The only thing more powerful than the truth is fear
As I was thinking about what to write this month, I was invited by my dry cleaner to attend a protest in a nearby park against genetically modified food. This somewhat infuriated me as I know without doubt that GMO has helped millions around the world and had never killed anyone (although denial of these foods has), yet, as with nuclear power, opposition remains strong, especially in Europe.
My dry cleaner argued trying to tell me that 500,000 were killed in India due to GMO and, as you can imagine, there was no winning the argument. Mark Lynas, who I have quoted in previous posts has recently taken a hard stand against those who oppose GMO. Mark makes his position clear in his talk at Cornell University this past April where he opens with the following: “I think the controversy over GMOs represents one of the greatest science communications failures of the past half-century. Millions, possibly billions, of people have come to believe what is essentially a conspiracy theory, generating fear and misunderstanding about a whole class of technologies on an unprecedentedly global scale.”
It is no mistake that environmentalists like Mark have also changed their views on nuclear power and are now vigorously supporting it. The simple reason is that Mark and others like Stewart Brand and George Monbiot, are taking positions that are founded in science rather than a set of beliefs that may feel right, but cannot be supported by scientific evidence.
Most of the opposition to nuclear power is founded in fear – primarily the fear of radiation. However, scientific evidence continues to grow demonstrating the benefits of nuclear power while disproving widely held beliefs of many who oppose it.
For example, this past week (on May 23), a new study was reported on by the Canadian regulator (CNSC) looking at cancer rates near Canadian nuclear plants. Not surprisingly, once again the results were clear. No indication of any increases in cancer near nuclear stations relative to the rest of the province. “The most important finding of this study is no evidence of childhood leukemia clusters in the communities within 25 km of the Pickering, Darlington and Bruce NPPs.”
Next I return to the study I wrote about last month published in the Journal of Environmental Science and Technology by Pushker A. Kharecha and James E. Hansen of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Columbia University Earth Institute. They found that nuclear power has saved an estimated 80,000 lives annually – 1.84 million in all – since widely introduced in the 1970s and could save another 5 million if construction continues at a decent pace due to a reduction in air pollution. Nuclear power has also reduced carbon emissions by 64 Gt over the same period.
And finally UNSCEAR has now released the results of its latest study on the Fukushima accident. It clearly concluded “Radiation exposure following the nuclear accident at Fukushima-Daiichi did not cause any immediate health effects. It is unlikely to be able to attribute any health effects in the future among the general public and the vast majority of workers“. But of even more importance this study also concluded that there are health effects from the Fukushima accident stemming from the stresses of evacuation and unwarranted fear of radiation.
So what does all this tell us? Looking at these three studies we can confirm that
i) operating nuclear power plants do not cause cancer to the residents of nearby communities from normal operations;
ii) over the past 40 years nuclear power has in fact saved almost 2 million lives through a real reduction in pollution by not burning fossil fuels and its resultant health impacts; and finally
iii) that after the biggest nuclear accident in the last 25 years, radiation has not harmed any of the people of Japan and is unlikely to do so in the future.
Considering these kinds of results, why aren’t we seeing this reported in the main stream media? With this kind of story there should be universal praise of nuclear power and strong support for its expansion. Frankly, if it were any technology other than nuclear that was reported to have saved millions of lives we likely would have seen it in the headlines at CNN, BBC and other mainstream media. So why are we primarily seeing these nuclear studies reported in trade magazines and blogs? Why is the world not blown away by this fantastic evidence of the benefits to our lives of nuclear power? As I was pondering these developments I came upon a chapter title in the book I am currently reading by Ben Goldacre called “Bad Science” (Good book by the way). The chapter title is “Why Clever People Believe Stupid Things”. The chapter then goes on to discuss many of the things we have discussed in this blog before such as confirmation bias, seeing patterns where there are none and a host of other standard reasons why people tend stick to their beliefs in light of strong evidence that they should consider alternatives.
The reality is that some people will never change their view of nuclear power and will oppose it no matter what evidence is brought before them. But for those of us who are frustrated, there is hope. We are starting to see positive change. We have well known environmentalists seeing the benefits of nuclear power. This is now captured in the new documentary “Pandora’s Promise” coming in June. Film maker Robert Stone is quoted as saying “It’s no easy thing for me to have come to the conclusion that the rapid deployment of nuclear power is now the greatest hope we have for saving us from an environmental catastrophe,” Entertainment Weekly says “the film is built around looking at an issue not with orthodoxy, but with open eyes”. (I know some of you have already seen it. I haven’t seen it yet but I am looking forward to it).
Our story is strong. The message is positive and one of hope for the future. But overcoming fear is no easy task. Fear is a powerful emotion. It will take hard work, commitment – and most of all – time. But if we all persevere, the future is bright. The time has come to get the message out and show how much nuclear power contributes to society, and how necessary it is in a high energy and resource intensive world.
7 Comments
Atomikrabbit · June 2, 2013 at 9:29 am
In an increasingly complex world, who has the time to acquire the scientific expertise needed to properly sort out the conflicting claims of the opposing sides, each of which puts forth “experts” with apparently valid credentials?
There are a slew of hot-button issues that require for intelligent appraisal a depth of technical knowledge not possessed by anyone not specializing in the field: nuclear energy, GMOs, and AGW among them.
Yet in our media-driven democracies we are urged to pick a side, and take up polemical arms, for the sake of saving humanity. I for one, am trying to restrain (not always successfully) my strongly-held convictions to those topics in which I hold some exceptional expertise. I wish that this would become the common criterion for debate.
mf · June 4, 2013 at 9:50 am
I am an experimental nuclear physicist. I do sometimes waste my time arguing with wilder anti-nuclear activists over actual versus imagined fears of radiation.
Having said this: the nuclear industry has some real safety problems and, like any industry driven by profits, it will cut corners if you do not watch it. Proponents of nuclear power need to be realistic about this, because consequences of nuclear accidents are far more severe than consequences of most other industrial accidents. Yes, you can say nobody died directly in Fukushima, but the accident created a mess that will take decades to clean up. Moreover, once an accident is in progress, it can be extremely difficult to contain because radiation on site to intense for anything living to deal with.
To wit: US nuclear power stations are accumulating waste in on-site pools. I bet these pools are getting overloaded as there is no national repository. Stability of these pools depends on steady supply of electricity to cool them (like in Fukushima). Creating a situation when a power station must depend on the integrity of grid around it not to blow up sounds kind of crazy. And yet, this is where we are at. So, support nuclear power, yes. Trust blindly assurances of the industry, NO. You do not need to be a conspiracy theorist to adopt this position.
The same goes for GMO foods. I am too old to trust when I hear “It is all safe”. This does not mean I blindly oppose the technology, but it means I am weary, and I am willing to look seriously at any arguments made by opponents. At least nuclear contamination is inert. It can be nasty, but it does not self-replicate.
R. L. Hails Sr. P. E. · June 4, 2013 at 2:29 pm
Excellent comments, let me add to sharpen the colloquy.
All nukes, from the earliest primitive ones like Fukushima, were based on a fuel cycle policy that after a few years of cooling in pools, the spent fuel would go somewhere. (I hate the term spent fuel. Some 95% of the energy remains, what is spent is the tin can which holds the fuel; the metal is slightly embrittled due to the fury of neutron bombardment and if left in the reactor would lessen the safety margin against shock, steam hammer, earthquake, etc. ) The US government passed a law which ordered the DoE to take all civilian fuel by Jan1, 1998, some 75,000 tons of lethal material. DoE has spent some $40 Billion and has not accomplished the storage of one pound. As a result those evil greedy profit mad corporations have stuffed the pools, until they groan with spent fuel (which is heavier than lead). I, an engineer, worry about the floor loads. Without a national storage facility, for several reasons, we are in big trouble.
I do not trust any organization which may lie to protect their backside: scientists, NCR, DoE, utilities, or engineers. I have a prejudice that politicians in D. C. are incapable of telling the truth. America desperately needs smart, honest leaders, knowledgeable about energy. It may be too late, but one can hope.
An example of a problem: Fukushima was the first nuke in Japan, engineered with slide rules, and 1960 knowledge of earthquakes and tsunamis. It was sited on a coast which has a history of killer tsunamis, but sales engineers put the electrical gear in the basement. It was cheaper. A few years ago, a tsunami expert told the utility management that recent research revealed a real risk of flooding. The response, “… that’s one man’s opinion.” When an expert tells you something, listen to him. That plant is located, within hours of the most technically sophisticated port on earth, but the next morning there was not a row boat off shore. The staff was reduced to stealing car batteries in a losing fight to shut down the raging beast. (A reactor, even shut down, has enough residual heat to melt. It must be cooled, even after a tsunami.)
I kept my old slide rule, for the day the power is lost.
R. L. Hails Sr. P. E. · June 4, 2013 at 4:56 pm
Strike NCR, insert NRC. My apologies to all, except NRC.
R. L. Hails Sr. P. E. · June 4, 2013 at 10:32 am
I engineered a score of nukes, two score fossil fueled power plants, (obviously not alone) and spent forty years in advanced technology, most related to energy. I lived the destruction of the peaceful use of the atom in America. Time and again I watched the evening news report of another accident at a nuclear power plant, and learned six months later that some worker had dropped his hammer on a sixty ton valve. But the negative reports just kept coming.
Americans are technically ignorant, based on our educational test scores, and we are led, via fear, by technical ignoramuses, e.g. Al Gore. We are terrified of trivia, which “some one said”, may happen some time in the future. This ideology drove our heavy industry off shore, we spent our wealth buying crude oil from savages, and today, we find that our entire electronic world is supported by power plants built by our grandfathers. They are decades beyond worn out. China is building nukes in size, speed and costs, that is impossible in the US. France, for decades regularly performed technical magic which is verboten in our nation. We pour billions on green technologies which are lousy, expensive, and give the bill to our babies, since we are broke.
China produces eight engineers to one US engineer; we produce lawyers. Our Congress is loaded with lawyers but devoid of technical people. We have tens of thousands of regulators, because we hate and fear big business, and technology. The clear result is that our economy is weak. Families go hungry because dad was laid off because his livelihood was destroyed by unsustainable costs.
Zoomies may be invisible, but green is the color of death.
aed939 · June 4, 2013 at 11:55 am
I just want to say that I see GMO ingredients as a proxy for cheap, low-quality food, so I just want it labeled so that I can more easily shop for high-quality foods. I am OK with “help[ing] millions around the world by exporting GMO foods to them, just as we still export leaded paint to them.
One of the issues of nuclear is it is traditionally done on a large scale where there are more likely to be winners and losers. It might be more palatable if we tried more distributed small-scale nuclear, where the generation, consumption, and responsibility for radioactive waste storage all occurred in the same jurisdiction.
Noboru Nakao · June 7, 2013 at 12:29 am
As you may know,Japan is strongly unti-radiation and anti GMO.
I think this is because of ,
1) Lack of education in primary and junior high school
2)The way of mass communications treating them : They don’t explain them technically.
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