On June 10, 1Sky sponsored a conference call with Waxman, Markey, and their staff to talk about the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES) a.k.a. the Waxman-Markey bill. I had three really tough questions that weren't addressed in the call, so I e-mailed the House staffers who spoke on the call.
I received a response which I've included below, but the response didn't directly answer my questions.
So I thought it would be fun to speculate at how they might have responded if they were required to answer each question directly, without being "politically correct."
Question #1: Jim Hansen did an analysis of the bill. He told me on June 7 that he will write something soon showing that Waxman-Markey "locks in terrible results for two decades."
Now we all know that Hansen is a really smart guy that we wished we had listened to back in 1988 when he first testified about global warming. His prognostications have all materialized.
Since we are so late in addressing climate change, and we really cannot afford to make any mistakes this time around (our last chance), how can you be so certain that Hansen is wrong in his assessment of Waxman-Markey? Do you have an expert who is as smart as Hansen (and as right in his prognostications) who has convinced you that Hansen is wrong?
Answer #1: No, we haven't seen Hansen's analysis.
Question #2: Both Secretary Chu and the President of MIT point out that nuclear has to be a key part of the energy mix going forward. We can't supply all our clean energy needs relying on just renewables.
Yet this bill has over 932 pages, and the word "nuclear" only appears twice.
That seems pretty odd considering that 70% of our CO2-free power is from nuclear. Even more odd considering we haven't built a new nuclear plant in 30 years and it's still 70% of our clean power!
I'm sure you all know that the energy content contained in light water reactor (LWR) spent fuel and depleted uranium exceeds all the known oil reserves in the world. It's an energy resource that is 10 times bigger than the energy of the coal we have in the ground. And that's just the stuff we have on hand! That's not even counting the stuff we haven't mined. Using fast reactors, we can run the entire planet for over 700 years on just the uranium "waste" we have on hand and for millions of years if we are willing to use the uranium that hasn't yet been mined.
So we have this huge energy resource just lying there and we invented the fast reactor technology (known as the Integral Fast Reactor (IFR)) at Argonne National Laboratory 25 years ago to use it 100 times more efficiently than in an LWR with minimal waste, lower cost, and better safety than existing nuclear plants. It also solves our nuclear waste problem since it uses the existing nuclear waste for fuel. But we aren't talking about it at all in this bill on clean energy security. It's not even a footnote in the bill.
Secretary Chu is talking about fast reactors as a critical piece to moving forward, yet nobody in Congress in the last 15 years has brought it up and it sure isn't anywhere in this bill. Isn't this a bit short sighted to not even mention this in the bill? The current DOE funding for this is ridiculously inadequate.
I spoke to the former top guy in charge of civilian nuclear for DOE (Ray Hunter) and he thinks this is a travesty. He was so disgusted he sent a letter to Senator Reid and a few other Senators explaining all of this, but they all ignored his letter (Senator Mikulski's office sent him a "thank you for writing us" response). That's a bit odd considering this is our biggest energy resource and this guy was the top civilian nuclear guy at DOE.
Unfortunately, this bill is no different. Jim Hansen has been building a fast reactor as one of his top 5 priorities for Obama to fix global warming. I heard that Congressman McNerney was briefed on fast reactors and tried to have a hearing on it. Nothing happened and this bill has nothing on it at all.
Is there any chance we can fix that? Or at least acknowledge the reason for this stunning omission?
Answer #2: No. Congressman Markey hates nuclear and he always has. He isn't going to let little things like "facts" and "science" change his beliefs. Even if nuclear supplied 99% of our clean energy, it still wouldn't be called out in the bill. However, the bill doesn't penalize utilities for constructing nuclear plants.
Question #3: One of the reasons we are in this crisis is due to our government's lack of a long term vision and a viable strategy with respect to global warming. This seems to me not to have changed. Am I wrong?
On the call, Markey correctly pointed out that in order to control climate change, we not only have to reduce our emissions at home, but we also have to get other countries to dramatically reduce their emissions. Coal is the big problem. If we can't virtually eliminate coal use worldwide, we are just rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. Is there a strategy for how we are going to move other countries off of coal? Markey talked about developing and then exporting carbon capture and sequestration (CCS), but such a strategy would rely on exporting a technology that doesn't exist (at scale), that may never exist, that nobody really wants, that would raise the price of electricity to be unaffordably high, and which can only be retrofitted onto coal plants originally designed to capture CO2 of which there are none.
That's a lot of assumptions. Is that our official core strategy to save the planet??!?!?!
Wouldn't it make more sense to invest in commercializing the IFR fast reactor technology that we invented 25 years ago, spend lots of money to modularize and mass produce the pieces, have the US finance construction of the plants in foreign countries, and make in-country joint partnerships with the local government to build and operate the plants? Such a plan could displace existing coal plants because it would provide power at a cheaper cost. It would be the equivalent of Walmart moving into town and displacing higher priced competitors. And of course, it will also eliminate the construction of new coal plants.
The benefits to the US would be huge: a nice recurring profitable revenue stream helping our trade deficit and creation of a huge number of high paying jobs to build these plants and the parts for them and to operate them. So we make tons of money and create lots of jobs. And the benefits to the world are huge in terms of CO2 reduction. We'd also virtually eliminate the nuclear waste worldwide. And the host country gets cheaper power. Everyone wins.
Isn't the latter a fundamentally better strategy than Markey's "pray for CCS" strategy?
Or is there a better strategy for getting other countries to eliminate CO2 from all power generation?
Answer #3: Sure, a strategy that relies on pure economics for getting people to abandon coal is better than a strategy of relying on an uneconomic and unproven technology and the threat of economic sanctions for non-compliance. Carrots are always better than sticks. Look at our own country for example. We are having a heck of a time getting enough votes for this bill and it we've already watered down the renewable portfolio standards so much that they basically don't require much change from the status quo at all. So sure, that's a better strategy, but that's not the strategy we are pursuing.
Look, it's not about economics or what is in the public's best interest for saving the planet. If you are trying to get enough votes to pass a bill in Congress, the political realities are this: We want to do the right thing for the planet and for the public. But If we don't have a strategy that makes the coal, oil, and gas companies happy, they'll spend lots of money on misleading ads to try to ensure that we don't get re-elected. Unfortunately, there are a lot of Members who are afraid of that.
The official response
Here is the response to the three questions that I did receive from one of the House staff members:
Thanks for your emails. We wanted to provide some information on how the Waxman-Markey bill (ACES) provides opportunities for new nuclear power:
● Because nuclear power generates far fewer greenhouse gas emissions than fossil fuels, utilities will need to hold far fewer emission allowances for the nuclear plants to comply with the carbon limitations in ACES. According to EPA modeling, twice as many new nuclear plants would be built by 2025 under ACES than without the legislation.
● Under the federal Renewable Electricity Standard, electricity generated from new nuclear units is not added to a utility's baseline electricity level. As a result, the addition of a nuclear plant would not require a utility to obtain additional renewable electricity. This ensures that the RES provides no disincentive to the construction of new nuclear units.
● ACES establishes a self-sustaining Clean Energy Deployment Administration (CEDA) within the Department of Energy to promote the domestic development and deployment of clean energy technologies. CEDA would be empowered to provide direct loans, loan guarantees, and letters of credit to support clean energy technologies that might otherwise be unable to secure financing, including nuclear power.
● ACES includes reforms to the existing Department of Energy loan guarantee program. The Department has received applications for federal loan guarantees from 21 proposed nuclear power plants, totaling $122 billion in requested assistance.
Chairman Waxman is committed to developing the strongest legislation that can pass Congress. Our staff is all working very hard to get the bill ready for the House floor next week, but if you'd like to talk about this issue or others, please let us know and we'll be glad to talk to you during the next recess.
But put that aside! We are going to use all the fossil fuel available within a few short decades anyway.
The US Nuclear industry has an excellent record, one that includes Three Mile Island as an incident which *caused no harm*. The problems of waste and proliferation are valid and important but solvable. The problems of the emissions of gas, oil and especially coal plants, the dangers associated with extraction (for coal) and political issues (for oil and gas) are much harder problems.
Replacing even 10-20% of the fossil fuel consumption in the U.S. with Nuclear energy, would challenge the U.S. infrastructure, but we need a combination of solar, wind, and nuclear to slow and reverse the trends of the last 150 years or Earth life will change dramatically. We then need to export both the technologies and the spirit of the switchover to China, India and the rest of the world.
My three posts immediately below largely refute the core point of your blog. Breeder reactors and nuclear waste reprocessing are very toxic propositions aside from the proliferation issues. I am surprised that you responded to the north pole commentary instead of my responses to your blog.
I am amazed that you wrote this blog promoting nuclear power, adopting fast breeder reactors and supporting nuclear reprocessing of spent fuel rods and waste as a solution to climate change without discussing any of the economics or environmental risks. As far you are concerned, there are no risks.
Nothing could be farther from the truth. Citing France, England and Russia as evidence that it works just fine is disengeniuos at best and a complete distortion of the facts at worst.
France and England do not have their own Freedom of Information Acts. Instead, they have official State Secrets Acts. Their histories of accidents, mishaps and poor waste disposal policies are barely known, but what is known is that their history is less than stellar. Let's take the Sellafield reprocessing facility for example. It was closed after an 83,000 litre leak of plutonium, uranium and nitric acid went undetected for months. The plant was shutdown for over 3 years. The claim that no one was injured is bogus when the official States Secrets Act is considered and along with the toxicity of plutonium. Have you heard of Windscale?
France plans to build a reactor on the coast of Lybia, but hat was called into question last year when the Tricastin plant released 30,000 litres of solution containing 12% enriched uranium into two French rivers. I will add to this post outling what little information is available, but there is no need to even discuss Russia deplorable nuclear history.
Illness clusters around the reprocessing plant have begun to emerge indicating spikes in leukemia cases.
France has 210 abandoned uranium mines many of which are unmarked and close to population areas. Additionally, uranium tailings from the mines have been used in school playgrounds and under ski resort parking lots. Areva has been asked to clean up the tailing waste, but they are strongly resisting.
The French nuclear program is nothing short of a disaster with several independent peer reviewed studies cited in the article. I encourage you to read it.
What you are proposing is an impending,utter unmitigated disaster. You cannot guarantee 100 percent containment when humans are involved in the nuclear fuel cycle.
You can, however, guarantee a geometric increase in radioactive waste whether it is defined as low or high level waste. Everything that comes in contact with radiation in the nuclear fuel cycle becomes waste itself. The minning operations are particularly insideous when the volume of waste is considered. For uranium concentrated at 0.02 %, one ton of uranium tailings is created that has to be disposed of in a permanent place.
The French, Australian, American, British ad Russian track records are dismal at best with regard to mine tailings. Worker exposure and tracking of their health for decades is even worse. The French and British have demonstrated that they cannot efficiently operate reprocessing without leaks and worker exposure.
1) Why haven't you made feed-in tarrifs national which will accelerate the use alternative energy faster than any other mechanism.
2) In conjunction with item number one, why haven't you eleiminated the utility for profit, Return On Investment (ROI) guarantee and replaced it with the California/New York Independent Service Operator (ISO) model where the ISO owns the grid and purchases power from the producers. The ROI guarantee does nothing to encourage energy efficiency or conservation. In fact, it does just the opposite.
3) In conjunction with Items 1 & 2, eliminating the ROI structure and adding in the national feed-in tarrifs would preclude the need for large subsidies for solar and wind which could, instead be applied directly to energy efficiency alone. Solar and wind make no sense whatsoever unless we invest hundreds of billions of dollars in energy efficiency. Encouraging feed-in tarrifs nationally will accomplish the goal of accelerating the adoption of solar and wind because small business and residential producers will get paid for their excess power, reduce grid congestion because more power will be used where it is produced and simultaneous reduce the cost of solar and wind by
reducing the size of the systems installed.
Stop complicating the problem by adopting simple solutions.
"Green" energy sources are not cost competitive without massive governent subsidies. The government will already spend 2 Trillion more this year than it has. Where will this subsidy money come from? The taxes Obama promised not to raise on wage earners earning less than $250,000?
AmerenUE Callaway Unit Number 1. Estimated cost $700,000,000. Final cost $2,800,000,000. First, 2nd generation French reactor being constructed in Finland. $7,000,000,000. Currently half completed and it is 50% over budget and 50% behind schedule. I can go on, but you are getting the picture. The government estimates that total decommissioning costs for our 104 reactors is $35,000,000,000. You can take that number and double it since it is a government estimate.
We haven't had the pleasure of discussing the total annual subsidies to the nuclear industry, but I will come back to it later.
Nothing.
Assuming anthropogenic CO2 is indeed the primary factor in climate change, Waxman-Markey will do nothing to actually reduce the net human emission of this gas because it can only be binding within the United States and its territories. China already emits more CO2 than the US and soon India will eclipse the US as well. Anything Waxman-Markey actually does to constarin US emissions will be swallowed up by greater emissions elswhere. Waxman-Markey will hve zero effect on other nations.
You seem to be confusing Waxman-Markey with actions that will help global warming. It is about regulating the economy and raising government revenues....not energy independence. Much of the EU gets over half their energy from nuclear and the US Navy has been operating dozens (hundreds?) of nuclear powered vessels for years. We should advance all of the alternatives. A simple carbon tax would provide a level playing field where the best technologies would win.
But, again, that isn't the point.
Nuclear power station causing cancer
http://timeforchange.org/nuclear-power-station-causing-cancer-leukemia
Rising child leukemia rates near U.S. nuclear power plants http://politicsnpoetry.wordpress.com/2008/12/20/718/
Child Leukemia Rates Increase Near U.S. Nuclear Power Plants
http://www.salem-news.com/articles/may182009/kids_leukemia_5-18-09.php
You might also consider why the nuclear utilities wont self-insur their plants if they are so safe. You might further consider asking yourself why Wall Street wont finance nuclear power stations and haven't since the 1970's. They don't buy the safety arguements from the industry or the economics of nuclear power.
Feel free to pore over the UNSCEAR report (http://tinyurl.com/l9akac), where you'll find more studies than you ever cared to read about epidemiology related to radiation releases. Then compare such risk with the hundreds of thousands (or more) of people who die because of coal-fired power generation every year (not to mention the miners who die in accidents). Ask yourself: Where will we obtain our power in the future? Unless you believe that solar and wind and as-yet-undeveloped other technologies can provide all we need (for those who do I suggest you read this: http://www.withouthotair.com/), then you must weigh nuclear against fossil fuels. How many people will be killed by the effects of global warming? The true dichotomy here is not nuclear or renewables, as it's often made out to be. It's nuclear or fossil fuels.
Since this may be the first that many HuffPo readers have seen about IFR technology, I've posted a chapter online from my book that describes it. You can find it here: http://tinyurl.com/cwvn8n
Dr. S. Fred Singer -- atmospheric physicist, Professor Emeritus of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia, and former director of the US Weather Satellite Service -- says that the Waxman-Markey bill (ACES or cap and trade) “would be the equivalent of an atomic bomb directed at the U.S. economy—all without any scientific justification.” The bill would significantly increase taxes and the cost of energy, forcing many companies to close, thus increasing unemployment, poverty and dependence.
The world's natural gas mining industry is a lot bigger than $80 billion a year. If its owners, and the governments that support millions of civil servants by taxing it, were the least bit miffed about their missing $80-billion-plus, there's a lot that isn't yet missing.
To me this suggests there is an honorable conservative policy option: reduce those fossil taxes. Immediately the Markeys of this world have less civil servant skin to protect, and accordingly less interest in preventing future life-saving by nuclear power plants of all sorts.
Of course, this would also be an honorable social-democratic policy option.
It was most certainly smaller than the present during the Eemian, 120,000 years ago, when global tempratures rose above the present level by as much as 5.0C and stayed that way for 12,000 years or so.
It was also most likely as small as today 1100 years ago when the Vikings constructed settlements and buildings there, some of whch have just recently emerged from under the ice for the first time since the 16th century.
Then there is the Holocene climatic optmum which was warmer than today for a period of approximately 2,000 years 5-7,000 years ago.
All of this is more recent than 50M years ago. Ignorance and hyperbole seem to be the stock and trade of progressives.