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"if society seriously aspires to be anti-carbon, it also needs to be seriously pro-nuclear"
That quote appeared in this WP article published on Monday.
In U.S., nuclear energy loses momentum amid economic head winds, safety issues
By Steven Mufson,
...Only five years ago, industry executives and leading politicians were talking about an American nuclear renaissance, hoping to add 20 or more reactors to the 104-unit U.S. nuclear fleet.
But today those companies are holding back in the face of falling natural gas prices and sluggish and uncertain electricity demand. Only five new plants are under construction, while at least that many are slated for permanent closure or shut down indefinitely over safety issues.
On Monday, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) reiterated its refusal to issue a license for a new unit at Calvert Cliffs, Md., that a French company had hoped to make the model for a fleet of reactors. A pair of reactors in Southern California are under scrutiny over whether a major contractor and a utility there concealed concerns about potential cracks in the tubes of a steam generator. And nuclear plants in Wisconsin and Florida are closing down because their owners said they cannot compete with less expensive natural-gas-fired electricity.
Industry officials still make the case for nuclear as a domestic source of energy that does not emit greenhouse gases. “Anyone concerned about global warming should acknowledge that if society seriously aspires to be anti-carbon, it also needs to be seriously pro-nuclear,” Thomas F. Farrell, chief executive of Dominion Resources, said at a recent conference in Washington sponsored by the industry newsletter Platts....
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/2013/03/11/fb6d61c2-715e-11e2-ac36-3d8d9dcaa2e2_story.html?hpid=z1
By Steven Mufson,
...Only five years ago, industry executives and leading politicians were talking about an American nuclear renaissance, hoping to add 20 or more reactors to the 104-unit U.S. nuclear fleet.
But today those companies are holding back in the face of falling natural gas prices and sluggish and uncertain electricity demand. Only five new plants are under construction, while at least that many are slated for permanent closure or shut down indefinitely over safety issues.
On Monday, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) reiterated its refusal to issue a license for a new unit at Calvert Cliffs, Md., that a French company had hoped to make the model for a fleet of reactors. A pair of reactors in Southern California are under scrutiny over whether a major contractor and a utility there concealed concerns about potential cracks in the tubes of a steam generator. And nuclear plants in Wisconsin and Florida are closing down because their owners said they cannot compete with less expensive natural-gas-fired electricity.
Industry officials still make the case for nuclear as a domestic source of energy that does not emit greenhouse gases. “Anyone concerned about global warming should acknowledge that if society seriously aspires to be anti-carbon, it also needs to be seriously pro-nuclear,” Thomas F. Farrell, chief executive of Dominion Resources, said at a recent conference in Washington sponsored by the industry newsletter Platts....
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/2013/03/11/fb6d61c2-715e-11e2-ac36-3d8d9dcaa2e2_story.html?hpid=z1
Because it reflects a constant and false refrain we hear from the nuclear industry, this paragraph jumped out at me:
"Industry officials still make the case for nuclear as a domestic source of energy that does not emit greenhouse gases. “Anyone concerned about global warming should acknowledge that if society seriously aspires to be anti-carbon, it also needs to be seriously pro-nuclear,”"
That quote, as you can see, was from Dominion Resources CEO Thomas F. Farrell. What do we know about Dominion? Well, among other things Wiki has this to say:
46 percent of Dominion's total electric production comes from coal, 41 percent comes from nuclear power, 9 percent comes from natural gas, 1 percent comes from oil, and the remaining 3 percent comes from Hydro and other renewables. Renewable energy sources, primarily wind and biomass, and conservation and efficiency programs will play an increasingly important role in meeting future energy needs and minimizing the company’s environmental footprint.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominion_Resources
46 percent coal
41 percent nuclear power
9 percent natural gas
1 percent oil
Nuclear power is not a threat to coal - it is a means of preserving the energy economy favoring coal in a world moving to an energy economy favoring small scale distributed renewables.
Dominion's bread and butter, now and into the future, are coal (both mining and burning), natural gas fracking and distributing, and nuclear power plant operations. You can see their attempt to play on climate change worries while maintaining a set of operating assets that preserve their dominant market position based on fossil fuels. It's almost funny that the wiki section quoted devotes half of the text to using 3% of their generating assets to show what great folks they are and how much they care about the company's environmental footprint.
Their PR flacks can't rewrite Sourcewatch so you might want to scan their content on Dominion.
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Dominion
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