[NukeNet] Analysis: pro-nuke amdt., Sen. climate bill

Thu Jun 5 12:01:27 EDT 2008

[While the filibuster against the U.S. Senate climate bill (S. 3036) threatens to kill it for now -- there may not be the 61 votes needed to overcome the filibuster -- it is still important to call Senate offices via the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121. Urge them to not fall for the myth that "nuclear power can help solve the climate crisis." Urge them to block any subsidies for the nuclear industry. Please see the analysis of the Lieberman-Warner-Carper pro-nuclear amendment below. Let me know if you would like me to email you the amendment itself. Thanks.

---Kevin Kamps, Beyond Nuclear, cell 240-462-3216] 

Beyond Nuclear Legislative Analysis

Nuclear Power Subsidies and Promotion Have No Place in U.S. Senate Climate Bill 

INTRODUCTION

U.S. Senators Lieberman (I-CT), Warner (R-VA), and Carper (D-DE) have proposed an amendment to S. 3036 (the “America’s Climate Security Act”) that would provide numerous taxpayer subsidies to the already very heavily subsidized nuclear power industry. A number of “Findings” in a “Sense of the Senate” section of the proposed amendment are inaccurate and misleading. Nuclear power subsidies and deceptive atomic booster-ism have no place in a climate change bill, and should be opposed on the Senate floor. Nuclear power is a false solution for the climate crisis. Real solutions include energy efficiency and renewable sources of electricity such as wind and solar power, all of which are faster, cheaper, cleaner, safer and more secure than nuclear power.

YET MORE PROPOSED NUCLEAR POWER SUBSIDIES

The nuclear power industry is over fifty years old, and has been the single most heavily subsidized energy sector industry in U.S. history. Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute, in his recent analysis of the economic failure of nuclear power in the marketplace (“Forget Nuclear”), estimates that the nuclear power industry has enjoyed around $500 billion in taxpayer subsidies and other support over the last half century. This has included such giveaways as over $145 billion in federal research and development funding between 1948 and 1998; an annual subsidy of $300 million to $3 billion in Price Anderson Act nuclear liability coverage, in the form of insurance premiums the nuclear power industry does not have to pay; over $13 billion in subsidies and tax credits in the 2005 Energy Policy Act; $20.5 billion in federal loan guarantees for new reactor construction and uranium enrichment in the 2008 Omnibus Appropriations Act; not to mention the $70 to $80 billion ratepayer and taxpayer subsidy represented by the proposed Yucca Mountain dumpsite for high-level radioactive waste disposal. Given such large-scale public support, along with an average net profit of $1 million per day at operating nuclear power plants, the industry is not only mature, but also highly profitable for nuclear power utilities and their shareholders. Despite this, Sens. Lieberman, Warner and Carper are proposing significant additional subsidies for the industry which could run into the billions, or even tens to hundreds of billions, of dollars.

“SEC. 536. EDUCATION AND TRAINING” would, between 2012 and 2050, under subsection “(b) NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING EDUCATION,” provide 1/3rd of funding under section 534(c) of the climate bill to “increase the number and amounts of nuclear science talent expansion grants and nuclear science competitiveness grants provided under section 5004 of the America COMPETES Act (42 U.S.C. 16532).” Under subsection “(c) NUCLEAR ENERGY TRADES TRAINING AND CERTIFICATION,” the amendment would allocate another 1/3rd of the funding under section 534(c) to “expand workforce training to meet the high demand for workers skilled in nuclear power plant construction and operation…” This amendment would subsidize training nuclear electricians, nuclear construction workers, nuclear technicians, and nuclear plant construction management through funding community college, skill center, and regional workforce development programs.

The question must be asked, what “high demand”? The last reactor order in the U.S. that was actually completed was placed in October 1973. Wall Street turned its back on nuclear power in the 1970s, leading to the cancellation of scores of reactor orders. This was due to the industry’s own failures, such as astronomical cost overruns (some as high as 300% above original estimates) and long construction delays (the last reactor constructed in the U.S. took 23 years to build). Why can’t a mature and highly profitable industry pay for its own infrastructure re-development, or at the very least borrow such monies from the private investment community, if it is supposedly so viable in the marketplace? The answer is, the financial risks are too great, so the nuclear power industry and its friends in the Senate want to entice Wall Street investors by placing the funding burdens on the American taxpayer.

INACCURATE AND MISLEADING “FINDINGS” AND “SENSE OF SENATE” PROPOSALS

Numerous deceptive proposed “Findings” must be challenged in this amendment. At Sec. 901(a)(1) it states “more than 40 years of experience…have demonstrated that nuclear reactors can be operated safely.” What about the Three Mile Island core meltdown in 1979? What about the Fermi 1 core meltdown in 1966, documented in John G. Fuller’s book “We Almost Lost Detroit”? More recently, what about the 2002 near-miss at Davis-Besse nuclear power plant near Toledo, due to a massive corrosion hole in the reactor pressure vessel lid? Many more significant accidents and incidents could be listed. 

Sec. 901(a)(3) states “nuclear power plants are the only baseload source of emission-free electric generation,” but this ignores the large-scale solar thermal concentrators planned or already under construction in California, Nevada, and Florida, not to mention large-scale wind turbine farms already operating or to be constructed in such places as Texas. Secs. 901(a)(6) and (7) mention the number of jobs expected during construction and operation of nuclear power plants, but fail to mention that energy efficiency measures and renewable electricity facilities would generate significantly more jobs than would nuclear power plants, dollar for dollar invested.

Sec. 901(a)(8), and Sec. 901(b) SENSE OF SENATE REGARDING USE OF FUNDS,” call for subsidies to “stimulate private sector investment in the manufacturing of nuclear power plant components…including through the financial incentives program established under this [Nuclear] subtitle,” and specifically advocates exporting these large nuclear components (such as reactor pressure vessels and steam generators) overseas, to help expand nuclear power worldwide. But what about the nuclear weapons proliferation risks of expanding the generation of plutonium in regions of tension such as the Middle East or East Asia: plutonium can be separated from irradiated nuclear fuel for weapons manufacture, as North Korea did in 2006. What about the escalation of tensions around the expansion of nuclear facilities and industries, as seen by Israel’s attack on Syria last fall, and the ongoing concerns regarding Iran’s uranium enrichment program? Such security risks would turn the “Security” in “America’s Climate Security Act” on its head.

Sec. 901(a)(10) claims that while needed, efficiency and renewables cannot meet carbon reduction goals without new nuclear power plants. But this assertion has been shown not to be true, as by the books published by the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research: “Insurmountable Risks: The Dangers of Using Nuclear Power to Combat Global Climate Change” (2006); and “Carbon-Free and Nuclear-Free: A Roadmap for U.S. Energy Policy” (2007). Finally, Sec. 901(a)(11) claims that nuclear power achieves greater emissions reductions at lower costs, but the Rocky Mountain Institute has calculated that energy efficiency is seven times more cost effective than nuclear power at reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

The Lieberman/Warner/Carper Nuclear Title amendment’s “FINDINGS; SENSE OF SENATE” section is full of inaccurately optimistic nuclear power booster-ism that the Nuclear Energy Institute’s biased PR department could have written itself, and should be blocked from enactment. 

CONCLUSION

After fifty years, it’s high time for the nuclear power industry to stand on its own two feet in the marketplace. Further subsidies should be blocked from inclusion in S. 3036. Nuclear power is not a solution to the climate crisis, as it costs too much, takes too long to deploy, and has unsolved, grave nuclear weapons proliferation, safety, security, and radioactive waste risks.

For more information, please contact Kevin Kamps at cell (240) 462-3216 or [mailto:kevin at beyondnuclear.org] kevin at beyondnuclear.org. Also see [http://www.beyondnuclear.org/Climate_Change.html] http://www.beyondnuclear.org/Climate_Change.html

6/4/2008 
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