OPPOSITION NUCLEAR POWER
1ST OPPOSITION SPEECH
OPPOSITION PHILOSOPHY/STRATEGY
THEMES AND MEMES – These are major concepts we go back to again and again – almost like slogans.
HOW TO USE THESE IDEAS:
They are not your body points (just main themes or concepts that are very useful.
 Use one in an introduction to a the 3rd opposition speech.
 Use them as the three major concepts of your summary speech.
OPPOSITION MEMES FOR NUCLEAR POWER:
•
ADDICTION
•
LEARNING FROM OUR MISTAKES
•
FOUNDATION OF OUR PYRAMID -- NATURE AND THE ENVIRONMENT
•
THE ETHOS OF OUR TESTIMONY
(We know more about our sources)
MAIN OBJECTIONS
(ALSO CALLED CONTENTIONS OR CLAIMS)
FIRST OPPOSITIONS SPEECH:
1. Nuclear power is poison. Accidents and risk.
2. Alternatives are better – especially Solar
SECOND OPPOSITION SPEECH:
3. The unnecessary risks of nuclear Power (Half life, Proliferation,
Terrorism, Waste Storage, …)
INTRODUCTION: ATTENTION GETTER
• THREE MILE ISLAND - The United States
• CHERNOBYL - Russia
• FUKISHAMA - Japan
• Three words from the past that seem to ring hollow to the proposition. All three were devastating and barely avoided becoming truly
catastrophic events. Different countries and different reasons for accidents.
• It brings to mind the old saying: Fool me once shame on you fool me twice – shame on me.
• Across the globe – nuclear accidents and environmental damage have resulted from a variety of causes: Mismanagement, employee fault,
mechanical breakdowns, political conflict, war, terrorism… the list goes on!
• This has led the opposition to the conclusion that:
INTRODUCTION: STATEMENT OF RESOLUTION
Because the OPPOSITION IS CAPABLE OF LEARNING FROM HISTORY WE
STAND OPPOSED to the proposition that:
This house believes that the use of nuclear energy should be a primary
energy source.
INTRODUCTION:CLARIFICATIONS
• Primary Energy Source:
• Definition:
• The reason this is a problem: It does not guarantee a specific tradeoff – for
example it doesn’t mean that coal use has to be reduced – only that
nuclear power should be used more than any other resource. If we get
35% of our electricity from coal – the topic would require a contribution
from nuclear of at least 36% so that it could be the primary energy source –
leaving you with two poisons instead of one! Fossils fuels and nuclear
power.
INTRODUCTION: YOUR TEAMATES - DUTIES
I will present two objections to the proposition.
My teammate will provide our third objection and respond to the
propositions claims.
Please turn your attention to Objection 1:
FIRST OBJECTION:
WE MUST PROTECT THE ENVIRONMENT
• The environmental system
• Risks to that system form nuclear power include:
• Waste
• Accidents
• Natural disasters
• The point is the stuff is poisonous
• Drug Analogy – You think one is going to get you off the other – they
call it switching your poisons. What happens is you end up doing
both: Fossil Fuels and Nuclear Power – essentially doubling the risk to
the environment.
CHERNOBYL
Chernobyl Accident 1986
(Updated October 2015)
•The Chernobyl accident in 1986 was the result of a flawed reactor
design that was operated with inadequately trained personnel.
•The resulting steam explosion and fires released at least 5% of the
radioactive reactor core into the atmosphere and downwind – some
5200 PBq (I-131 eq).
•Two Chernobyl plant workers died on the night of the accident, and
a further 28 people died within a few weeks as a result of acute
radiation poisoning.
•UNSCEAR says that apart from increased thyroid cancers, "there is
no evidence of a major public health impact attributable to radiation
exposure 20 years after the accident."
•Resettlement of areas from which people were relocated is ongoing.
In 2011 Chernobyl was officially declared a tourist attraction.
The April 1986 disaster at the Chernobyla nuclear power plant
in Ukraine was the product of a flawed Soviet reactor design coupled with
serious mistakes made by the plant operatorsb. It was a direct
consequence of Cold War isolation and the resulting lack of any safety
culture.
ST
1
OBJECTION CONCLUSION
• Protecting the environment is the most important priority when
considering the development of human society.
• Growth, technology and development have combined to make energy
consumption a global concern – one of existence.
• Safe renewable energy needs to be the foundation of our pyramid –
for without that – nothing else, jobs, the economy, society – even life
itself can survive.
SECOND OBJECTION:
THERE ARE BETTER ALTERNATIVES THAN NUCLEAR POWER
• We are closer than ever to sustainable clean energy. But our country
can not afford to develop both nuclear power and safe alternatives.
• The alternatives are plenty: Wind, Geothermal, Ocean Thermal, and
perhaps the most plentiful source – Solar – the sun.
• Choosing the non nuclear option – guarantees a tradeoff that benefits
the environment. Probably two: It does not burn fossil fuels and it is
not radioactive!
• Remember the attention getter – about the answer and the lessons of
history staring us in the face.
• Looks look at just one of the clean alternatives to nuclear: SOLAR
SOLAR POWER BY 2050
Solar To Be Primary Energy Source By 2050? IEA Says Yes
September 29th, 2014 by James Ayre
Solar will be the industrial world’s primary energy source by the year 2050, according to a recent report from the International Energy Agency —
presented at EU PVSEC’s closing event.
By the middle of the century, the report argues, solar energy technologies — whether photovoltaics, CSP, solar thermal, or others — will make up more
than 50% of the total electricity produced in the world. A big portion of that will — again, according to the report — be from photovoltaics, which will
make up more than 16% of the world’s electricity production.
The prediction is part of the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) most recent Energy Technology Perspectives report. Much of the IEA’s recent change
of opinion on the potential of solar technology is reportedly down to the recent, relatively fast cost-reductions in the commercial forms of the
technology.
http://cleantechnica.com/2014/09/29/solar-primary-energy-source-2050-iea-says-yes/
ETHOS:
Our Mission
The IEA is an autonomous organisation which works to ensure reliable, affordable and clean energy for its 29 member countries and beyond. The IEA
has four main areas of focus: energy security, economic development, environmental awareness and engagement worldwide.
2nd OBJECTION - CONCLUSION
• Nuclear Power is a poor choice for a primary energy source.
• That does not mean we need to shut down nuclear power – nuclear
can help in the transition but should not be the PRIMARY SOURCE.
• CHOOSE THE EARTH AND THE ENVIRONMENT AS YOUR FIRST
CONMSIDERATION WHEN YOU SUPPORT THE PROPOSITION
QUOTES ABOUT LEARNING FROM THE PAST
ATTENTION GETTER
George Santayana The Life of Reason is sometimes considered to be one of the most poetic and well-written works of philosophy
in Western history To supply but a single example, the oft-quoted aphorism of Santayana's, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat
it," may be found on p. 284 of Reason in Common Sense.
The Life of Reason, subtitled "the Phases of Human Progress", is a book published in five volumes from 1905 to 1906, by Spanish-born American philosopher George
Santayana (1863–1952). Santayana's philosophy is strongly influenced by …. the refined ethics of Aristotle, with a special emphasis on the natural development of ideal ends.
ATTENTION GETTER
WINSTON CHURCHILL
But perhaps his best remark on the subject was this:
“When the situation was manageable it was neglected, and now that it is thoroughly out of hand we apply too late the remedies which then might
have effected a cure. There is nothing new in the story. It is as old as the sibylline books. It falls into that long, dismal catalogue of the fruitlessness of
experience and the confirmed unteachability of mankind. Want of foresight, unwillingness to act when action would be simple and effective, lack of
clear thinking, confusion of counsel until the emergency comes, until self-preservation strikes its jarring gong–these are the features which constitute
the endless repetition of history.”
•
—House of Commons, 2 May 1935, after the Stresa Conference, in which Britain, France and Italy agreed—futilely—to maintain the independence of Austria. (My book* page
490).
VOCABULARY
NUCLEAR SAFETY EVIDENCE IS BIASED
The
proposition must know about the credibility of their sources. We have been lied to before – by Big Tobacco and Exxon to name a few.
Quotes are nothing more than hearsay testimony – it is essential to have a thougtough understanding of the authors qualifications and the qualifications of the publication.
ENERGY COMPANIES HAVE KNOW ABOUT SAFETY RISKS AND HAVE LIED, CHEATED AND USED PROGANDA IN THE PAST – DO NOT TRUST THEM
Inside Climate News reveals the nature of the trickery and propaganda – comparing it to big tobacco and their lies.
The outrage began last month, when InsideClimate News and the Los Angeles Times reported that Exxon scientists knew decades ago -- as early as 1977 -- that fossil fuels contribute to global warming. Nevertheless, the company has sowed doubt about manmade climate change since then.
•
They fund the American Petroleum Institute and the Heartland Institute, which promote climate-change denial.
•
On Friday, a coalition of civil rights and environmental leaders sent a letter to the DOJ, asking the government to investigate Exxon.
•
"Given the damage that has already occurred from climate change -- particularly in the poorest communities of our nation and our planet -- and that will certainly occur going forward, these revelations should be viewed with the utmost apprehension,"
they wrote. "They are reminiscent -- though potentially much greater in scale -- than similar revelations about the tobacco industry."
ETHOS THIS EVIDENCE IS AWESOME!!! HISTORICALLY SUPPORTED, SUPPORTED IN THE MOVIES AND THE ARTICLE COMES FROM
PULITZER PRIZE WINNERS FOR JOURNALISM – THIS IS SUPER EVIDENCE
http://insideclimatenews.org/content/Exxon-The-Road-Not-Taken
Exxon's Own Research Confirmed Fossil Fuels' Role in Global Warming Decades Ago
Top executives were warned of possible catastrophe from greenhouse effect, then led efforts to
block solutions.
By Neela Banerjee, Lisa Song and David Hasemyer
Sep 16, 2015