75% of Greens OK with Nuclear Power
Over in the TalkClimateChange section of the new Green Options Discussion Forums, my colleague Mark Seall recently wrapped-up a “Live Debate” on the merits of nuclear power. In addition to the excellent and informed discussion with nuclear experts and environmentalists, there was also a reader poll that concluded with some rather unexpected results. Nearly 75 percent of the respondents believe that nuclear power is good because it is a source of “abundant carbon free energy.”
Yes, this is a reader poll, and it is not a statistical representation of the public attitude of any country in particular. But it is striking that the 133 readers who did vote, were all doing so from a blog network called Green Options. Get it? Simply put, the public attitude towards nuclear power has undergone a seismic shift in recent years. This evidence indicates that this is not the same environmental movement that emerged in the early 1970’s.
But as consumed as I am with energy issues and the politics that surround them, I remain somewhat agnostic about nuclear power. Why is that? There’s no simple answer. Part of it is not wanting to reconcile the tensions between nuclear power as a low-carbon alternative with the ecological dangers of mining uranium and the big issue of transporting and storing nuclear waste. [If you want to know more about the specific dangers and problems facing nuclear power, Judith Lewis has written an excellent article in the most recent issue of Mother Jones addressing these issues in great depth.]
I would also argue that the reason I (and many other greens my age) are not particularly averse to nuclear power is because the pressing environmental issues that were building blocks to my own environmentalism were generally not related to nukes.
