Guest essay by Eric Worrall
The International Atomic Energy Agency has decided to push harder to promote climate change as a reason to embrace nuclear power.
What Can Nuclear Technology Offer to Address Climate Change: Conclusions of the Scientific Forum
Ismini Dimidis,
IAEA Office of Public Information and Communication
Sep 21 2018
Mitigating greenhouse gas emissions through low-carbon electricity, offering methods to monitor the impact of emissions on oceans and soils, and helping countries adapt to increasingly erratic weather – these are some of the areas in which nuclear technology can offer proven solutions to address some of today’s most pressing climate-related challenges.
Over two days, presenters from over 20 countries showed that nuclear technology must be part of the solution to climate change, and public awareness of this contribution should be raised. This article summarizes some of the highlights of the discussions.
In the first session looking at the role of nuclear power in mitigating CO2 emissions, speakers discussed the importance of this low-carbon energy source from the perspective of countries already using it and those considering it as part of their energy mix. The session began with a close look at the Paris Agreement and the essential role nuclear power has to play in order for the targets set by the Agreement to be met. Renowned climate scientist Tom Wigley argued for the inclusion of nuclear power in meeting climate targets: “We need to produce energy in a way that doesn’t essentially produce carbon dioxide and other gasses that affect the climate, and there are a number of ways that we can do that,” he said. “The most important way is through nuclear energy because nuclear energy can produce clean energy all the time.”
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The panel concluded that, in two of today’s most pressing climate related challenges, namely energy and food security, nuclear technology can play an essential role. The importance of continuing to raise public awareness of this contribution, as well as of the role of the IAEA to assist Member States in accessing the peaceful applications of nuclear energy, particularly through capacity building, was highlighted.
I think it is a mistake for the IAEA to go full climate alarmist.
I doubt most greens will ever embrace nuclear power. While there are exceptions like Dr. Tom Wigley and Dr. James Hansen, the green agenda in most cases seems to be much broader than simply switching to renewables, they also seem to want some level of de-industrialisation, to reduce our resource use impact on the planet. Nuclear power wildly conflicts with this agenda by providing a means for us to decarbonise the global economy without making any lifestyle sacrifices.
For example, in 2015 Greenpeace has stated they would even oppose nuclear fusion if it ever becomes a viable option – they think nuclear fusion research money should be spent on renewables.
On the other side of the fence, the new IAEA policy of going full climate concern risks alienating Conservatives, many of whom have been staunch supporters of nuclear power.
Pushing climate risk as a reason to embrace nuclear power might seem an obvious strategy, but with the climate movement rapidly falling apart, and with green radicals fanatically opposed to any form of nuclear power, no matter how safe, I doubt this new strategy will help the IAEA advance their pro-nuclear agenda.
Update (EW): Fixed a typo in the title
This is equivalent to the Republicans appealing to “natural conservatives” among solid Democrat bloc voters. And it has also failed.
The green movement was anti nuclear first and climate alarmist second. Look what’s happening in Germany and California. Renewable energy is replace existing nuclear energy at great cost. For those who are more pragmatic in their climate solutions, the cost advantage of natural gas is too big and obstacle to overcome. The nuclear solution is probably going to wait for its time to come around again.
And,.. in California, they won’t count “big Hydro” as a “renewable”, no carbon source. Old allergy to ‘storing water’ to produce hydro-electricity. Anti-Dam movement was before anti-nuke movement and anti-C02 movement. Part of the naturalist lore going back to the late 1800’s with the romanticism of pure and pristine. The Sierra Club never forgave Teddy Rosevelt for allowing the building of with Hetch Hetchy that now provides aqueous sustenance to all the Green Gubers in SanFrancisco. With Jerry Moonbeam’s mission i would have thought he’d have dynamited the dam dam by now.
Moonbeam seems to be busy dynamiting everything else, maybe he’ll get round to it.
Why destroy a dam when you can just make a law ordering it to release its water? I’m sure the Delta Smelt isn’t the only fresh water fish that tries to live in the ocean.
~¿~
A dam that isn’t destroyed can be refilled by just closing the valves again.
The modern environmental movement doesn’t like to leave things to chance.
They would spend enough other people’s money to fully destroy the dam.
So while China is going full bore ahead with nuclear and meanwhile replacing and then some all CO2 saved by sucker nations the Green Blob just leaves them alone. No conspiracy there, just move along.
Many ‘Nuclear people that I know, do not believe in man-made climate change, but like many other opportunists, they are loath to let a ready made paranoia go to waste. That was one of the reasons I backed out of getting involved in teaching the politically correct line. I felt that using bad science to promote good science was a losing proposition.
Agreed.
Nuclear solutions (Thorium for example) should promote themselves as clean, cheap and reliable. Putting all cards on a movement that could be near its end (see the political changes in the US, Canada, Australia, possibly Brazil after the next October elections etc) seems to be something as putting all cards on a movement without a future. The alarmistic movement is lacking sound science and as soon as the basic failures become clear to everyone it will crumble rapidly. No dangerous warming = no dangerous warming. A clear period of cooling could make all investment in ‘alarmistic noise’ even fully contraproductive. Such a policy can not be a basis for the future of a sector that needs ‘long term confidence’ for their long term investments.
Clean, cheap, reliable. Those are the words they need to use. Spoken to everyone (!) Smart solutions, future proof, sustainable, safe. That is how I would promote the sector.
A clear period of cooling has begun, identified by the Argos buoys.
a brilliant presentation, August 2018, by genius astrophysicist Willie Soon, of real & up to the minute climate science. He openly derides the man-made-CO2 nonsense.
His new orbital theory & paper is at 50 mins in:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=6&v=XxiQoanjvLE
John Doran.
That’s the thing about exploitation – you find it everywhere.
Pursuing arguments in one area that are readily disproved, such as the invalidated assumptions and claims made about anthropogenic global warming, in the vain hope of gaining popular support for your main objective, degrades and undermines the acceptability of otherwise valid arguments that support your cause.
Stick with the verifiable facts.
I too, cringe, at the thought of going warmist, even for a geed cause. Yet tactically, it puts the warmists on the spot. We can solve global warming with nukes. Ain’t it great?
There is an obvious temptation for nuclear advocates, but I don’t think pretending to be green, if that is what they are doing, will achieve anything useful. I think the green reception of this message will be a bit like our response to green advocates pushing carbon trading as a “market oriented solution” to climate change.
The greens were big advocates of natural gas too. Until frac’ing opened up vast new supplies. Before that it achieved their Malthusian goals of limiting growth and increasing poverty. Once American Exceptionalism solved that scarcity problem it became public enemy #1 just like coal and oil before it.
Nuclear at last has seen that to survive for the moment, or at least postpone its “death’, it must fight
the renewables, seriously.
No wonder the same claims propagated, both these sides will fight for the same scraps.
Just got to consider fusion energy… worse than wind mills.
Already burned and wasted a lot with no any “gram” of energy delivered anywhere, for quite a long while now.
Pure wastage and a scam driven by delusion.
This so highly proclaimed energy of the future suffers from a Q factor serious handicap, that can not be overcome for fusion, to allow it to become economically viable or energy reliable even in the concept of principle, let alone in the concept of a practical application in the energy sector.
It is more like a French wishful thinking, or a French delusion.
cheers
BS. The Hinkley C fission reactor will cost more than a fusion prototype. The problem is a lack of funding. ITER won’t be ready until 2017.
Meanwhile, many times more more is spent in a year on windfarms than has ever been spent on fusion projects.
Greenpeace don’t want fusion to work because they would lose their backers if it came online.
A thought:
how about IAEA & pals form a marketing consortium/think tank to engage a top marketing man who is anti the CO2 fraud & who is prepared to do battle with the “green” orcs?
Nuclear can easily be marketed as safer & cleaner than coal, & I’m sure that enough interested parties could be lobbied to support a plan which used a clear disclaimer at the foot of every leaflet/film/article:
this organisation has concluded that CO2 is a beneficial trace gas in our atmosphere, but if YOU are convinced it’s a dangerous pollutant, then nuclear power is for you.
People-hating progress-hating Malthusian heads would be exploding all round the world.
A book written by Robert Zubrin, a PhD nuclear engineer with 9 patents to his name, or pending:
Merchants of Despair, Radical Environmentalists, Criminal Pseudo-Scientists and the Fatal Cult of Antihumanism
Exposes the “Darwinian”, Malthusian & Eugenicist roots of our present rabid “environmentalist” nutters. A grim read, it also reveals the genocidal history of the Brit Empire: forced famines in Ireland & India & some current depopulationist policies & more.
Firmly pro-nuclear, & compellingly convincing.
John Doran.
Before we solve global warming, or create/find a solution to climate change, we should looking at solving more important problems.
We need to solve Vulcanology and Plate Techtonics first, then we can go on to finding a solution for hurricanes and solving meteors second & third. Hell, “solving” climate change isn’t even the top ten of nouns that need to be solved through world wide cooperation.
On an individual note, I’m going to go out in the driveway and solve my car (right after I find a solution to last nights dinner).
Don C wrote: “I too, cringe, at the thought of going warmist, even for a geed cause.”
Typo: No “r”. “I too, cringe, at the thought of going warmist, even for a greed cause.” Better now!
The Health Hazards of NOT Going Nuclear. Petr Beckmann.
Does no one remember that quantitative book?
Is everyone in favor of eliminating subsidies for nuclear power?
Or is nuclear power special?
The price for cleaning up after Fukushima is estimated to be only 180 BILLION dollars.
“Cheap, clean, reliable” – Humpty Dumpty
Many nuclear proponents say the cleanup cost is a consequence of unnecessary regulations imposed by anti-nuclear fanatics, and that no cleanup is really necessary at all because radiation and nuclear isotopes in the diet are completely harmless!
But those people won’t volunteer to help with the 180 Billion dollar cleanup.
► Six Years After Fukushima, Robots Finally Find Reactors’ Melted Uranium Fuel
► Experts baffled as robots sent to clean up Fukushima nuclear site keep dying [no robot hormesis, apparently]
► Dying robots and failing hope: Fukushima clean-up falters six years after tsunami
Exploration work inside the nuclear plant’s failed reactors has barely begun, with the scale of the task described as ‘almost beyond comprehension’
► Another robot just broke down investigating Fukushima’s record high radiation levels
► Tepco’s ‘ice wall’ fails to freeze Fukushima’s toxic water buildup | Reuters
►Fukushima ‘ice wall’ linchpin not living up to high hopes
► This US$320 Million Ice Wall in Fukushima Is Doing a Terrible Job
All those subsidies, exclusion zones, and trillion dollar cleanups are completely necessary, of course, because carbon dioxide emissions are a much more serious problem!! We know this because nuclear proponents keep saying so, over and over again, catapulting the anti-hydrocarbon gospel of the greens.
eg. nuclearforclimate.com.au
etc, etc
I’m not a fan of 1960s reactors like Fukishima continuing to operate.
But I strongly suspect bureaucratic red tape creates a perverse incentive to stick with old reactor designs. Its difficult enough to get a bureaucrat to sign off on a new nuclear plant without introducing new reasons for bureaucrats to fear for their future career, such as a request to approve a radical new design.
There are new passive safe designs which simply cannot melt down, like Pebble Bed reactors. But for some reason (red tape?) as far as I know they are not being used on any kind of scale.
Of course if you don’t like nuclear power under any circumstances we could always stick with fossil fuels.
This is indeed true. The LFTR design has hit this bureaucracy problem.
1) Even if accurate, (which it isn’t) that estimate is a fraction what is being wasted on renewable energy.
2) Most of the cost of what is being done now, is not and never was necessary. It’s just bureaucrats wasting other people’s money by being way more cautious than necessary.
3) All that’s needed is to just seal it and wait a century. As to what is leaking, diffusion is more than adequate to deal with a minor problem like that.
Even if everything your fevered imagination is actually true about this one site. Nuclear is still by far the safest and cleanest form of power out there.
Of course the tragedy is that the $180 billion is as wasted on the cleanup as it is on windmills and solar panels. It is simply political virtue signalling.
Apart from the reactors and fuel ponds, remarkably little radiation has been released into the environment. Certainly not enough to be a long term problem to anyone.
http://www.cfact.org
& look for the pinned Fukushima article on homepage.
There were deaths from the Tsunami, deaths from the panicked govt mandated evacuation.
There were zero radiation deaths until the first was announced just recently.
This was not a nuclear disaster, as our fake news MSM insist: this was an architectural & planning disaster: to site a nuclear power station in an area known for thousands of years to be a tsunami zone is folly bordering on insanity.
when will the voting public ever realise that whatever is proposed energy wise as a solution to the Greens obsession with CO2 will be rejected by them. They are against any generation of energy and their apparent desire for the inefficient ” Renewables”,s”even their rejection of Hydro, shows that a world without the generation of electriccity is their long term goal.
MJE
We’ve had enough of “good things” justifying any means to obtain them. Lying and cheating our way into “heaven” is not the way to do it. It seems necessary because weve had three generations of de-education and social engineering of thought (designer-brains) in schools and universities and therefore thoughtful, logical presentation of demonstrable facts is believed to be the subversive tools of Philistine non-‘progressives’. Banging on idjit buzzwords of the distopians to achieve something useful won’t fool anyone anyway.
The way has to be patiently righting of the ship. Bringing back abandoned works of the great thinkers to a new crop of students. Reclamation of the rigorous scientific method and logic (which in today’s post normal thought is to disenfranchise those who contribute their feelings as equivalentto knowlege in a science). High on the list is to reclame the social sciences back into usefulness.
The overhaul will take time, but we have plenty of it. And while we are working on it, it seems CAGW is already extinguishing itself. They will have no recourse but to keep cutting back on the range of temperatures they deem dangerous as the deadlines for catastrophe keep being pushed back further and further until even they see the writing on the wall. They’ve ceded several degrees over the past decade, from 5-6C rise by 2100 from 1950, to 2-3 and now 1.5 C measuring back to 1850! Can they make a sale at less than a degree? I dont think so. Anyway, I dont want the disappearance of CAGW to be the logic behind rejection of future nuclear.
Perhaps the biggest piece of evidence that the CAGW sc@m was a Leftist ploy to destroy free-market capitalism was the Leftist’s insistence of replacing “evil” fossil fuels with the most expensive, unreliable, intermittent, diffuse and inefficient forms of energy available: wind & solar…
China will have commercial Thorium Molten Salt Reactors (MSRs) for large-scale rollout by 2030, while Leftist Western countries waste $trillions building absurd grid-level solar and wind farms:
https://web.archive.org/web/20171214071933if_/https://www.iaea.org/NuclearPower/Downloadable/Meetings/2016/2016-10-31-11-03-NPTDS/05_TMSR_in_China.pdf
In just 2 years, Trump’s tax and regulation cuts have created the strongest US economy in 60 years, which is why the Left hates him so much and why they’re out to destroy him 24/7/365: capitalism works, Socialism does not…
Leftists do not want that reality to be known…
China is more “leftist” than any Western country.
That is debatable. Ever since Deng Xiaoping made his white cat, black cat speech, China has moved a long way from pure Marxist economic theory, though they kept the parts of Marxism they liked regarding brutal political repression.
Doesn’t matter how far to the right China moves, all Western countries have taken a hard turn to the right. China can’t possibly catch up to them.
PS, you have displayed your ignorance of Marxism. It does not condone political repression. Your problem is that you are confusing economics with politics.
Ha, the elimination of class conflict in the classless society. Sadly the journey to a classless society seems to involve the elimination of lots of people.
“seems to involve the elimination of lots of people”
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..
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Get back to me when the word “seems” changes to something more definitive.
Why don’t you tell us all what people were “eliminated” when the USA changed from a capitalist (robber/baron)/every man for himself, system to the socialistic FDR New Deal type of system?
Fascinating. Backing off from full blown socialism is now a “hard turn to the right”.
I would hate to see how big or an explosion your head would make if any of those dangerous countries actually started to implement a free market.
While Marxism in it’s theoretical form may not condone violence, violence is the only way Marxism can be imposed and maintained.
de Lion seems to be unfamiliar with the history of Marxism in the last century.
100’s of millions of people killed in order force Marxism on people who didn’t want it.
As usual, our friendly neighborhood Marxist is as unfamiliar with reality as he is with the history of Marxism.
The so called Robber Barons weren’t.
You have your systems 100% reversed. Under capitalism, individuals are forced to co-operate with each other.
Under Marxism, the government tells everyone what to do and kills anyone who gets out of line.
MarkW makes the same mistake that Worrall makes, namely confusing economics with politics. MarkW also does not know what “full blown socialism” is. Lastly “imposing” is not what is happening in the USA. Socialism is being adopted piecemeal in the USA through the democratic process.
Ah yes, the standard response of the leech.
The fact that a majority of people who would rather be supported by government are voting to have the minority support them is viewed as “the democratic process”.
The only way Marxism and socialism can ever happen is for it to be forced on the productive via the political process.
MarkW says: ” Under capitalism, individuals are forced to co-operate with each other.”
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Nope
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Under capitalism, individuals are force to obey the plutocrats. You ever study history? Under the capitalistic system they had child labor in the factories. There was no such thing as a 40 hour work week, nor was there any sick time or vacation time.
…
Learn history MarkW, because you seem to be unaware of it.
MarkW is ignorant of today’s reality. He posts: “majority of people who would rather be supported by government are voting to have the minority support them”
..
The reality is very different buster. The majority (99%) of people work. The minority (the 1%) rarely work, and collect the profits from their wealth.
De Lyon, the difference between you and me, is I’ve studied real history. While you’ve studied the Marxist pablum that passes for history amongst those who don’t have what it takes to deal with reality.
Nobody is forced to obey these mythical plutocrats, because the rich don’t have the ability to force anyone to do anything. If you don’t like your job, you are free to get another. If you don’t like one store, you are free to patronize another.
On the other hand, under Marxism, the government makes all decisions for you, and kills those who don’t go along.
It wasn’t capitalism that caused child labor. If you would open your brain for once and attempt to learn something, you would realize that child labor had existed from the dawn of time. It was capitalism that created the wealth necessary for child labor to be eliminated. If you study a little actual history, you will find that child labor had all but disappeared by the time government got around to banning it. The only place where child labor still existed, family farms and family companies, were explicitly exempted from the child labor laws.
Likewise, the 40 hour week was brought to you by the wealth created by capitalism.
It is impossible to pay a man more than that man is capable of creating. It was capitalism that created the productivity enhancing tools that enabled people to be paid more.
Government had nothing to do with it.
As to learning history, you can’t, not until you unlearn all the lies that you cling so desperately to.
99% of people work?
And what color is the sky in your world?
The reality is that the top 10% of income earners pay almost 90% of income taxes, while the bottom 50% pay less than 1%.
But of course to those who’s whole philosophy of life is based on hatred of those who have succeeded, there’s no limit to how much money you feel entitled to steal from those who have more.
PS: Investing takes a lot of work. But without investors, none of us would have jobs to go to.
MarkW thinks that income taxes are the only taxes people pay. ROTFLMAO @ MarkW
MarkW of the top 10% of income earners, 99% of them work. Can’t you tell the difference between “work” and “taxes???”
They are the bulk of them.
Of course the rich pay a lot more of the other taxes as well. But for those who want government to take care of them, no amount of other people’s money is ever enough.
“hatred of those who have succeeded” no MarkW, it’s not hatred. For example if you have a rich daddy, and he pays a doctor to diagnose bone spurs in his son’s feet, then that son gets to avoid going to war, and the poor guy’s son comes home in a box.
Cur duh Lyin’:
Please compare and contrast:
USSR v. USA
West Germany v. East Germany
North Korea v. South Korea
Maoist China v. Deng China, et seq
Chile v. Bolivia
Colombia v. Venezuela
Florida v. Cuba
Thanks!
“the rich pay a lot more of the other taxes as well.”
…
Nope. The rich pay accountants and tax lawyers to circumvent tax laws with loopholes. The current POTUS is so embarrassed at how little he paid, he won’t release his returns for public viewing.
Or Japan, Taiwan, Singapore and Hong Kong v. pre-free market China.
Communist China would be even richer and less prone to really bad disinvestment decisions had it embraced political freedom as well as free markets.
Hard to argue with the stunning success that is Venezuela. And of course socialism eliminates all of those kulak wrecker plutocrats, just ask Chavez’ humble daughter.
And now for reality:
The latter also fall disproportionately on the “rich.”
Tsk,
Proving yet again that “Power to the People!” means “{Power to Me and My Friends”, plus “Money in My Swiss Bank Account!”.
[quote]Why don’t you tell us all what people were “eliminated” when the USA changed from a capitalist (robber/baron)/every man for himself, system to the socialistic FDR New Deal type of system?[/quote]
Thank God for the Second Amendment.
CdL, there are a heck of a lot more folks in your 99% who are now working and “collecting” than in the 1%…
“not” not “now”.
What the heck happened to the edit feature???
de Lyon, every post you make just proves the point about your hatred towards those who have had more success in life than you.
It really is amazing how de Lyon insists on believing left wing fantasies.
The claim that the rich use accountants to avoid paying taxes can easily be refuted by examining IRS data.
Of course you won’t do that.
Examine the mega-deaths under Communism:
Forced relocations & famines; one child policies where 2 year old girls are strapped into chairs, to starve, while a bucket is placed under her, to catch her dying evacuations ?
Times how many thousands?
Research China’s dying rooms. There are photos.
& you advocate Communism?
Read Solzhenitsyn. Gulag Archipelago. Cancer Ward. First Circle. A Day In The Life of Ivan Denisovitch.
Read The Bridge at Andau, by James A. Michener for an insight into how Hungary, 1956, was run under a system of sadistic terror.
& you advocate such a barbaric totalitarianism?
USSR went bust, & China was headed that way until they decided to let a bit of individual enterprise & ingenuity have free rein, a la Hong Kong.
& you want to turn back the clock, to destroy prosperity?
http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/20TH.HTM
Look at the deaths Communist govts are responsible for in the 20th century.
Agreed. China, and many other formerly Marxist nations that have gotten sick of being poor and backward, have embraced free markets to the extent consistent (in their opinion) with maintaining their political power. Their model is not the US, nor nearby Hong Kong (one of the freest markets in the world). Their model is Lee Kuan Yew’s Singapore, with its pseudo-democracy, authoritarian reality, and thriving, modernizing economy. Lee, leader of Singapore as it transformed from backwater to modern affluence, was a thinker, a writer, and prosletyzed extensively about capitalism and “democracy with an Asian face”.
True, but under strict communist rule from 1921~1980, China only reached a per capita GDP income of….. $300….
Since implementing some capitalist concepts like…limited private property rights from 1980, China’s per capita GDP income has increased to $11,000/year; still pathetic, but it beats the hell out of $300/year under communist rule…
Hong Kong, (with little arable land and NO natural resources) which has always embraced capitalism, and still has THE freest economy in the world, has a per capita GDP income of around $50,000/year; one of the highest in the world…
Thanks for proving my point….
As of right now, China is increasing it’s holdings of US government debt, and continues to run a trade surplus. It’s doing this with a significant part of the government owning the means of production. Comparing recent growth numbers between China and the USA, it’s obvious that a central planned and controlled economy will beat the “free market” system.
The sad thing is that de Lyon really does believe the lies he’s been told.
The US hasn’t been a free market system since the days of your Saint FDR.
As to growth in China, all of your experts declared that the Soviet Union proved that Marxism was going to trounce capitalism, and they pointed to official government numbers to prove their point. They kept this up right till the day Communism collapsed and revealed that the numbers were nothing but lies being fed to willing dupes who wanted desperately to believe that stealing from others was more noble than working to earn it yourself.
For the past decade China’s growth rate has outpaced the USA’s
MarkW, your religious belief in “free market” systems is just that, a “belief.” None exist today. Why do no free markets exist today? Because they don’t work.
According to China’s “official government” numbers, their economy is growing faster than ours.
However the “official Soviet” numbers proved the same thing.
To the extent that China is growing faster than us (assuming it is) it’s because China is adopting the free market, while the US is adopting socialijsm.
The free market doesn’t exist, because people like you would want to steal from the successful, rather than do the hard work of being successful yourself.
PS: Declaring that the lack of true free market economies proves that free markets don’t work, is like declaring that the fact that government only funds climate alarmists, proves that there are only climate alarmists.
Coeur de Lion-san:
Again, you fail to understand my argument…
Any Chinese economic growth since the 1980’s was ENTIRELY due to economic reforms, which allowed SOME limited private property ownership and SOME commercial laws, IN SPITE OF Communist disasterous central planning..
The ONLY things strict Communist rule “accomplished” were the murder of 80 million Chinese citizens and $300/year per capita..
I do a lot business in China.. it’s an extremely corrupt and controlled economy, but at least Communist bureaucrats stay bought and will minimize control of private companies if they play the game..
If China followed the Hing Kong economic model rather than their corrupt and ineffienct “mixed” economy, China would be on par with the US by now with a per capita median income of $50K~$60K/yr and a GDP of over $50 trillion.. imagine that..
Again Communism/Socialism doesn’t work… Never has and never will. These despicable ideologies have led to the murder of 100 million of their citizens unfortunate enough to have lived under Commisnt/Socialist tyranny, and has impoverished billions; not exactly a model of success…
A society/economy based on the State initiating of force against its citizens will ALWAYS collapse spectacularly as history clearly shows…
China ‘grew’ because of the fastest debt growth in human history. They spent all of the future money that they don’t have, and haven’t earned, just so they could pretend to be a rising superpower.
paper tiger
Communism/Socialism doesn’t work… Never has
….
Socialism works very well in Norway.
Many other places also.
…
Oh, by the way, the USA is closer to socialism than it is to capitalism.
Coeur de Lion September 21, 2018 at 9:06 pm
Norway would contest your characterization of its economy as “socialist”.
It does spread the wealth from its North Sea fossil fuel riches around, but its economy is very much dependent upon free markets. Its leaders characterize the economy as “mixed”.
Norway wisely chose not to join the socialist EU.
Norway depends on the oil market. Tillman hilariously thinks the oil market is “free.” Clue number 1: Saudi/Aramco.
Coeur de Lion September 21, 2018 at 9:18 pm
Please try to concentrate on what I said, not the preposterous straw man you’ve tried to erect.
It is a fact that Norway can fund much of its welfare state from North Sea hydrocarbon profits. The extent to which that market is free or controlled by Saudi Arabia is totally irrelevant, as would be obvious to anyone of normal intelligence and analytical ability.
The free markets in question are those for Norway’s products other than crude oil and natural gas. Apropos of Cur duh Lyin’s straw man, I note that Norway’s main natural gas field is called Troll.
Cur,
To the extent that Norway is socialist, it’s precisely in the energy sector which I cited:
https://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Europe/Norway-ECONOMY.html
The rest of its economy, not so much. As in, hardly at all.
Coeur de Lion-san:
I’m sorry, but you really need to read up on history and economic theory…
Scandavian countries USED TO BE Socialist economies with high corporate taxes, massive corporate regulations, and state ownership of many industries, which bankrupted their countries…
In the 1990’s Scandavian countries implemented massive capitalistic economic reforms and privatized most industries, slashed corporate taxes and regulations and their economies recovered..
Many Scandavian countries are actually ranked HIGHER than the US in the Economic Freedom Index…
Scandavian countries are WELFARE states with the central government imposing 60%+ taxes on their citizens to pay for their collasal welfare programs…
The US has also become a capitalistic welfare state, but finances its $1 trillion/year budget deficits through money printing and a $22 TRILLION national debt…
Scandinavian countries are capitalistic and have very small and homogenous poplutations with huge oil reserves relative to their population…
As long as the oil revenues remain high, Scandavians can afford to pay 60%
+ in TOTAL taxes, but when the oil runs out, they’re economies will collapse, unless they end their welfare state policies…
It’s also disgusting to realize that from January to July, Scandavians salaries go to the government…
If you think that makes any sense, move there..
Socialism in Norway works because of the revenue from North Sea oil.
de Lyon can’t make up his mind as to whether the US is closer to dog eat dog capitalism, or socialism. With every post he makes he bounces between one claim or the other.
To the extent that the US has adopted socialism, our economy has slowed.
Capitalism produces the wealth that socialist leeches feed on.
Once again, de Lyon proves that he has no idea regarding economics.
Saudi Arabia does not control the oil market. Even OPEC doesn’t control the oil market.
Cur,
Please quit dodging the relevant question and tell me where you would rather be a 12 year old girl: in the democratic, rule of law, capitalist Republic of Korea, or the Communist “Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea”, aka North Korean.
Would you rather be a pretty girl selected by Kim’s procurers as a tweenager in the DPRK or a normal schoolgirl in the RoK? Simple question.
Would rather be a citizen of one of the most vibrant economies on the planet, or a subject of the most oppressive, totalitarian regime on Earth?
Simple questions requiring only yes or no answers, in order to establish the superiority of liberty and capitalism over tyranny and communism.
Would you rather be a refugee from socialist Venezuela escaping into Colombia to find food, or a citizen of free Colombia, happy with ever increasing plenty in your home country?
Despite the fact that socialist Venezuela has lots more natural resource wealth than capitalist Colombia.
QED.
I presented a note and to the government of India “II – Energy Related Issues” on pages 108-116 in my book “Green Green Revolution: Agriculture in the perspective of climate change”, 2011:
The former Soviet President Michail Gorbachev warned that oil or nuclear energy weren’t viable energy sources for the future. Gorbachev also said that nuclear power doesn’t add up economically, environmentally or socially. The nuclear power is neither the answer to modern energy problems nor a panacea for climate change challenges. Nuclear energy is not only a high risk technology in terms of safety, but also with respect to financial investment. It doesn’t stand a chance in a market economy without state subsidies.” That is, nuclear power does not fit in to the issues of “security, safety & economy”.
Fuel – Uranium: it is also like other fossil fuel taken out from the ground through mining. Mining is hazardous. Mining has both radiological and non-radiological health hazards on life forms and help in the degradation of environment. The mined material has to be transported to processing plant and the waste is dumped into tail pond for years that contain radioactive material – health hazardous. The life of the reactor is very short and the dismantling of such reactors is costly & risky. The spent fuel storage is critical issue – somebody in earlier post here said USA found one – for developing countries. Enrichment is another important component as uranium can’t be directly used in the nuclear power plants like thermal power plants. The spent fuel processing & storage, de-commissioning-demolition of the plant are costly affair – government subsidizing. That is, cost of nuclear power is not real but subsidized factor.
Fuel – Thorium: This is mainly found along the coasts – beach sand. By destroying coastal ecosystem, India will have to face catastrophic effect on people and production.
Nuclear power plant fuel is also a non-renewable source taken from the Earth, similar to fossil fuels that are used in thermal power plants. It has a carbon factor similar to thermal power. Also, most of the nuclear power plant equipment has to be imported with very low quality control.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
Gorbachev was a politician, and not a very good one. He wasn’t an engineer or a scientist.
His opinions on nuclear power are no more informed than anyone random man on the streets.
You think there’s no mining involved in sourcing materials for so called renewables? Stop arguing your feelings and start thinking with your brain.
Mining for uranium is highly hazardous with both radiological and non-radiological pollutants. Ore has to be transported to processing plant and on its way pollutes the environment. You can visit sites mined for renewables and uranium and see the pathetic condition of people living around it for miles.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
We don’t even need to mine uranium. We can use uranium already mined which exists as stockpiles of waste fuel and depleted uranium. It’s certainly enough for a few hundred years of electricity for everyone on earth. It can power fast reactors, which can be molten salt based. Therefore very safe.
If you want to see people in a ‘pathetic condition’ have a look at those living without electricity.
If so please write to Indian government, sir there is no need to mine for uranium and we swill upply plenty.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
True, fissionable fuel can be generated from depleted uranium. Just gotta have the guts to build breeder reactors…..
Agreed.
So that’s a no then. No citations. No evidence–in fact uranium mining is a lot cleaner than monazite tailings left over from rare earth extraction. Nope, we just get this “highly hazardous” because… reasons, and “on its way pollutes the environment,” again because… reasons.
Uranium ore is barely radioactive. It doesn’t pollute anything.
MarkW — sorry sir, you are wrong. Records are available on some of the mining ore. As long as it is in the earth undisturbed, no radiation but once you disturb through mining, it emits radiation and other pollutants in to the atmosphere. Radiation enters through skin also.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
As I stated before, it is radioactive, but barely. Your granite counter tops are just as radioactive.
PS, if it only comes out once disturbed, than it isn’t radiation. Radiation is quite capable of penetrating rock all on it’s own.
MarkW — As long as the mineral is in deep in the Earth, no radiation comes out but when the ore comes in to contact pollution enters in to the atmosphere. Radiation enters human body through skin also like in x-ray.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
You seem to suffer from the delusion that any radiation caused by uranium is bad. No acceptable threshold.
The reality is that low levels of radiation are harmless, and may even be beneficial.
If think so, leave that and please read the other part of the observation.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
John — Canada and Australia refused to supply uranium to India and as a result, Indian government is mining in environmentally sensitive areas — like Nagarjunasagar Dam. We fought against the government for that but government went ahead by shifting the processing plant from the drinking water pumping site as we raised objection.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
I too have misgivings about tying nuclear power to climate change.
We certainly need nuclear power. If we are to remain civilized – which is by no means certain – and the nature of the Marxist Green mind is , as I have oft said, essentially an atavistic yearning for a pre-industrial – even pre-agricultural society – which indubitably WOULD solve the impact of man on the environment by reducing population to stone age levels.
Renewables cannot deliver on their own, and become impossibly expensive without another source of energy. The key to understanding ‘peak oil’ is EROEI. At some point the energy that you use to create and run an energy producing technology exceeds the energy used to create an alternative one.
At the moment renewables use more energy to build, per MWh out, than fossil fuels. At some point both will exceed EROEI of nuclear power.
We will never ‘run out’ of oil. It will simply cost more energy to extract than the equivalent nuclear fuel. Which will be preferential therefore for power stations.
But it is not the first time nuclear power – the correct solution – has been built for the wrong reasons. General de Gaulle’s (maybe with hindsight not so unreasonable) hatred of Islamic nations holding the West to ransom, decreed that nuclear power was to be deployed en masse.
The legacy of that decisions has been of immense benefit to France.
In the end it is a struggle between competing narratives for the stupid.
Stating that, shorn of unnecessary over-regulation. the EROEI of nuclear power guarantees greater prosperity for nations that deploy it doesn’t really cut the mustard with millennials half as much as Saving the Planet…
The Liberal Left of course has no dilemma. The end always justifies the means and they take for granted the proposition that contradicts the very ethos of Leftism, namely that the people are in general stupid and utterly manipulable, and therefore one should tell them whatever lie will achieve whatever result it is that you want.
Noblesse is no longer Obligé. They have absorbed Nietzsche, and the Übermensch Are no longer National Socialist, but International globalists using the masque of Liberal Socialism to achieve a cynical and total control of the individual.
Whether for and on behalf of the stupid people who may actually deserve better, one should seek to twist the Enemies narrative into one that actually achieves a real socially desirable result after all, or whether one should refrain on the grounds that it sets a dangerous precedent is up to the conscience of the individual. I myself have preferred to say that I favour nuclear power for the EROEI. But for those that Believe in Man Made Climate Change it represents the least pollution and GHG generating technology of all, when analysed holistically (which renewable energy never is).
That at least allows the retention of some integrity and achieves the result wanted as well.
Yes, France has it but you must know the fact that they built their reactors of several times higher capacity than those the western governments wanted to dispose of to developing countries. They are of poor quality reactors. Some body says there is plenty of uranium and there is no need to mine for uranium. It is like watching a man washed away with flood waters. If uranium is available plenty why Indian government planning new mining areas that are ecologically sensitive. We talk many things but first we must understand the scenarios of nuclear power production in several developing countries. India has around 17% of warld population on 2.3% of land area. If something goes wrong, it will be catastrophe. In fact, even without nuclear power, the best way saving energy by discarding useless IT-Computers.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
“several times higher capacity than those the western governments wanted to dispose of to developing countries”
Could you rephrase that in clearer terms please?
What’s the just capacity?
Majority reactors in India has capacity of 220 MW [effective out is not 100% but it is lower]; France reactors have 900 MWe [34 in number], 1300 MWe [20 in number], 1450 [4 in number] — some are upgraded to 1500 MWe and now working on 1650 MWe — here also effective output is not 100%.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
Isn’t India one large electric consumer? Wouldn’t India want big production units?
As you said above, India is mining it’s own because others refused to sell to it.
Pick a piece of federal land in California, lease it to a nuclear power plant developer,announce your plan to build
a new power generating facility, let all the fruits and nuts whine and bitch, then build the plant. End of story. Let’s get the ball rolling and what better place than moonbeam’s back yard? https://www.google.com/search?q=california+federal+lands+map&oq=California+federal+lands+map&aqs=chrome.0.0l2.16590j1j7&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8#imgrc=lLucjI3Ck4oXfM:
It is said that EDF could build its nuclear power plants because it built so many reactors at the same time and the protesters just couldn’t focus on one area!
The downside is that with so many reactors built at some point you simply don’t have anything to build, and you lose competence and regulatory realism.
With all due respect, why should I listen to a child’s opinion about so-called climate change?
I think it’s a safe bet. Reports of the “falling apart” of political AGW consensus are exaggerated – seems rock solid. The science-politics-media blok now have confidence that even cooling toward glaciation can be spin and packaged as CO2 warming. The story is safe whatever happens. In fact it’s likely that significant cooling already began some years ago.
No better evidence of just how many companies and organizations have belief systems, let alone “mission statements,” that really amount to nothing more than just following the money.
Majority reactors in India has capacity of 220 MW [effective out is not 100% but it is lower]; France reactors have 900 MWe [34 in number], 1300 MWe [20 in number], 1450 [4 in number] — some are upgraded to 1500 MWe and now working on 1650 MWe — here also effective output is not 100%.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
“I doubt most greens will ever embrace nuclear power“.
Got it in one. The argument is strategically dumb. Appeasement never works, and what they are doing is appeasement. They should just go straight for the jugular and say it like it is: Nuclear power is reliable, deliverable, sustainable for yonks and just about every positive “-able” you can think of and renewables are not. Renewables will achieve absolutely nothing for the climate, and nor will any other power source. And I really do think the public are ready to embrace direct messages like that.
You are right, Mike, and I’ve been arguing this all my professional career. No one buys a product for what it doesn’t do. You buy a power plant because it makes electricity. This has always been the true and only purpose of nuclear power: to make electricity where fossil fuel could not be delivered. This was the specific driver behind France’s large nuclear power program: the Franco-Belgian coalfield was finished, and there was no capacity to deliver coal in quantity from Africa.
“cgh September 23, 2018 at 10:15 am
You buy a power plant because it makes electricity. This has always been the true and only purpose of nuclear power: to make electricity where fossil fuel could not be delivered.”
That’s not always been true. Windscale/Sellafield in the UK for instance was specifically designed and built to produce fissile material for weapons, electricity was just an inconvenient excuse/byproduct. It’s now being decommissioned.
Windscale/Sellafield is a military project as you acknowledged. Its principal purpose has nothing to do with civilian power generation.
It was purposed for both military and civil use as there were two civil use reactors, one on site and one at Dounreay. Let’s not talk about the fire in 1957, probably the first nuclear disaster.
Dounreay is not on the Sellafield site. It was a demonstration project for fast reactors. Windscale had nothing to do with civilian programs. The two Windscale piles were purely for producing plutonium for military use. They were not capable of producing electricity.
When I first read the title “IAEA Nuclear Advocates Pushing Climate Messages” I read “IAEA” and I thought to myself the Swede’s have managed to flat pack nuclear power stations now?