Des Moines Register
07-20-07
Nuclear power is far from 'benign'
State Rep. Phil Wise's essay ("Times Demand Democrats Take Another Look at
Nuclear Energy," July 6) loses all credibility when it cites Iowa State University
professor Carolyn Heising's opinions about nuclear energy. Heising makes the
outrageous claim that nuclear power plants are "emissions-free," when any highschool student knows that nuclear plants generate hazardous and deadly
emissions, including plutonium 239 and strontium 90.
Wise also mistakenly claims that nuclear energy is "sustainable" and
"environmentally benign." It is neither. Sustainability implies continuing
availability of energy without the need for new input or resources, but nuclear
plants require the constant mining and processing of uranium. An
environmentally benign energy source would cause no harm to our surroundings,
but nuclear power creates massive amounts of radioactive and toxic waste that
directly endanger anyone or anything it touches.
While Wise claims that times have changed, some hard facts haven't changed:
Nuclear power remains an economically inefficient energy source made feasible
only because it's propped up by U.S. taxpayers who are financially liable (instead
of power companies) in case of a catastrophic nuclear accident. It is also a dirty
energy source that requires millions of dollars of clean-up whenever a plant is
shut down and decommissioned. With North Korea and Iran, we are also
experiencing daily the foreign-policy problems created by nuclear-energy
production because of its direct link to the manufacturing of nuclear weapons.
Fifty-six years after the first nuclear plant started operating, there are still no
solutions on the horizon for any of these problems. As Democrats, we should
continue to focus our research efforts on energy sources that are truly benign
and sustainable: wind, solar and perhaps hydrogen.
- Dennis Harbaugh,
Waterloo.