Arguments
against nuclear energy
I.) Nuclear
energy is not a smart alternative to fossil fuels
Nuclear
power is limited
Like
fossil fuels, nuclear power depends on non-renewable and finite
resources. The world’s resources of Uranium will not last more than
a few decades, especially now that the US is building new plants,
China is expanding rapidly and countries like India are also talking
about increasing their nuclear energy production. The fast breeders
have proven not to work efficiently and so the reprocessing of
nuclear waste produced by the plants does not seem to be an
alternative for the future. Why bind ourselves to a limited resource,
which could spur similar conflicts over spare resources like oil is
doing now when we can ensure the use of unlimited natural resources
for generations to come? The motto should be: “Peace through sun
and wind instead of wars through uranium and oil”… See also: Facts on
Nuclear
Energy
Nuclear
power is not clean
People
often times think that nuclear energy is the “clean alternative”
to fossil fuels, but that’s not true… only because it doesn’t
produce CO2, doesn’t mean that it’s healthy. In fact, radiation
is pretty much the most unhealthy thing you can imagine and it’s
still not clear how safe nuclear plants really are or how nuclear
waste is best stored away. Uranium mining is a great environmental
disaster and has turned beautiful patches of indigenous lands in
Australia, Canada, Nigeria, India or Russia into radiactive
wastelands, dispersing tens of thousands of people and causing health
problems for the inhabitants who remain. Scientists have shown
increased rates of leukaemia in the children of nuclear power plant
workers. Every month, accidents happen in power plants. In fact,
experts say that it’s only a matter of time before we have another
accident like Chernobyl – or worse. In the end, there is no 100%
safety anywhere and the risks attached to nuclear power with its long
half life and its effects for generations to come are so much graver
than with any other form of energy. See also: Facts on Nuclear Energy
Nuclear power is expensive
Subsidies
for nuclear research have by far exceeded the subsidies for any other
type of energy in the last 50 years. The nuclear industry knows it:
without the heavy state subsidies, nuclear power would not be a very
good product to invest in. Nuclear power produces costs incomparable
to any other type of energy – environmental costs, health
detriment, tons of radioactive material that needs to be carried
around the country and hidden in salt mines for thousands of years,
millions of dollars worth in costs carried not by us but by future
generations, not by the companies producing “cheap energy”, but
by society, the state and our children. See also: Facts
on Nuclear Energy
Nuclear
power is superfluous
Right
now, nuclear power plants produce a little more than 2% of the
world’s power. A dispensible power source, if you ask experts. It’s
not the future – it’s the past. Why invest in a technology that
supplies energy for only 40 years when there are numerous
opportunities to harness the renewable energy sources like wind,
solar power, water and terrestrial heat? The EU is already
calculating the development of energy supply and demand without
nuclear energy for the next few decades - most companies have also
realized that the nuclear age is over. Nuclear power plants can only
be built in states, where there is the political will to pay the
higher price in order to appease the nuclear industry (Finland) or
develop nuclear weapons (Iran, North Korea) . See also: Facts
on Nuclear Energy
II.) Nuclear
energy is a health hazard
Nuclear
plants cause cancer
There
are many reports about increased rates of cancer around nuclear power
plants. The best scientific study ever performed on this subject is
the KiKK case-control study, published by the German Childhood Cancer
Registry (GCCR) in 2007. It showed that living within a 5km of a
nuclear power plant significantly increased the rate of childhood
cancers (60% increase), especially leukemia (120% increase). It also
showed a clear association between the distance from a nuclear plant
and the rate of unexpected cancer cases. But even 50 km away from the
plants, effects were seen. 23 years of data of the registry was
examined, all possible confounders were considered, but only the
distance from the nuclear plant proved to be significantly associated
to the cancer incidence. Read
more about this study here or download the original publications
at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18082395
and http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18067131.
Accidents
occur all the time and can pose health risks
A
few days after the earthquake in Japan, workers at the
Darlington nuclear station in Ontario, Canada filled the wrong tank
with a cocktail of water and the radioactive isotope tritium,
spilling more than 200,000 litres into Lake Ontario:
http://www.thestar.com/news/ontario/article/742225--nuclear-plant-spills-tritium-into-lake
In
July 26, the nuclear power plant at Forsmark, Sweden came close to a
nuclear meltdown due to human mistakes. Lars-Olov Hoeglund, former
chief of construction at the nuclear plant in Forsmark criticizes the
energy company and lacking safety measures.
http://www.ippnw-europe.org/commonFiles/pdfs/Verein/Speech_Lars_Hoeglund.pdf
The
thermal Oxide Reprocessing Plant in Sellafield recently reported an
83,000 litre leak of a highly active uranium-plutonium-mix over the
course of 9 months starting in August of 2004. The rate of childhood
leukaemia consequently increased to 10 times that of the national
average in the coming years. Going even further, a clear dose-effect
relation between the amount of irradiation of the father and the rate
of leukaemia in the children was established. "Gardner, Martin
et al. Results of case-control study of leukaemia and lymphoma among
young people near Sellafield nuclear plant in West Cumbria. BMJ 1990;
300:423-9" and "Lancet 1999; 354:1407-14) To read more
about the Sellafield case, take a look at the following scientific
journals: New Scientist 29 May 1999, New Scientist, 15 November 1997
and CORE Briefing 10.99, 10 June 1999." See also: Living
in the Shadow of Sellafield
Krümmel
is a nuclear power plant near Hamburg, Germany and, in terms of
commercial operation, currently the world's largest of its type.
Since 1986, an significantly increased number of leukemia cases have
been found in the area around the power plant. There have been
fires dure to short circuits on June 28, 2007 and again on July 4,
2009.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,635788,00.html
In
the nuclear power plant of Tricastin, France, 18,000 litres of
Uranium solution were accidentally released and spilled to the ground
in July 2008. Testing found elevated uranium levels in the nearby
rivers Gaffière and Lauzon. French authorities banned the
use
of water from the Gaffière and Lauzon for drinking and watering
of
crops. Swimming, water sports and fishing were also
banned.
http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/RS_Uranium_solution_spill_at_Tricastin_0907081.html
Chernobyl
– not just one catastrophe
The
first catastrophe of Chernobyl was the Meltdown itself. On Saturday,
April 26th, 1986 at 1:23 am, Block 4 of the nuclear power plant at
Chernobyl explodes. 180,000 kilograms of highly radioactive material
is inside the reactor at the time - an amount equal to 1,000
Hiroshima bombs. At least 200 different radioactive isotopes are
catapulted into the atmosphere and contaminate 23% of the state of
Belarus, some parts of Russia and Ukraine, as well as regions of
Poland, the Czech Republic, Scandinavia and southern Germany. Most of
Europe receives additional radiation and even as far as North
America, a significant rise in the daily intake of radiation can be
noted. 800.000 people were used by Soviet authorities to clean up the
rubble of Block 4 – exposing them to radiation doses comparable to
the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Up to this day, children in
the region eat contaminated food, live in contaminated houses, play
in contaminated woods and breathe contaminated dust.
The
effects: a significant rise in all types of cancer, thousands of
deaths, a sharp increased in the number of spontaneous abortions,
stillbirths, and childhood mortality, a growing number of birth
defects and genetic abnormalities, disturbance and retardation of
mental development, a growing number of neuropsychiatric diseases,
blindness, endocrine diseases, diseases of the respiratory,
cardiovascular, gastrointestinal, urogenital systems as well as
higher depression and suicide rates.
The second catastrophe
of Chernobyl is the subsequent cover-up. The effects of the accident
are still being suppressed, covered up, played down, minimized. Even
today, the IAEA claims there were only 56 deaths. Hundreds of
thousands were and still are being affected: in Ukraine, Belarus,
Russia, Poland and other western and northern European countries.
Many victims have been neglected and remain without any help at all.
Even worse: the IAEA has just recently called for a stop of aid to
the victims in order to prevent what it calls victim-mentality. In
reality, the organization’s sole aim is to promote nuclear energy
and the pictures of tens of thousands of irradiated children with
leukaemia don’t really fit into the picture of clean energy.
Chernobyl
should have been the beginning of the end of nuclear energy. The
Chernobyl catastrophe should be synonymous with the understanding
that nuclear energy is neither technically under our control, nor can
it prevail politically. The civilian use of nuclear energy is
inextricably linked with severe health, security, ecological,
political, economic and social risks. See also: Chernobyl
Research and Power Point Presentation
After
Chernobyl, a new nuclear meltdown in Fukushima
Now,
exactly 25 years after the nuclear catastrophe in Chernobyl, the
world is watching in horror as the events in Fukushima, Japan unfold
themselves. This time, we are faced with the prospects of not one,
but 6 nuclear reactors overheating due to lack of cooling devices.
Reactor 3 contans MOX-elements, consisting of uranium oxide and the
much more dangerous plutonium. We've seen numerous hydrogen
explosions in the reactors which were running at the time of the
earthquake and increased levels of caesium-137 and iodine-131 have
already been reported. Fears abound that a nuclear cloud might result
and make its way to the metropolis region of Tokyo or across the
Pacific towards the mainland United States. Current news can be found
online at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nhk-world-tv
III.) Nuclear
Power powers the bomb
With
most technologies used in nuclear energy being dual-use technologies,
the sharp line between civilian and military nuclear research doesn’t
exist. Examples like North Korea, Iran, Pakistan, Israel or India
should have shown the world that countries possessing nuclear energy
programs have absolutely no problem of developing military nuclear
projects without a lot of trouble and develop nuclear weapons under
covert civilian nuclear programs. Because
nuclear weapons require highly enriched uranium, a civil nuclear
program is a good way for a country to acquire nuclear weapons.
Countries like Israel, India, Pakistan, Iran and North Korea have
shown how it works – and how the right to civil nuclear programs
has greatly contributed to restarting the Nuclear Arms Race. As long
as there is nuclear power and as long as countries persist on their
right to acquire civilian nuclear energy programs, which the NPT
gives them, the number of nuclear weapons states will increase.
Already, the number has risen from just five to seven (with India and
Pakistan) and now to eight (with North Korea) and possibly to nine
(with Iran) in the next few years – always keeping in mind that
Israel also has nuclear weapons but doesn’t admit it and that
countless other countries have the “nuclear option” of turning
their civilian into a military program, dropping out of the NPT like
North Korea has done and begin testing. Instead of addressing its
starving populations and investing in development and education,
countries like China, India, Pakistan or North Korea are spending
billions on nuclear programs aimed at gaining more political clout. Also,
in the days of international terrorism, nuclear power plants have
become attractive targets for people seeking to cause harm to
innocent people just to make a statement.
Like
stated above, the chances of a resource-driven aggression over
uranium could well be ahead of us if we rely on this finite source of
power. Also, with so much nuclear waste around, the easy
disposal in form of depleted uranium shells and ammunition is a (not
a very pacifist) means of getting rid of radioactive material. See
also: Two
sides of the same coin
Nuclear power plants
in the world:
See
also: Facts
on Nuclear Energy
