By Ian Hall

Nuclear Power has been in the Malaysian news recently after the government gave the go ahead for a nuclear power plant to begin operating from 2021

Environmentalists and NIMBY’s are usually vocal in their opposition to such announcements and indeed the Malaysia Nature Society has been debating the issue for some time before the government announcement. As an environmentalist and a disciple of James Lovelock I felt the need to weigh in on the debate with a letter to the editor of Malaysian Naturalist magazine which was published last month

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Sir,

I have read in Malaysian Naturalist recently arguments against nuclear power. This has prompted me to write a letter to the editor to come out of the closet as an environmentalist who is in favour of nuclear power.

I don’t believe that we can change our energy consumptive behaviour quickly enough to avoid climate change. Therefore we need an instant low carbon way to generate power. Nuclear power seems to be the only technology that we have available right here, right now, that can do the job.

Opponents will talk of alternatives; but wind, hydro, tidal and biomass all have their own environmental costs or are unproven, solar is promising but does not work at night, hydrogen is not so much a source of power as a good way to store it and clean coal does not exist. Only natural gas seems viable as our other option for a low carbon fuel.

The high cost of disposing of radioactive waste is often highlighted as a downside of nuclear power. In fact I see this as contributing to its credibility. Nuclear power generation is one of the few industries that is forced to pay the environmental clean up costs of its operation. Most other industries cut and run leaving others to deal with their mess.

Of course any debate about nuclear power eventually comes down to one key factor; we’re scared of it. My feeling is that although the dangers are real, they are over-exaggerated by paranoia. I liken this to the relative danger of air travel versus car travel. Many more people are killed by car travel but in our minds air travel is much more dangerous because each incident is more catastropic.

Then finally we come to the issue closest to my heart which is environmental conservation. For this point I refer you to an ongoing debate about the wildlife that apparently thrives in the exclusion zone around Chernobyl (the site of the world’s most catastropic nuclear accident). The science is still unclear as to exactly how much damage has been caused to wildlife at Chernobyl but analysis seems clear on one thing; that the benefits to wildlife of removing people from the zone, have far outweighed any harm from radiation.

In this I support James Lovelock (Author of the Gaia Theory) by saying, let’s dump our low level nuclear waste in the rainforest. It will cause far less environmental damage than logging or plantations and we can turn paranoia about nuclear power to the benefit of conservation by keeping people away from the area. We will also have responsibly generated low carbon energy to keep up with demand.

Sincerely

Ian Hall

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Further reading:
Environmentalists For Nuclear Energy
The Mystery of Chernobyl