Smoking Gun – Sierra Club admits donations targeting a natural gas competitor
On February 2, 2012, the Sierra Club allowed a Time magazine blog to break a poorly kept “secret” whose existence had threatened to get out of hand. In a post…
As regular readers know, I harbor cynical thoughts about the motivations of some anti-nuclear commentators. I honestly believe that many of them are supportive of continued market domination by coal, oil and/or gas. I even have a series of blogs with the keyword of “smoking gun” (go ahead, do a search in that little block at the top left of your Atomic Insights window) that points to places where the source is a bit more open about motivation – “smoking gun” articles on Atomic Insights are generally those where an anti-nuclear comment comes directly from someone with an admitted interest in selling more coal, oil or gas.
In all fairness, however, I need to remind myself that there are some people who sell fossil fuel that say very nice and supportive things about nuclear energy and new nuclear power plant construction. I have decided on a new key word – Kevlar Vest – to indicate a post where I point to a statement or commentary by a person with a clear interest in building markets for coal, oil, or gas who comes out in strong support of new nuclear power plant development. (It is not enough to accept the existence of current nuclear plants with a “damning by faint praise” flavor. That kind of support will not earn a Kevlar Vest.)
The first Kevlar Vest goes to Rich Kinder, chairman and CEO of Kiinder Morgan Energy Partners LLP. According to a recent Reuters article titled Kinder: CO2 policy needs natgas, nuclear focus here is what Kinder Morgan does:
Kinder Morgan owns or operates 35,000 miles of gas and oil pipelines and 170 fuel and coal terminals and is building a major gas pipeline from the Rocky Mountains to the East.
In the same Reuters article linked above he is quoted as saying:
“To think we’re going to solve this with solar and wind power is ludicrous,” Kinder, chairman and CEO of Kinder Morgan Energy Partners LP, told the Reuters Global Energy Summit.
“If you want to knock this thing,” he said of cutting fossil fuel emissions to slow global warming, “you’d go to more natural gas and you would go to more nuclear. That is far more effective.”
It is not surprising that he put his own product at the top of the list, but at least nuclear came next and he forthrightly dismissed the notion that solar and wind could solve our energy challenges.
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.
Jim Conca has published a couple of recent posts on Forbes.com about the premature closure of nuclear power plants in the United States. One titled Are California’s Carbon Goals Kaput? focuses on some of the environmental aspects of the San Onofre debacle; the other, titled Closing Vermont Nuclear Bad Business for Everyone focuses on the…
Dieter Helm’s The Carbon Crunch: How We’re Getting Climate Change Wrong–and How to Fix It has the potential to be an influential energy policy book, not just for the UK but for the rest of Europe and the United States. Helm has been making the rounds to promote the book and recently gave a concise…
It is virtually impossible to get an educational institution to understand something when its revenue depends on its audience not understanding it. – Rod Adams, Stanford’s New Natural Gas Initiative, Atomic Insights, May 30, 2015 Aside: In case the allusion doesn’t work for you, the above is deliberately structured to align with a quote from…
In 1972, an Exxon internal audit disclosed that Esso Italiana, Exxon’s Italian subsidiary, had been making payments to Italian political parties that were tied by amount to specific corporate objectives. One of the objectives that was listed on documents seized by Italian authorities was halting nuclear energy development in Italy in favor of burning more…
A ‘smoking gun’ article is one that reveals a direct connection between a fossil fuel or alternative energy system promoter and a strongly antinuclear attitude. One of my guiding theories about energy is that a great deal of the discussion about safety, cost, and waste disposal is really a cover for a normal business activity…
John Hofmeister’s book Why We Hate the Oil Companies should be required reading for people who aspire to engage in the energy conversation. It helps to explain so many things. I do not agree with his proposals or even the point of view that Hofmeister expresses; the reason that I want people to read the…