Sierra Club advisor calls for public review of nuclear power
The Daily Observer (Pembroke), Wed 29 Oct 2003
by Stephen Uhler
DEEP RIVER - The time has come for a national, far reaching and public review of the place and future nuclear power has in Canada, if any.
This according to David Martin, the senior policy advisor for the Sierra Club of Canada, who took part in a debate on the issue at Childs Auditorium Tuesday night.
"Ideally, I'd like to see a national review which is broad ranging in scope," he said, while debating with Jeremy Whitlock, AECL employee and President of the Canadian Nuclear Society (CNS).
"Ottawa has never had a public review of nuclear power despite massive public subsidies," and it is time one is held. If nuclear power is such a great thing, Mr. Martin said, then people who support the industry should have nothing to fear from it.
"The one thing we can agree on, is it is long, long, long overdue to have a national and public review on nuclear power," he said.
The debate, entitled "Is There A Future For Nuclear Power In Canada?" was the first in a series planned by Mackenzie High School's Humanitas Program, as a means of raising money. It pitted the anti-nuclear Sierra Club against the pro-nuclear CNS.
"Nothing could make electricity more cleanly and more cheaply than nuclear power," Mr. Whitlock said. In Ontario, half of all electricity is generated by nuclear reactors and is a big factor in the province remaining the engine of the Canadian economy.
"We create the maximum electricity with the minimum footprint," and as power usage grows, it becomes the only viable option.
He praised the made-in-Canada technology of the CANDU, the flagship of the nuclear power industry, the spin offs it generates including providing the technical know-how in the manufacture of medical isotopes, and said, despite predictions to the contrary, the future is looking bright for nuclear power.
"The Renaissance is happening and Canada wants to be a part of it," he said, and pointed to the ongoing Advanced CANDU Reactor (ACR) project as an indication of that future.
"The ACR is the reactor of the future," Mr. Whitlock said, calling it the CANDU which can compete head on with fossil fuels such as natural gas, which isn't nearly as efficient as people would like the public to think.
"Natural gas is a beautiful thing to heat the house, but its terrible to generate electricity with," he said.
In contrast, Mr. Martin said if the nuclear industry is such a wonderful thing, why does it account for such a small portion of electricity generation in Canada, and why does it need heavy government support.
"Nuclear power is a technology whose time has passed," he said, which, despite 40 years and $17 billion in subsidies, still only provides some 12 per cent of total energy generation in this country, "roughly the same as firewood."
"There is no Renaissance in nuclear power," Mr. Martin said, describing the nuclear energy program in Ontario as "an unmitigated disaster," with eight out of 20 reactors shut down.
The main stumbling block, he continued, above the fears of accident, radiation releases, nuclear waste and links to nuclear proliferation, is the high financial cost of nuclear power. Mr. Martin said it costs around $2,000 U.S. per kilowatt hour to operate a CANDU, and it is his understanding that price has to be sliced in half to remain viable.
"It is too expensive and too risky."
Mr. Whitlock countered that probably the biggest barrier the industry faces is political and public reaction to the words "nuclear" and "radiation" which makes people run for cover.
"If people can get past the words," he said, they will find the technology and what the nuclear industry can offer is really the best solution to current and future power needs.
Mr. Whitlock calculates that the total subsidies are $6 billion and not $17 billion, explaining the latter number is one extrapolated into today's dollars, but said ultimately it isn't important.
"It doesn't matter if it cost $6 billion or $17 billion," he said, as the investment has been paid back in full, both in revenues and in lives saved from reducing pollution and in benefits from nuclear research.
The Humanitas Program, taught by Terry Serviss, involves the examination of case studies related to modern human rights issues and the exploitation of individual and societal rights and responsibilities.
The students are fundraising for field trips to U.N. simulations at McGill University and the University of Toronto, and hope to go to New York to spend several days at the Canadian Mission at the U.N., and to Washington, D.C., to participate in a Human Rights and Holocaust Education Program. They are also raising money to fund presentations by several human rights guest speakers each year.
[Follow-up by Jeremy Whitlock]
| 