Smoking Gun Attack on Nuclear From Aloys Wobben, Enercon Managing Director
A couple of weeks ago, I posted an article about a Tim Wirth pep talk to the natural gas industry that I called the best smoking gun ever. When I…
Dick Armey is a former US Congressman (Republican) who now serves as the chairman of FreedomWorks, a conservative, issues-based organization founded in 1984 that includes “full time staff in ten states and over 800,000 grassroots volunteers nationwide.” (quote from the organization’s “About Us” page). The tag line for the group’s web site is “Lower taxes, less government, more freedom.”
On October 18, 2006, the Star-Telegram (Dallas-Forth Worth, Texas) published an opinion piece by Mr. Army titled, Let’s act energetically. Mr. Armey makes a strong case that Texas needs new electricity supplies in an attempt to gain public support for TXU’s plans to build 11 large new coal fired power plants. Here is an example of the words used to provide the basis of his support for the plants:
Texas has some important decisions to make about energy policy, and those decisions will affect consumers, businesses and the overall health of the state’s economy. ERCOT has made it clear that new capacity is required to compensate for the surge in economic growth and the retirement of older power plants.
Faced with a potential shortage of energy, the state can either adopt the California approach of excessive regulation, which has led to power disruptions and rolling blackouts due to limited capacity, or establish policies that encourage increased energy production while ensuring environmental stewardship. Fortunately, Texas is trying to take the latter approach.
So far, so good. Dick and I agree that having sufficient energy is important for a growing economy. Then he mentions that there are proposals for 17 new power plants including 11 coal fired plants that “will inject more than $10 billion into the Texas economy to produce new plants that will yield lower levels of pollution in the state — in fact, reducing overall emissions of pollutants by 20 percent.”
At this point, I began to get suspicious that there might be a ‘smoking gun’ here since I know that there are also a large number of potential nuclear power plant projects under investigation in Texas that ELIMINATE (as opposed to reducing) emissions if they replace older coal or gas plants.
Then comes the real kicker.
Opponents to the coal-fired power plants hope to promote alternative solutions to the looming energy crisis. Two such options are increased use of renewable energy and “demand management,” or identifying opportunities to reduce the amount of energy consumed.
Although additional research for viable renewable energy is important, the bottom line is that the widespread use of renewable energy is not practical, cost-effective or particularly “Earth-friendly” at this time. Any policy that relies on renewables as a solution to our current energy woes is a false hope that will end up costing consumers dearly. Another alternative — expanded use of nuclear power plants — is even more politically unpopular than coal-fired plants, making this a weak alternative at best.(emphasis added)
Of course, the phrase is a bit weak itself, laying the blame on the political unpopularity (which does not really exist anymore), but it is pretty clear which fuel source Mr. Armey favors when it comes to large scale electrical power production. It is not too surprising then, that his conservative organization has the following statement on its energy issues page:
Energy producers — such as the oil and natural gas industry and the electric utility industry — must be allowed to continue fueling the economic growth that has enabled our country to create millions of new jobs and new opportunities for all Americans.
Of course, like most issues based organizations, FreedomWorks is free to provide whatever “information” it chooses while not revealing the sources of its funds. A good “between the lines” reader, however, can probably guess that FreedomWorks receives funding from the specifically mentioned energy producers.
Rod Adams is Managing Partner of Nucleation Capital, a venture fund that invests in advanced nuclear, which provides affordable access to this clean energy sector to pronuclear and impact investors. Rod, a former submarine Engineer Officer and founder of Adams Atomic Engines, Inc., which was one of the earliest advanced nuclear ventures, is an atomic energy expert with small nuclear plant operating and design experience. He has engaged in technical, strategic, political, historic and financial analysis of the nuclear industry, its technology, regulation, and policies for several decades through Atomic Insights, both as its primary blogger and as host of The Atomic Show Podcast. Please click here to subscribe to the Atomic Show RSS feed. To join Rod's pronuclear network and receive his occasional newsletter, click here.
Proving the Principle provides some wonderful and inspiring stories about the days when the United States had a place where atomic tinkerers could explore new ideas and test those ideas with real reactors and real materials. It also provides some insights about the economically and politically motivated reasons that a place with those characteristics no…
Every once in a while I come across articles that directly support the notion that much of the energy source debate is really a marketing battle, though the stated topic might be “energy security”, “environmental concerns”, or “global warming”. To their great credit, most engineers and scientists that I know are very straightforward people; they…
Recently an Atomic Insights reader shared a document that inspired a new line of thinking about the chronology of atomic energy development. The inspirational document was a PDF copy of a chapter titled Little Red Schoolhouse from Freeman Dyson‘s memoir, Disturbing the Universe. It was a brief tale about a memorable burst of creativity in…
One of the themes that I continue to pursue is the fact that the established energy industry has the means, motive and opportunity needed to be a silent partner in the anti-nuclear enterprise. When I bring up this topic at nuclear industry gatherings, I am often met with either silence or vocal disagreement. Many of…
The old “smoking” industries are not the only ones who have a direct financial incentive in shutting out the nuclear competition. Here is a quote from a March 6, 2009 article on Energy Daily titled Analysis: Nuclear vs. renewable in Germany: In 2020 renewables are to satisfy 47 percent of Germany’s power mix — more…
A story titled GOP House candidate Bill Flores backtracks on loans for nuclear power plants caught my eye this morning. It tells the story of Bill Flores, who is running for congress in the Texas district that includes the Comanche Peak nuclear power station. Luminant, the current station owner, has been working for a number…