Ontario must support clean safe nuclear power

Ontario must support clean safe nuclear power

Fri 25 May 2007
Byline: Dr. Patrick Moore, Vancouver

Re: ‘Nuclear power is a failed ’50s dream’ (letters, May 15)

Greenpeace’s Bruce Cox spends two-thirds of his letter attacking me while failing to provide any realistic solutions to the country’s increasing demand for clean energy.
Cox claims Germany and Spain are phasing out nuclear power, so Ontario should, too. He fails to mention that these countries are replacing nuclear with coal and gas, both of which emit vast amounts of greenhouse gas and air pollution.
Eight EU nations, including Germany and Spain, plan to add nearly 13 gigawatts of new coal-fired capacity by 2012.
Germany alone will build 15 new coal plants in the next few years, contributing enormously to greenhouse gas emissions and air pollutants that can cause asthma and other breathing problems. Is this the “solution” Cox wishes Ontario to follow?
Germany and Spain excepted, most European countries are sticking with and in some cases building additional nuclear plants, to reduce dependence on fossil fuels and comply with greenhouse gas restrictions.
Contrary to Greenpeace’s claims, intermittent energy sources like solar and wind are nowhere near sufficient to meet German and Spanish energy demands. That’s why Germany continues to import much of its power from France, whose electricity production is 80 per cent nuclear.
Activist groups like Greenpeace must be called to account for their irresponsible and unrealistic demand that Ontario replace both coal and nuclear energy, which make up 70 per cent of the province’s existing energy supply, with alternative energy sources alone.
As Germany and Spain have found, conservation and renewables are important to future power, but meeting the demand for new electricity means making a choice between coal-fired and nuclear power generation.
In Ontario, nuclear energy is the greatest single contributor to carbon reduction relative to all other energy producing technologies.
If Ontario is serious about reducing CO2 emissions while meeting its increasing energy needs, it must continue to support clean, safe and reliable nuclear power combined with hydro, wind and geothermal energy sources.