I have blogged a lot about all the reasons that nuclear power is not a viable option. Recently a promoter of nuclear power gave a lecture in which he questioned whether nuclear power was really necessary as a part of the mix of future global energy sources. Professor Sir David King was formerly a chief scientist and an advocate for building new nuclear reactors in the United Kingdom. He presented his lecture for the Ashden charity which presents the Ashden Energy Awards annually.
Although King has been one of the most prominent strong advocates for nuclear power in the past, he did not make much mention of nuclear power in his lecture. A reporter who was struck by this omission got up and asked King about nuclear power in the Q & A part of the event. He did not get the answer that he expected. King said that Britain might be able to do without nuclear power and that the priority should be to develop battery systems that could support intermittent renewables such as wind and solar. “We have to keep reassessing the situation”, he said. “I believe that what we need, more than anything, is a surge of activity to develop energy storage capability …. Once we can do that technologically, why would we not just keep with renewables.”
King pointed out that a country like India with lots of sunlight and deserts should go directly into solar energy. He said that solar power was already as much as a quarter the cost of connecting remote villages to the national electrical grid. On the other hand, he pointed out that countries such as Britain and Japan with less sunlight and fewer open spaces might have to include nuclear power if they could not solve the energy storage problems that accompany renewables. In that case, King said that he favored the small modular nuclear reactors that have recently been advocated by Owen Paterson, the former environmental secretary of the U.K. King did say in response to a later questioner that if the costs could be brought down enough, renewable energy sources and energy storage could provide all the electricity that Britain needed.
In the past few years, there have been prominent opponents of nuclear power who have become advocates. This has been primarily a result of concern that we have to reduce the carbon footprint of energy sources if we are to ameliorate global climate change. It is true that the carbon footprint of nuclear power is much lower than fossil fuels but it is still not on par with renewable energy sources which also have many fewer problems than nuclear power. King's conversion from an advocate to an opponent of nuclear power may be one of the first prominent advocates of nuclear power to switch sides in the debate.
As the cost of renewables and energy storage drops and the problems with nuclear power increase, it is inevitable that nuclear power will be abandoned. The only question is how many more dollars will be spent and how many more lives will be damaged or lost before this happens.
Sir David King:
