Nuclear Myth-Busting at Spiked Online

Rob Johnston put together some great nuclear myth-busting in anticipation of the UK's "green light to the building of new nuclear power stations in the UK." My favorite myth is number 6:

6) Building reactors takes too long

This is perhaps the most ironic of the anti-nuclear arguments, since the legal manoeuvrings of Greenpeace delayed the UK government’s nuclear decision by a year and it is the very opposition of greens that will cause most of the future delays.

Comments

Joffan said…

My two rhetorical responses to the nuclear build schedule objection are:

1. So, were you supporting new nuclear build ten years ago, when it wasn't "too late"?

and

2. Do you really think we won't need any more low-carbon energy in ten years' time?

although I should maybe add a third arising from this:

3. Do you solemnly swear not to delay the nuclear build process?

There is also of course the example of France, that went nuclear in a total timescale of about 20 years.

January 9, 2008 at 3:16 PM

Anonymous said…

It's a similar strategy used in the opposition to the waste disposal process. The no-nooks claim that nuclear is bad because "there is no where to store the waste". But look who are the ones who rise up in opposition to Yucca Mountain. Sure, there is "no where to store the waste" if you prevent development of a storage facility.

So then we ask, well, you're against Yucca Mountain, where to you want us to store it? And they say, "at the plant sites". But then they turn around and hammer the industry for storing spent fuel at the plants, because "that makes them a terrorist target". But, gee, you're the ones opposing Yucca Mountain, we can't ship it off site because you say we should keep the fuel at the plants, but that's bad so we should do it? I mean, make up your mind, wackos.

January 10, 2008 at 11:58 AM

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