I think one of the most vile is Bulletin of Atomic Scientists - they endlessly conflate nuclear power with weapons, they never fail to dump on any new developments that make the already safest energy source even safer . . . the levels of hypocrisy is flabbergasting ( bought and paid for scare mongering )
Well of course Pritzker vetoed a pro nuclear bill at the bidding of the Anti-Nuclear NGOs. He just got re-elected to a four-year term so voters won't remember. Plus, he wants to be waiting in the wings in case Biden somehow drops out of the Presidential race and the Democratic nomination is up for grabs. Being pro-nuclear could be an automatic disqualifier.
Thanks for this piece. I was the Senior Public Affairs Officer at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Region IV, and I had much interaction with this anti-nuclear industry. I believed the NRC should be pushing back hard against the anti-nuke crazies, but management seemed to have a strange, symbiotic relationship with them. They seemed to think satisfying the demands of the anti-nukes was good for business, that the anti-nukes actually played a constructive role somehow. They seemed oblivious to the fact that anti-nukes can never be satisfied -- the only solution they would ultimately accept is complete termination of nuclear power. However, in the short term, ramping up regulation of the nuclear industry served the interests of NRC bureaucrats and they were fine with that. I got in trouble with the Chairman of the Commission once because I criticized the anti-nuke crazies in a comment I made to a WSJ editorial. Amazing! People can convince themselves of most anything if they think it furthers their careers. I've often noted that the anti-nuke movement is now a lucrative career for too many folks, so it's going to take some kind of apocalypse to dislodge them.
Paradoxically this situation shows the beauty of a decentralized system. The good is it can effect and shape policy, the bad is that taken to far bad policy can be implemented with no accountabillity. Criminal actions like closing Nuclear Plant-Inidan Points & the 40 others that happen in the United States-for the sake for Gaia, forcing utilities to burn more natural gas & coal their contributing to pollution and emission increases-notice emission and pollution are not the samething. Air pollution kills an estimated 60,200 per year in America. These groups are directly responsible for deaths yet are treated with a sense of reverence while bring enviormental destructive less carbon efficient more material dense useless energy.
Back in the mid 70s I was a newspaper reporter tasked with explaining the origins of the anti-nuclear crowd.
What I found was that the fellows behind the the anti-nuclear power were skillful propagandists who convinced the public that the milk being sold in our nation was contaminated by nuclear fallout, and thus a serious danger to children.
For other than real charities, why does tax-exempt status exist at all? Tax exemption amounts to the government paying organizations to influence government policy.
These are Mercenary Environmental Non-Governmental Organizations, ENGOs. And they make their income by doing the dirty work for $billionaires and even entire Nations (i.e. Russia, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE) by using Environmental Regulations and Fear Porn to kneecap their funders competition. Not just Nuclear.
An example, "The Center for Biological Diversity" , is a very wealthy Schlock Mercenary Environmental Organization know for its mass of lawyers and constant litigation to the profit of its $billionaire benefactors. Their latest target is SpaceX. Suing the FAA to block all Starship launches touting what are in reality absolutely negligible environmental effects on the local region. So who's hiring these creeps to shutdown SpaceX? The also very Litigious Jef Bezos with his Blue Origin, can't-get-off-the-ground, public funded porkbarrel project? Aerojet Rocketdyne, Boeing, Jacobs, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman protecting their $30B, 100-1000X more expensive and non-reusable, one-launch-per-year SLS boondoggle? They were previously paying a couple Moon Astronauts to lobby Congress to block funding to SpaceX because "they are unsafe for astronauts".
This was a very good statement of how loss of public sentiment can damage an industry whether the sentiment is sound or not. I did work in the light water reactor business for many years. There were well run utilities and others not so good. In its early phases the smaller 2-loop PWRs for example were built for modest costs and offered reasonable complexity for improving operations. By the time the industry scaled to larger 4-loop plants the costs for construction spiraled out of control. The industry languished for more than 30 years with the legacy. Save for the PRC, there doesn't seem to exist a capital market that will underwrite the investment in new facilities. I'm not sure this has as much to do with anti-nuclear sentiment as it does with basic finance. I think the moment capitalism gets out of its lane is when it supports the construction of things that are NOT RESPONSIBLE for their fully loaded cost. I am sure there are modern designs that may be economically feasible. It just seems unlikely these are sound long-term investments in a fast-changing world that has the multiplier effect in place for the development of battery infrastructure. It is unfortunate but it may be the window for broad dependence on fission reactors has passed. The French model will likely be the outlier exception.
NRDC is also spending big money in the anti-gas front. They fund a lot of the press you read about how your gas range is killing you, and the studies they use to back those articles. Getting rid of gas ranges is key in killing gas period because it is the personal connection most people have ro gas.
Very well documented, logical and fact?data based.
I posted a link to this article in the FaceBook forum Renewable vs Nuclear Debate. Looks like a good discussion. https://www.facebook.com/groups/2081763568746983/posts/3541738229416169
And here in Australia we have a political ban on nuclear energy based on that well-known formula: FEAR + IGNORANCE = STUPIDITY!
It would seem that you are afflicted with that same formula in the U.S. of A. ...... (Although you don't have a stupid nuclear ban!)
Michael Shellenberger runs a pro-nuclear group called Environmental Progress that I support.
I think one of the most vile is Bulletin of Atomic Scientists - they endlessly conflate nuclear power with weapons, they never fail to dump on any new developments that make the already safest energy source even safer . . . the levels of hypocrisy is flabbergasting ( bought and paid for scare mongering )
Well of course Pritzker vetoed a pro nuclear bill at the bidding of the Anti-Nuclear NGOs. He just got re-elected to a four-year term so voters won't remember. Plus, he wants to be waiting in the wings in case Biden somehow drops out of the Presidential race and the Democratic nomination is up for grabs. Being pro-nuclear could be an automatic disqualifier.
Thanks for this piece. I was the Senior Public Affairs Officer at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Region IV, and I had much interaction with this anti-nuclear industry. I believed the NRC should be pushing back hard against the anti-nuke crazies, but management seemed to have a strange, symbiotic relationship with them. They seemed to think satisfying the demands of the anti-nukes was good for business, that the anti-nukes actually played a constructive role somehow. They seemed oblivious to the fact that anti-nukes can never be satisfied -- the only solution they would ultimately accept is complete termination of nuclear power. However, in the short term, ramping up regulation of the nuclear industry served the interests of NRC bureaucrats and they were fine with that. I got in trouble with the Chairman of the Commission once because I criticized the anti-nuke crazies in a comment I made to a WSJ editorial. Amazing! People can convince themselves of most anything if they think it furthers their careers. I've often noted that the anti-nuke movement is now a lucrative career for too many folks, so it's going to take some kind of apocalypse to dislodge them.
Paradoxically this situation shows the beauty of a decentralized system. The good is it can effect and shape policy, the bad is that taken to far bad policy can be implemented with no accountabillity. Criminal actions like closing Nuclear Plant-Inidan Points & the 40 others that happen in the United States-for the sake for Gaia, forcing utilities to burn more natural gas & coal their contributing to pollution and emission increases-notice emission and pollution are not the samething. Air pollution kills an estimated 60,200 per year in America. These groups are directly responsible for deaths yet are treated with a sense of reverence while bring enviormental destructive less carbon efficient more material dense useless energy.
It's amazing that there's a whole industry aimed at guaranteeing we have fewer people and life is worse for the ones we do.
Back in the mid 70s I was a newspaper reporter tasked with explaining the origins of the anti-nuclear crowd.
What I found was that the fellows behind the the anti-nuclear power were skillful propagandists who convinced the public that the milk being sold in our nation was contaminated by nuclear fallout, and thus a serious danger to children.
Not much has changed since then.
Anti-nuclear activists are not just wrong; they're evil. And their primary victims are the poor.
For other than real charities, why does tax-exempt status exist at all? Tax exemption amounts to the government paying organizations to influence government policy.
These are Mercenary Environmental Non-Governmental Organizations, ENGOs. And they make their income by doing the dirty work for $billionaires and even entire Nations (i.e. Russia, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE) by using Environmental Regulations and Fear Porn to kneecap their funders competition. Not just Nuclear.
An example, "The Center for Biological Diversity" , is a very wealthy Schlock Mercenary Environmental Organization know for its mass of lawyers and constant litigation to the profit of its $billionaire benefactors. Their latest target is SpaceX. Suing the FAA to block all Starship launches touting what are in reality absolutely negligible environmental effects on the local region. So who's hiring these creeps to shutdown SpaceX? The also very Litigious Jef Bezos with his Blue Origin, can't-get-off-the-ground, public funded porkbarrel project? Aerojet Rocketdyne, Boeing, Jacobs, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman protecting their $30B, 100-1000X more expensive and non-reusable, one-launch-per-year SLS boondoggle? They were previously paying a couple Moon Astronauts to lobby Congress to block funding to SpaceX because "they are unsafe for astronauts".
This was a very good statement of how loss of public sentiment can damage an industry whether the sentiment is sound or not. I did work in the light water reactor business for many years. There were well run utilities and others not so good. In its early phases the smaller 2-loop PWRs for example were built for modest costs and offered reasonable complexity for improving operations. By the time the industry scaled to larger 4-loop plants the costs for construction spiraled out of control. The industry languished for more than 30 years with the legacy. Save for the PRC, there doesn't seem to exist a capital market that will underwrite the investment in new facilities. I'm not sure this has as much to do with anti-nuclear sentiment as it does with basic finance. I think the moment capitalism gets out of its lane is when it supports the construction of things that are NOT RESPONSIBLE for their fully loaded cost. I am sure there are modern designs that may be economically feasible. It just seems unlikely these are sound long-term investments in a fast-changing world that has the multiplier effect in place for the development of battery infrastructure. It is unfortunate but it may be the window for broad dependence on fission reactors has passed. The French model will likely be the outlier exception.
BTW, John Doerr in the past has claimed to support nuclear.
https://freakonomics.com/podcast/what-is-john-doerrs-plan-to-save-the-planet/
NRDC is also spending big money in the anti-gas front. They fund a lot of the press you read about how your gas range is killing you, and the studies they use to back those articles. Getting rid of gas ranges is key in killing gas period because it is the personal connection most people have ro gas.