Nuke Plant Closure Strengthens Call for Renewable Energy Future

Tuesday's announcement that the Three Mile Island Unit One nuclear plant will close unless it gets massive subsidies has vastly strengthened the case for a totally renewable energy future.

That future is rising in Buffalo, and comes in the form of Tesla's massive job-producing solar shingle factory which will create hundreds of jobs and operate for decades to come.

Three Mile Island, by contrast, joins a wave of commercially dead reactors whose owners are begging state legislatures for huge bailouts. Exelon, the nation's largest nuke owner, recently got nearly $2.5 billion from the Illinois legislature to keep three uncompetitive nukes there on line.

In Ohio, FirstEnergy is begging the legislature for $300 million per year for the money-losing Perry and Davis-Besse reactors, plagued with serious structural problems. That bailout faces an uphill battle in a surprisingly skeptical legislature. FirstEnergy is at the brink of bankruptcy, and says it will sell the reactors anyway.

To make matters worse, Ohio lawmakers have imposed unique spacing restrictions on the state's wind industry, blocking at least $1.6 billion in investments poised to build eight wind farms now waiting in the wings. Those turbine developments would go far in providing jobs to those who will inevitably lose them at FirstEnergy's uncompetitive nukes…

more: Three Mile Island Nuke Plant Closure Strengthens Call for Renewable Energy Future

#NuclearFreeCarbonFree contingent at the #ClimateMarch in D.C. on 29 APRIL 2017; photos by Jasmine Bright

Tim Judson of Nuclear Information and Resource Service

Tim Judson of Nuclear Information and Resource Service (left) and Paul Gunter of Beyond Nuclear

 

Special thanks to Jasmine Bright for permission to use her photos!

via Nuclear-Free, Carbon-Free Contingent to the People's Climate March (Facebook group)

www.nirs.org
Nuclear Information and Resource Service on Facebook

www.beyondnuclear.org
Beyond Nuclear on Facebook

Time and money run out for nuclear revival - Climate News NetworkClimate News Network

Nuclear industry faces uncertain future as the building boom instigated by the need for low-carbon electricity is hit by unexpected costs and delays.

It is now clear that solar farms and
wind turbines produce cheaper power
than new nuclear will ever be able to

LONDON, 11 January, 2017 – The prospects for expansion of the nuclear industry worldwide look worse in 2017 than at any time since the first atom stations were built in the 1950s.

Toshiba, the giant Japanese company that owns the American reactor designer Westinghouse, is the latest company to face financial difficulties due to unforeseen cost overruns and delays that run into billions of dollars.

Westinghouse Electric’s troubles began after it bought construction contractor CB&I Stone & Webster and then had to write down the value of the acquisition by billions of dollars because of problems with building four new reactors for US utilities...

READ: Time and money run out for nuclear revival - Climate News NetworkClimate News Network

Nuclear Power is Not Clean and Green, Period | DiaNuke.org

…Nuclear power lobbyists and their marketing firms want us to believe that humankind’s current CO2 atmospheric releases would have been much worse were it not for those 438 power plants now operating. How much worse? The World Nuclear Association industry trade group estimates that an additional 1.1 gigatons of CO2 would have been created in 2015 if natural gas plants supplied the electricity instead of those 438 nukes. Worldwide, all those nuclear power plants made only a 3 percent dent in yearly CO2 production.Put another way, each of the 438 individual nuclear plants contribute less than seven thousandths of one percent to CO2 reduction. That’s hardly enough to justify claims that keeping your old local power plant running is necessary to prevent the sea from rising…

…Let’s not recreate the follies of the 20th century by recycling this atomic technology into the 21st century. The evidence proves that new nuclear power plants will make global climate change worse due to huge costs and delayed implementation periods. Lift the CO2 smoke screen and implement the alternative solutions that are available now — faster to implement and much less expensive.

READ: Nuclear Power is Not Clean and Green, Period | DiaNuke.org

Tell President-Elect Trump: Stop the $100+ Billion Nuclear Bailout!

CLICK HERE TO SIGN

Act Now for 100% Clean Energy!

With the election results in, we know that hard times for climate action and clean energy are ahead. But this election was not a referendum for climate denial and dirty energy. We need to mobilize now to stop the bad ideas that are coming.

Dirty energy corporations are already trying to get a jump on the political transition in order to block the shift to renewable energy, including pushing a massive bailout to prop up dirty, old, dangerous nuclear power plants—and they want the next President to make it a national policy, costing $280 billion by 2030.

For the same money, we could get four times more renewable energy than nuclear power, and accelerate the transition to a 100% renewable energy economy--carbon-free AND nuclear-free.

Join us in calling on President-elect Trump, and every state governor, to end subsidies for fossil fuels and nuclear power—and to oppose the nuclear power bailout. This outrageous scheme is starting at the state level, and the industry began pushing presidential candidates take it nationwide even before the election.

The United States can make energy a force for good, both domestically and abroad:

Making sure our kids have clean, healthy air, land, and water.

Creating millions of good jobs and building a prosperous, stable economy.

Making energy affordable, so no one has to choose between the power bill and the grocery bill.

We need to begin pushing President-elect Trump, and our state governors, to say no to the nuclear power bailout, and put our energy dollars to work creating millions of jobs through a clean energy revolution.

SIGN NOW

NUCLEAR ENERGY IS DIRTY ENERGY (and does not fit into a “clean energy standard”) – Briefing Paper [PDF]

The nuclear power industry spent more than $650 million on lobbying, campaign contributions and advertising from 2000-2010 in its persistent effort to achieve a nuclear “renaissance.”1

Now that the nuclear “renaissance” has sputtered, with only 5 of some 35 reactor proposals currently being pursued, the industry is turning its attention— and money--toward preventing the shutdown of many aging reactors unable to compete economical- ly with wind and solar power.

One of the industry’s primary goals has been to convince federal and state legislators, regulatory officials, and the media that nuclear power is some- how “clean” energy, because nuclear reactors emit little carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. But this disregards the alphabet soup of other cancer- causing pollutants spewed into our air and water by nuclear facilities. Unfortunately, lobbying cam- paigns backed by so much money often attain some success.

Thus, there are increasing calls from nuclear indus- try backers, inside and outside of government, to include nuclear power in Renewable Energy Stand- ards (or new “Clean Energy Standards”) intended to boost use of clean renewables, or to permit nuclear to trade emissions credits in regional cap-and-trade emissions programs. This is occurring at both the federal and state levels to encourage use of nuclear power (and for some proponents, coal and natural gas as well) to the detriment of genuinely clean and affordable technologies like wind, solar, energy efficiency and others.2

This trend is likely to accelerate as states prepare plans to implement the Environmental Protection Agency’s carbon reduction rules over the next two years.

Proposals to include nuclear power as part of a Clean or Renewable Energy Standard suffer from three fundamental misconceptions: 1) that carbon dioxide is the only pollutant that matters when de- fining “clean energy;” 2) that because radiation is invisible and odorless, it is not a toxic pollutant; 3) that nuclear power is carbon-free. None of these is true.

Only one of the many technologies that can produce electricity is capable of a catastrophic accident that can kill tens or even hundreds of thousands of peo- ple, presents a security threat of unprecedented pro- portions because of this vulnerability, and creates a lethal byproduct that will be toxic for hundreds of thousands of years: nuclear power. To call nuclear power “clean” is an affront to science and common sense...

more: Briefing Paper: NUCLEAR ENERGY IS DIRTY ENERGY (and does not fit into a “clean energy standard”) [PDF] | NIRS