Nuclear energy isn't answer

Dear editor:

Nuclear energy sounds like the answer to this country's energy problems, but it isn't.

For decades, nuclear power has been peddled as being an efficient and inexpensive energy. In the '50s, nuclear advocates loudly promised the world that atomic power would provide electricity "too cheap to meter." That promise dissolved with the reality of reactor construction costs in the 1970s and 1980s.

But the price to consumers isn't limited to just the cost of the power usage that is listed on your monthly electricity bill. It goes way beyond that. Nuclear power is not cheap. Since the very beginning the government has been heaping subsidies, which come from our tax dollars, into the building and running of nuclear plants. But these cash payments and tax breaks are not the most valuable subsidies that they receive. The most important subsidies that the investors and owners can receive come from shifting the risks onto the taxpayers or the surrounding area's population.

A lot of the risks to the investors are financial, such as the unexpected costs associated with construction, or the risk of defaulting on the costs of loans or the debts that can occur from construction delays or administrative failure and error. The investors know that the loan guarantees and other subsidies can be worth hundreds of millions of dollars each year for each nuclear reactor. Our government pays the owners and investors these subsidies, which again, are derived from our tax dollars. And because of these subsidies, it appears that the actual costs of building and running a nuclear power plant are a lot cheaper then they really are. This also makes it practically impossible for less subsidized forms of energy to have a fair chance to compete.

Since its inception, the nuclear industry has benefited greatly from government programs that shift the key risks of the nuclear fuel cycle away from investors and onto taxpayers. All operating nuclear power plants in the U.S. were built with very large public subsidies (our tax dollars again). These include large subsidies for research and development, for plant construction, for uranium enrichment, and for waste management. Since the very beginning, the nuclear industry has been supported by the public monies given to them from our government (our tax dollars), as well as monumental and lucrative tax write-offs.

Constellation's Co-CEO Michael Wallace said that "Without loan guarantees we will not build nuclear power plants." Another Constellation executive acknowledged in testimony before the California Energy Commission "that every planned future reactor would need to receive federal loan guarantees in order to be viable."

With the increased number of nuclear power plants being built and the decline in uranium supplies caused by the flooding of some of the world's largest uranium mines, the price of uranium will most likely continue to rise. In 2006, 45 percent of the world supply of uranium came from old nuclear warheads, most of which came from Russia, and it is estimated that at the current rate of use, those old stockpiles will be depleted by 2015. So the supply of uranium will most likely not meet the demands of the future.

One of the major problems that we will face regarding nuclear plants, besides the world's declining uranium supplies, will be the handling of all the nuclear wastes that are piling up. If there were one thousand 1 GWe reactors of the light-water type built and running in the world, we would need a new repository at least the size of the Yucca Mountain repository built in the world every three to four years. The taxpayers have spent at least $13 billion on the unfinished Yucca Mountain and the costs can only go higher.

This is what I believe Mr. Gillespie, his cohorts and investors truly want. They want all the government subsidies, funding and risk protection. AEHI hasn't decided on what they want to build. They haven't offered up real plans. They've promise the community hundreds of jobs without letting these people know that it might be many years (if ever) before they will become available.

And it is quite believable that they might obtain the rights to build a nuclear power plant, only to turn around and sell those rights to another company or investment group. These might even include companies from other countries. There is a planned new reactor at Calvert Cliffs in Lusby, Md. The consortium of firms that plan to build this plant include Areva, Electricite de France and Constellation Energy. Interestingly, ownership of these firms means that the governments of France and Germany will also be heavily involved in American energy production.

But whoever begins construction here will need to hire a lot of workers. A few workers will come from Elmore County, but many more will come from other places. Many specialists are required for every aspect of the construction and eventually the running of the nuclear plant and the local community can offer little to meet this need. Thus, many of the jobs, if not all of them, will be for people from outside this area, this state and even the country.

The incoming workers to Elmore County will expect to have places to stay, places to eat, places to be entertained, schools for their children... the list goes on. We, the citizens of Elmore County, will need to come up with the money to supply these things.

It will be a very long time before we ever see any benefits, from this nuclear plant... if ever. Our county will have to front these monies to improve our county so the influx of nuclear workers will want to spend their time and money here. Our county does not have this kind of money and so will look to the county's taxpayers to supply the colossal amount of money that will be needed.

The agricultural land that Don Gillespie and his group wish to build on is a part of our diminishing precious cropland that we have here in Elmore County and the Snake River is vital to maintaining this land and the people who live here. If the water is gone... the people are gone. Not just here but all the way to the Pacific Ocean. We can live without electricity... but we can't survive without food or water.

The nuclear industry suffers from a lack of manufacturing facilities and a trained workforce. The costs for the basic building materials like steel and concrete are spiraling out of sight. It is long past time for the government to step back and stop its intervention in the energy sector.

It is critical for our government to remain neutral to allow truly viable energy solutions a chance to be developed

Catherine Brown