The word comes from author, journalist and climate activist Mark Lynas, who recently had a phone conversation with Mike Childs, the head of climate change with the organization. Apparently, the organization is about to do an extensive scientific review of the positions for and against nuclear energy. Here's Childs from the interview:
[S]o we’ve commissioned the Tyndall Centre in Manchester to lead the review. They’ll go through a process of pulling together the arguments for and against nuclear power, both new nuclear power stations, extending existing stations, and some of the fast breeder ideas on the table. They’ll synthesise that and do a peer-review with proponents both for and against, to see whether they’ve got those arguments properly synthesised and understood. They’ll then do some further work around that, looking at the robustness and quality of those different arguments, and come forward with recommendations.Very, very interesting (for more thoughts on the possible change, visit Rod Adams). It's too bad that this reconsideration of policy came too late for Rev. Hugh Montefiore, an Anglican bishop who was forced to leave the FOE board in 2004 for his support for nuclear energy. Rev. Montefiore passed away just eight months later.
One point that needs to be made here: this policy review is only taking place in the U.K. As Childs himself points out in the interview, each local affiliate of FOE is allowed to chart its own policy course, which I guess has Arnie Gundersen breathing a sigh of relief -- at least for now. Stay tuned.
UPDATE:
Comments
James Greenidge
Queens NY
The fact Friends of the Earth review the latest information regularly is much to be welcomed.
from 2 Mile Island, Chernobyl, and now Fukushima?
Chernobyl: 28 deaths of emergency responders, 15 due to developing thyroid cancer. Studies so far have shown no measureable increase in cancer in inhabitants or increased birth defects.
Three Mile Island: nobody died, nobody over exposed, no cancer related developments. zip. nada.
Fukashima: 2 deaths. Due to stuff falling on them during the earthquake. Yes, there were related deaths during evacuation, but most of those related to the infrastructure being wiped out by earthquake and typhoon.
Japan will now significantly increase fossil fuel burning for power, which has been directly related to million+ deaths over just a few years. look it up.
It's morally vacant to leave toxic waste for future generations to deal with, they never had a chance to negotiate.
Nukes must be wiped from the planet, before they wipe us from the planet.
Simply, you're a selfish idiot if you support nukes. Sheer and utter selfishness - and it supports the organized crime that runs world politics. Scum, the lot of them.
Heat rejection from power stations is not a cause of climate change. You are wrong about this. The cause of climate change is the change in the composition of the atmosphere which requires a higher temperature to be in balance with the tremendous influx of energy from the sun. Heat rejection from nuclear electricity generation would not approach current climate change impacts even all energy (not just electricity) were generated from nuclear power today.
Future generations benefit from the construction of infrastructure and the advancement of knowledge we undertake now. We can leave that wisdom and the resources to deal with nuclear waste, and indeed the Nuclear Waste Fund collected from electricity purchase has enough accumulated wealth to cope with this issue easily.
Simply put, your comment is offensive and vacuous slogan-shouting. You would rather believe dramatic fiction than practical reality.
"So far" being a very important qualifier.
"The Expert Group concluded that there may be up to 4 000 additional cancer deaths among the three highest exposed groups over their lifetime (240 000 liquidators; 116 000 evacuees and the 270 000 residents of the SCZs). Since more than 120 000 people in these three groups may eventually die of cancer, the additional cancer deaths from radiation exposure correspond to 3-4% above the normal incidence of cancers from all causes.
Projections concerning cancer deaths among the five million residents of areas with radioactive caesium deposition of 37 kBq/m2 in Belarus, the Russian Federation and Ukraine are much less certain because they are exposed to doses slightly above natural background radiation levels. Predictions, generally based on the LNT model, suggest that up to 5 000 additional cancer deaths may occur in this population from radiation exposure, or about 0.6% of the cancer deaths expected in this population due to other causes."
Greenpeace? No, the World Health Organization.
http://www.who.int/ionizing_radiation/chernobyl/backgrounder/en/index.html
You left off the final sentence from your quote, so I'll add it here for completeness: "Again, these numbers only provide an indication of the likely impact of the accident because of the important uncertainties listed above."
If you're worried about increased cancer rates in Belarus, the Russian Federation, and Ukraine, efforts and resources would be better spent developing anti-smoking and anti-drinking public service advertising campaigns, rather than whining about Chernobyl.