Give nuclear power a chance

Give nuclear power a chance
Editorial, Esquimalt News,
Aug 10 2005
BC Sustainable Energy Association replies
Guy Dauncey, BCSEA, 15 Aug 2005

Editorial
Esquimalt News
Aug 10 2005

COMMENT: Another plug for nuclear that avoids mentioning the two things that make nuclear so ill-advised: the industry's history of things going disastrously wrong, and its failure to address the question of what to do with spent fuel.

The petty visions of environmentalists and energy companies threaten to wrest B.C. from its potential as an energy supplier to the entire Northwest.

During the battle that eventually struck a dagger into the heart of Nanaimo-based Duke Point power plant proposal, environmentalists rightly contested the idea of burning fossil fuels to generate electrical power. After all, conversion of fossil-fuel to steam to electrical power rates as one of the least efficient methods of power conversion, doubly so when one factors in the permanent loss of fossil fuels and inevitable skyrocketing costs when fossil-fuel availability dwindles.

Duke Point opponents demanded investigation of hydroelectric, wind and tidal power to meet the needs of Vancouver Island and the province as a whole. Yet that push underscores a strikingly similar lack of vision, largely because wind and tidal power don't have the capacity to meet the province's future energy demands.

As for dams, the province has a plethora already. From the mighty W.A.C. Bennett Dam in the far north, to Revelstoke, down to modest-sized generation systems near Squamish and Campbell River, there are few rivers remaining suitable for sufficient hydroelectric generation on a scale necessary to meet energy demands. Further, dams are not pretty: they permanently destroy ecosystems on a large scale- something environmental groups must pause to ponder. Consider Williston Lake, a massive body of water created by the construction of the W.A.C. Bennett Dam that rates among the top five largest human-made lakes on the planet. So vast is the reservoir that it changed climates in the area forever.

But the reservoir also beckons with the promise of a solution: nuclear power.

The main challenge with nuclear power is the availability of a suitably large body of water to cool the generators. Ideally located next to an existing power-grid feeding the province, the perpetually cold artificial lake beckons as an ideal location for nuclear power generation.

Unlike the environmental impact of gas-powered generators or hydroelectric dams, the impact of nuclear power is measurable and manageable. Indeed, industry experts consider the compact CANDU reactors - designed and built in Canada - one of the safest and most environmentally sensitive power-generation systems available, and as proof point to decades of safe reactor operation in Ontario.

B.C. has the ideal foundations to embrace an energy-dependant future with a series of nuclear power plants that would allow B.C. to not only meet its own needs but export electrical power for decades to come.

Environmental groups and power company executives can either recognize this or continue to do as they have done: bicker over short-term visions and stopgap "solutions" that carry a much greater economic and environmental price for the entire province.

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Guy Dauncey
BCSEA
15 Aug 2005

Dear Sir,

On August 10th, your Editorial criticized “the petty visions of environmentalists”, that helped persuade BC Hydro to kill off its plans to build a natural gas fired power plant at Duke Point, Nanaimo, and then said that “wind and tidal power don’t have the capacity to meet the province’s future energy needs.” It went on to sing the praises of nuclear power for BC.

I am one of the environmentalists who put in a large amount of effort to stop the Duke Point proposal. The Duke Point plant would have produced 1,800 gigawatt hours of electricity a year, while generating 800,000 tonnes a year of polluting CO2, and other toxic gases.

My analysis of the potential energy which BC could obtain from wind, solar, tidal, geothermal, and other clean, sustainable sources of electricity, combined with a strong commitment to energy efficiency, using BC Hydro’s own data, and other studies, comes to 84,000 gigawatt hours. This would generate around 400,000 part-time and full-time jobs over a 30-year period. With 46 times more power than Duke Point would have provided, I think this might be sufficient to meet our needs.

Your enthusiasm for nuclear power should perhaps be tempered by the fact that no investors in the private sector will touch nuclear power without a cast-iron guarantee of government subsidies, for it is far too expensive and dangerous a product. No-one on the planet has yet come up with a way to keep the resulting radioactive waste secure for 100,000 years, which is one of several reasons why Germany is in the process of closing down all 17 of its nuclear reactors.

If any of your readers would like to work with us in the BC Sustainable Energy Association to build more support for safe, sustainable ways of generating energy, we would welcome your involvement (see www.bcsea.org).

Sincerely,

Guy Dauncey
President, BC Sustainable Energy Association
Victoria

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