If I were a large, wealthy corporation that wanted to push a hazardous and unnecessary environmental disaster onto an unsuspecting population for the sole purpose of expanding my bottom line, what would I do?
I would hire the man responsible for recently handing their government a massive landslide victory to be my lobbyist. That's what I would do.
This post was borne out of a debate in the comments section of my last post. You can find that exchange here.
Using nuclear to fight climate change is replacing one environmental problem (fossil fuel electricity generation) with another. In 2006 the Pembina Institute (arguably Canada's most respected environmental think tank) released a comprehensive, 130 page analysis of the environmental impacts of nuclear power generation in Canada. It's team of engineers, eco-efficiency analysts and policy analysts found that nuclear energy should not be considered a solution (or even part of the solution) to climate change.
Here is an excerpt that sums up their arguments well:
while the GHG emissions associated with nuclear power are less than those that would be associated with conventional fossil fuel energy use, no other energy source combines the generation of conventional pollutants and waste streams (including heavy metals, smog, and acid rain precursors, and water contaminants) with the generation of extremely large volumes of radioactive wastes that will require care and management over hundreds of thousands of years. The combination of these environmental challenges, along with security, accident and weapons proliferation risks that are simply not shared by any other energy source, place nuclear in a unique category relative to all other energy supply options. In essence, reliance on nuclear power as a response to climate change would involve trading one problem-greenhouse gas emissions-for which a wide range of other solutions exist, for a series of other complex and difficult problems for which solutions are generally more costly and difficult and for which the outcomes are much less certain.
If nuclear is our answer to climate change, why is every major Canadian environmental organization against it? It's not a sustainable long-term solution and it's not emissions free. In fact the amount of GHG emissions generated by nuclear power-related activity has been estimated to be just under 600 000 tons a year in Canada. That's about the equivalent of putting 170 000 new cars on the road for a year. Nuclear power is dirty and its proliferation only takes interest and resources away from the development of renewable energy and the promotion of energy conservation. It puts money in the pockets of a few (in the short term) and it does nothing to foster a sustainable energy future for our province or country.
The Alberta Electric System Operator currently has applications from several companies to generate a total 10,500 megawatts of wind power. Given that the AESO is forecasting the need for an additional 5,000 megawatts of power over the next 10 years, this is excellent news! Kudos to the Stelmach government for finally lifting Alberta's asinine wind power cap last year.
This begs the question, why do we need nuclear in Alberta? Especially given the latest news from Bruce Power.
Check it out: ISL Engineering has been kind enough to provide a live video feed (Internet Explorer only, tough luck to all you Safari and Firefox hippies) of our municipal tax dollars being wasted on an interchange that is promised to cut the travel time from IKEA to the red light at 34 ave by up to 20 seconds*.
After you're done with that, I would recommend checking out the rest of the 23 Avenue Interchange website (particularly the "hot" 3D video in the "multimedia gallery"). Gotta love Edmonton; the roads even have websites.
*Not actually promised anywhere. This is me being sarcastic and cynical and attempting to illustrate, ultimately, what we're gaining for 250 million dollars.
