Myth Buster: Nuclear Energy

By Park Sae-jin Posted : March 18, 2011, 15:26 Updated : March 18, 2011, 15:26
Japan’s worst nightmare has become their reality; nuclear reactors explosions.

Some have started a debate on this matter; does nuclear energy offer a path from carbon-based fuels? Are nuclear power plants too big a threat? It is time to bust the nuclear energy myths.

1. Nuclear power plants are sitting ducks for terrorists.

After the Sept. 11 attacks, it’s easy to get scared about terrorist attacks on nuclear plants.

However, nuclear expert Matthew Bunn of Harvard University has explained that well-planned terrorist attacks probably would produce the sort of simultaneous failures in multiple backup systems that Japan’s reactors are experiencing. But it’s much harder to target a nuclear power plant than one might think, and terrorists would have great difficulty replicating the physical impact that last week’s earthquake had on the Japanese plants. Although attacks have been attempted in the past in Spain 1977 but none has succeeded in widespread damage.

2. Democrats oppose nuclear energy; Republicans favor it.

The Republican are enthusiastic about nuclear energy, while the Democratic base is skeptical. However, the politics of nuclear power have changed in recent years, mainly because of climate change.

Democrats, including many supporters in the environmental movement, have become more open to nuclear power as a large-scale zero-emissions energy option. Steven Chu, President Obama’s energy secretary, has been enthusiastic about the nuclear option. When asked to compare coal and nuclear energy in 2009, Chu responded: “I’d rather be living near a nuclear power plant.”

3. Nuclear power is the key to energy independence.

When people talk about energy independence, they’re thinking about oil, which we mostly use in vehicles and industrial production. When they talk about nuclear, though, they’re thinking about electricity; people think more nuclear power means less coal, less natural gas, less hydroelectric power and less wind energy.

However, unless we start putting nuclear power plants in our cars and semis, more nuclear won’t mean less oil.

4. Better technology can make nuclear power safe.

Technology can increase safety, but there will always be risks with nuclear power.

However, what happened in Japan reminds everyone that unanticipated vulnerabilities are inevitable in any highly complex system. Careful engineering can minimize the chance of disasters, but it can’t eliminate them such as the oil spill in the Gulf o Mexico, explosions at the Upper Branch coal mine in West Virginia, and now the nuclear reactor explosions in Japan due to natural disasters.


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