In Australia we have the remarkable phenomenon of a small Green Party tail wagging the dog of the mighty Australian Labor Party. The greens say jump and Prime Minister Gillard asks how high. At the behest of the greens an extremely unpopular "carbon tax" has been introduced to do what exactly? No one knows. If the Greens in Australia really wanted to do something about making Australia "carbon neutral" they would impose massive tariffs on coal exports to China, they would be opposed to immigration, in favour of GM foods and they would be strongly pro nuclear power. At least this is the argument that Mark Lynas makes in his interesting new book The God Species. He argues that greens opposed to nuclear and GM foods are muddle headed, essentially unserious people. ...
Who is Mark Lynas? He's maybe the most important writer, journalist and green thinker in the UK. His green credentials are first rate: he's been writing, blogging and campaigning on green issues for a decade. He's certainly no environmental skeptic: he's looked carefully at the evidence and is convinced that the planet is getting warmer and the reason for this is the pumping of fossil fuels into the atmosphere. But now he's seen as a heretic amongst greens because he says that nuclear power is the only answer to the problem of carbon pollution. What about windmills, solar, tidal, other renewables? Well Lynas has run the numbers and thinks that these are pipe dreams. They will never be able to provide enough energy for a developing planet.
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In part the book is one big mea culpa, because it was Lynas who for many years led the green attack on nuclear power and GM foods in the UK. He has now had a Damascene conversion and is promoting nuclear with the the zeal of a convert. He accuses greens who oppose nuclear & GM of being shortsighted at best and blind prejudiced at worst. Lynas is certainly a bit more pessimistic about climate change than I am, and I think the real future is probably going to be in nuclear fusion (not dangerous fast breeder fission reactors) but his book is food for thought. The Guardian has a nice review of it here and the comments underneath show just how strongly people feel about Lynas and his change of heart on nuclear energy.
In part the book is one big mea culpa, because it was Lynas who for many years led the green attack on nuclear power and GM foods in the UK. He has now had a Damascene conversion and is promoting nuclear with the the zeal of a convert. He accuses greens who oppose nuclear & GM of being shortsighted at best and blind prejudiced at worst. Lynas is certainly a bit more pessimistic about climate change than I am, and I think the real future is probably going to be in nuclear fusion (not dangerous fast breeder fission reactors) but his book is food for thought. The Guardian has a nice review of it here and the comments underneath show just how strongly people feel about Lynas and his change of heart on nuclear energy.
7 comments:
Unrelated to the post, heard you on Radio Ulster, don't listen to the publishers!!
I'll second that, Anonymous.
I really don't know enough about nuclear fusion to know if that's the way out, but judging by recent evidence, nuclear reactors do not really seem like a way out of the energy crisis, at least ethically speaking.
It does seem true that most of the debate is split along lines that have nothing to do with scientific evidence, given that a whole lot of us aren't educated well enough to have a truly informed opinion.
Anon
Yeah that was fun wasn't it?
Seana
I think Fusion really could be something if they could get it to work, but will they ever get it to work?
I think Lynas is a little to free and easy about the safey concerns of fast breeder reactors.
Well - my country supports the children who lived or whose parents lived in Belarus, children who still suffer from the nuclear power plant accident in Cheronobyl (some of them were not even born then and still suffer, which is scary), I met some of them once, I am very glad my country will give up nuclear power soon (I think 2020), and all parties in the parliament agree from the Greens to the conservatives (Angela Merkel said this year: Nuclear Power Plants are not controllable - after promoting them for decades). I like different opinions, but Mark Lynas - if I may jugde him from his appearence in our medias, I have not read his book - is a very good salesman, who can sell his strong views very good and gets a lot of attention. Some well known scientists have torn some of his thesis to shred here. Which might not mean his wrong, I just think, if you go to the public with very provocative thesis you get a lot of attention, no matter, if they are build on sand or stone. I do hope my country will take the step to the future with alternative energies. We'll see if we can make it.
Andre
Yeah I am very suspicious of fission reactors. I mean the timing of Lynas's book couldnt have been worse could it what with the disaster in Japan in everything, but Lynas is such a terrific salesman that somehow he seems to have turned all that to his advantage. I dont quite know how.
I think on paper nuclear is the best way we have for energy but man in real life practice, it's foolhardy. If people are involved in the constructing, running, and protecting the plants, we're doomed because someone will always be cutting corners. And the mistakes are so grave. It almost makes a great case to be ruled by robots.
But what I am curious about is the nonGM foods. Does he mention anything about people with allergies and GM foods? I once had to be hospitalized because I'd taken some chlorella (pill form) that had been cut with alflalfa, which was not indicated on the bottle because it hadn't been an ingredient. A gene from one element spliced into something else might possibly have similar effects on people.
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