The cost of saving our skins

Some of my readers are global warming deniers. I have given up trying to argue with them. I have come to the conclusion that global warming skepticism has become a part of political "Conservative" identity, and such not curable by appeals to reason. This is really too bad because in matters related to mitigation of AGW the right is likely to be far more sane than the left. The left has bought into mitigation formulas that will make mitigation far more difficult and expensive than it need be. First much of the left has bought into a set of truly crazy ideas peddled by Al Gore, Amory Lovins, and Joe Romm. It pains me no end to include Al Gore in the crazy solutions to AGW crowd, but the fact is that Gore has bought into the "renewables and efficiency can save us," ideology.

When I started Nuclear Green, I expected to be writing more about my father's career than I have. Instead I have been doing something that Other people should be doing, which is analyzing the cost of coal replacement with renewable electricity. I have actually and informally accepted the argument that conventional nuclear is too expensive to serve as a fossil fuel replacement in the long run. But given the investment choice between renewables and conventional nuclear, conventional nuclear winds hands down in terms of CO2 displacement, cost of base load electricity, reliability, and flexibility. Part of the cost of conventional nuclear is due to excessive regulations, and a regulatory reform is desperately needed. As for the objections to conventional nuclear, new reactor designs are highly safe, and I expect "nuclear waste" to play a valuable role in a post carbon nuclear economy. The argument that because we build reactors in the United States, Congolese rebels and assorted terrorists will acquire nuclear weapons is down right silly. The anti-nuclear crowd clearly crosses the line into fanaticism, offering us arguments that are silly, and/or dishonest, rather than carefully thought out reasoning. I have pointed out before that rational objections to nuclear power can be answered by improved technology, and in particular the Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor. Were critics of nuclear power rational, they would be open to dialogue about the advantages of LFTR technology. Alas, Greenpeace and the Amory Lovins crowd are not in the slightest interested in solutions to the nuclear waste problem, advances in nuclear safety, or proliferation resistant nuclear technology.

The real discussion about the future of energy should focus on the advantages of the LFTR over conventional nuclear technology, the need to get LFTR development started as soon as possible, and methods to accomplish the rapid and low cost deployment of LFTR generators world wide, starting in about a decade. I am well aware that I am going against conventional wisdom by saying this, but the LFTR is the silver bullet, or rather the thorium bullet. If we have only hope of saving our skins, it is going to be through rapid deployment of LFTR technology.

Conventional nuclear technology still costs less as a base power source than renewables. Conventional nuclear is far more flexible and reliable. But conventional nuclear is still too expensive, requires too much labor to construct, and takes too long to build. Even the NIE, which speaks for the conventional nuclear industry admits conventional nuclear cannot be more than part of the show. In addition the world energy economy cannot be sustained with once through nuclear fuel technology. The disadvantages of conventional nuclear become apparent when it is compared to the LFTR potential.

The biggest obstacle to global warming mitigation is ideological. The right denies the necessity of mitigation, but is more receptive than the left to a rational mitigation approach. The left accepts AGW, but buys into a wish fulfillment approach to mitigation. A sane conversation about mitigation is not yet possible in the United States, or most of Europe for that matter. If we cannot talk about rational approaches to AGW mitigation, progress toward that goal is not possible, and the time is short. My call then is a call to reason, a call to sanity. Let's put all of the cards on the table face up. Let's talk about who is holding what, and stop grinding axes. Well that is what should happen, at the very least the media should start reading the ax grinders out of the conversation. It is disgraceful that Scientific American has turned its name over to a poorly informed, journalism school graduate, who follows the Amory Lovins/Joe Romm partly line on nuclear power. It is disgraceful that the New York times turns its pages over to the poorly informed art restoration specialists, who poses as an expert on nuclear technology issues for Greenpeace. We are not going to make progress on mitigation sanity until the fanatics, the ideologically motivated ax grinders, the dishonest, and the ill informed are shoved to the side in the conversation.

A sane conversation is not going to happen overnight. There has to be a real awakening to the difficulties we face, and that has not happened yet. It will happen soon, however. We are about to be brought to an incontrovertible awareness that our own skins are at stake, and that the need to act quickly and decisively is most urgent. At that point, given responsible leadership, the conversation should become serious. Then the central question will be how will it be possible to save our skins. How will it be possible to afford to save our skins, and do it in time?