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2004 Dec, Newsletter No.76 |
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Written by SONE
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Wednesday, 01 December 2004 |
OUR NEW YEAR TASK IS CLEAR: TO SECURE ACTION IN 2005
Happy New Year. We start 2005 knowing where we are going. We have a
clear aim and a clear plan. A series of committee lunches and meetings
over the autumn has dispelled the mists, though it has yet to bring
mellow nuclear fruitfulness.
We now have one overriding task: to influence senior politicians to do
their duty by the nation in the new Parliament expected in June. That
requires them urgently to review energy policy and face up to the logic
of a nuclear future.
SONE, in consultation with the Nuclear Industry Association (NIA), with
whom we work closely, is now finalising how precisely to bring that
influence to bear. We have to be careful to avoid one obvious pitfall:
creating an immediate counter-productive anti-nuclear backlash. After
all, we are told that Greenpeace is straining at the leash to throw its
mysteriously acquired riches against the first party that dares before
the election to contemplate the development of nuclear energy.
We have more allies than many might suspect. The more sensible and
realistic Labour MPs recognise that the Government’s Energy White Paper
(EWP) was “a nonsense”. Serious politicians know we have not had an
energy policy for decades. North Sea oil and gas, now waning assets,
saw to that. Policy, such as it is, is riddled with inconsistencies -
energy, for example, is dirt cheap in real terms even though global
warming is said to be a greater threat than terrorism.
There is also a reasonable shudder among men of common sense when
assorted free marketeers, City experts and eggheads airily dismiss the
risks of relying on imported natural gas for up to 80% of our energy at
prices unfathomed. This is not to mention the public angst over wind
farms, where subsidy farming is conducted, and the Government’s
admitted impending failure to meet its CO 2 reduction target. There is
now probably more support for nuclear power in Parliament than since
the heady days of the industry’s development nearly 50 years ago.
Martin O’Neill, chairman of the Commons’ industry committee, was
optimistic on November 25 that a new Labour Government would take a
hard look at nuclear “within months”.
Whatever the outcome of the election, our aim is to make 2005 the
decisive year for nuclear power. If it isn’t – or if action is delayed
beyond 2006 – another four years will be lost and with it our economic
security. There is a lot riding on the next few months. We seek your
enthusiastic and controlled support.
KEEP FACTS FLOWING
One of the best ways members can help is by keeping up the barrage of
energy facts to the media. We need this to complement the broadside the
committee is laying down for senior politicians.
The more the public sees sense the more politicians are likely to
embrace it, apart from those, in and out of Cabinet, with a “visceral
hatred” of nuclear such as Margaret Beckett and Patricia Hewitt who are
in pole positions to damage nuclear at DEFRA and DTI.
We need to get over to the public the following simple points:
1 – after 50 years nuclear is demonstrably safe, reliable, clean and economic –and new designs are safer and cheaper.
2 – there is no insoluble nuclear waste problem apart from political procrastination.
3 – nuclear is crucial to security of electricity supply since renewables (ie wind) and energy conservation are failing.
4 – nuclear is the only means by which we can reduce greenhouse gas emissions
5 – without nuclear we shall be at the mercy of gas suppliers from
Russia, the Middle East and Algeria. How can we confidently face the
future on that desperately unstable basis?
Over the autumn the following members have been very active in
promoting nuclear and rubbishing nonsense about it through the media:
Graham Brightman, Steuart Campbell, A D Evans, Philip Owen. Dr G R
Plumb, Dr John Sandalls, Richard Sargent-Manse, Alan Shaw, Paul Spare,
Roy Sumerling, Professor J H P Watson and Dr P D Wilson. We thank them.
FIVE OUT OF FIVE
Perhaps a measure of the political task before us is the Energy
Minister, Mike O’Brien. He has become the fifth of five Energy
Ministers since SONE was formed in 1998 to turn down a meeting with us.
In response to the chairman’s invitation to lunch he replied: “I regret
I will not be able to accept your kind invitation in the foreseeable
future. My diary, as I am sure you will understand, is always under
considerable pressure with numerous constraints upon my time”.
The Secretary replied as follows:
“My committee have asked me to say that they are extremely disappointed
at your inability to join us for lunch. You are, of course, the fifth
Energy Minister since we were formed in 1998 to decline to meet us. We
have no option but to conclude from this that the Government, behind a
façade of not ruling out nuclear, is essentially prejudiced against
it, even though it is the only form of electricity generation that can
provide reliable, continuous, clean and economic power.
“We note that you have found time since you became Minister to promote
renewable sources of energy which, with the best will in the world,
have only a marginal contribution to make to Britain’s electricity
industry”.
On November 16 Mr O’Brien spoke at a Plymouth conference signalling the
Government’s determination to push ahead with onshore wind power.
Other Energy Ministers who turned us down were: John Battle, Helen
Liddell, Stephen Timms and even the pro-nuclear Brian Wilson whom we
never managed to meet before he was sacked.
THE RISING TIDE
Ministers may ignore us, but not the CBI. Nowhere has SONE been more
influential. Its director general, Digby Jones, with whom we have
regular meetings, has called for the immediate construction of six new
nuclear power stations over the next 10 years. He said the Government’s
reliance on wind would achieve little.
Mr Jones’ call was later reinforced by the chief executives of more
than 20 EU energy companies. They urged Governments to make nuclear
power a central part of their energy policies in the interests of
energy security and environmental protection. They said all lowcarbon
sources needed to be mobilised and enabled to compete fairly.
Their statement was presented as the opening shot in a campaign to
change energy policies in EU countries and end discrimination against
nuclear power. It included German and Swedish nuclear industry leaders
whose Governments are bent on phasing out nuclear power.
Follow us, says France
The rising international tide of support for nuclear power saw France’s
putative successor to President Chirac – Nicolas Sarkozy – tell the G8
meeting in Washington that Europe should follow France’s example and
opt for nuclear energy. As Economics Minister, he said it was the
answer to tightening prices of oil and other resources.
International licensing needed
At the same time the chairman of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission,
Nils Diaz, called for a common international licensing system for new
reactor designs. While licensing should remain in the hands of each
nation’s regulatory authority, he said regulators needed to handle its
increasing internationalism better. In a speech to his organisation’s
Nuclear Safety Research Conference on October 25, he said he wanted a
process that went beyond the IAEA’s current safety standards. Safety
would be better served when certified designs could be accepted across
borders.
New Trans-Atlantic Forum
We hear that a new Trans-Atlantic Nuclear Energy Forum is being formed
by businessmen to exchange information on Government thinking about the
way forward for nuclear power. It will be on the lines of a
Trans-Atlantic Business Forum, open only to top executives and
involving European and North American interests.
PRO-NUCLEAR WAVES IN UK
UK Greens, trying to stem the incoming nuclear tide, are getting their
feet wet like King Canute, though he knew he would. They have long
sought to defy logic.
The DTI has at last got the wind up in a big way, whatever the
prejudices of its Secretary of State, Patricia Hewitt. It has appointed
Energy Security and Energy Review Units to pave the way for a
post-election review of energy policy.
BNFL has also appointed an Energy Unit that is seeking to establish a
fact base on nuclear economics, waste, safety, security and investment
risks. This base will be invaluable for those arguing the case for
nuclear – a case that would be immeasurably strengthened by an
application from a nuclear or more generally an electricity company to
build a replacement nuclear station on an existing site. The Government
still relies on the mantra-like excuse for its own inaction – namely,
that no generator is coming forward with a proposal to build a nuclear
power station.
Martin O’Neill, Commons industry committee chairman, thinks a new
reactor order is more likely to come from a consortium, though
Mike Alexander, British Energy’s chief executive, said last month that
he believed BE had a good future if it pulled its socks up.
Mike Parker, chief executive of BNFL, claimed better public support for
nuclear at an inaugural nuclear assembly in Belgium on November 25.
“Public opinion is starting to move”, he said, “and there are clear
signs of a movement in nuclear’s favour.”
To promote this shift, BNFL took a supplement in the Spectator magazine
on October 30 on “The nuclear issue”. It incorporated anti-nuclear as
well as company arguments.
COULD THE LIGHTS GO OUT?
Graham Brightman, a Cumbrian member, sends us these edited impressions
of the NIA/BNES conference in December which attracted more than 200
people:
1 – present energy policy is unrealistic
2 - signs of realism are coming – slowly
3 – there is an urgent need to address the question: Is nuclear power unacceptable?
4 – As one listener put it, “You could feel the temperature going down”
as Energy Minister O’Brien proceeded to repeat the “renewables and
conservation” messages and that nuclear is “commercially unattractive”.
5- Robert Knight, research director of MORI, said “Nuclear folks don’t convince the public: they are not trusted”.
6 –Gordon McKerron, chairman of the Committee on Radioactive Waste
Management (CORWM), was “an unconvincing speaker” on “consulting the
public” but seemed to have discovered West Cumbria’s unanimous view is
to “keep the waste here”.
NUCLEAR WASTE CONSULTATIONS
SONE, as well as individual members, is to make its views known to the
Committee on Radioactive Waste Management which is due to report in
2006. This is one of those bodies successively appointed by Government
to avoid a decision on a long-term waste repository. It is currently
canvassing options.
On December 10 the Lords’ Select Committee on Science and Technology
published what has been described as a “damning” report on the
Government’s slow progress in developing a coherent radioactive waste
management policy. It was, it said, “astonishing” that CORWM had been
set to explore radioactive waste management policy from “a blank
sheet”.
This had occurred in spite of an overwhelming international scientific
consensus that underground disposal or storage is a safe long-term
option.
Ah yes, but the powers that be don’t like the consensus.
CONSENSUS UNDER STRAIN
Two of the major energy/environmental events of 2004 were caused by SONE patrons.
First, Professor James Lovelock, author of the Gaia theory, told Greens
they could not be serious about climate change if they maintained their
opposition to nuclear. Then the Rt Rev, Hugh Montefiore, former Bishop
of Birmingham, was forced to leave Friends of the Earth as a
long-standing trustee because he wanted to write in support of nuclear
power.
Their invaluable support for nuclear is founded on the need to combat
global warming. That stand was reinforced in October by Sir David King,
the Government’s chief scientific adviser. He said Ministers would have
to decide within five years whether to build new nuclear power stations
in Britain if it was to reach its targets for cutting greenhouse gas
emissions.
But this consensus is under strain from some very forthright critics.
We do not rely on Michael Crichton, author of Jurassic Park who, in a
new techno-thriller, “State of Fear”, attacks the “interminable
yammering of fearmongers” about climate change to keep people
perpetually anxious. Nor are we thinking of the likes of Dr Martin
Keeley, a geologist and Visiting Professor at University College,
London, who has described global warming as “a scam perpetuated by
scientists with vested interests but in need of crash courses in
geology, logic and the philosophy of science”. Nor even of Professor
John Brignell, Emeritus Professor at Southampton University, or Piers
Corbyn, an astrophysicist of Weather Action, both of whom have been
scathing about “global warping”.
Wake up Treasuries
Instead, we refer to a letter sent to The Times by a group of seven
economists led by former Chancellor Lord (Nigel) Lawson, attacking the
“alarmist” Blair/Howard view of climate change. They claimed that their
“sombre assessments and dark scenarios” paid no heed to the great
uncertainties over the causes and consequences of climate change. There
were no solid grounds for assuming, as Messrs Blair and Howard did,
that global warming demanded immediate and farreaching action which
would raise costs and make us all worse off.
“We consider”, they said, “that the treatment of economic issues by the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is not up to the mark. It is
time for finance and economics ministries everywhere, including HM
Treasury, to wake up to this situation and take action”.
YOUR CHOICE
On the assumption that global warming is “the central problem of the
age”, two academics have come up with a choice for replacing petrol and
diesel with hydrogen as transport fuel: either 100,000 wind turbines or
100 nuclear power stations.
Andrew Oswald, Professor of Economics at the University of Warwick, and
Jim Oswald, an energy consultant, say that that many turbines would
mean a 10km-deep strip of turbines encircling the entire coastline of
the British Isles or onshore an area larger than the whole of Wales.
The only alternative is nuclear which could in principle provide the
necessary green electricity to fuel UK transport needs.
NEW PATRONS
We welcome two new patrons – Lord Taverne of Pimlico QC as well as the
Rt Rev Hugh Montefiore, former Bishop of Birmingham (see Consensus
under Strain, above). Lord Taverne, the former Government Minister and
MP, Dick Taverne, has made a study of hormesis, the idea that a little
radiation can do you good, and has spoken and written about it. He is
chairman of AXA and Equity Law Life Assurance Society.
NEW CHAIRMAN
Another SONE patron, Giles Chichester, Conservative MEP for the South
West, has been elected chairman of the European Parliament’s energy
committee. A major review of EU renewable energy policy is scheduled
for next year and this is causing much concern in wind and renewable
energy quarters because of the cost of their support systems.
NEW BOOKS
We are delighted to record two new books by SONE members.
Dr John Sandalls, formerly of the AERE at Harwell from 1958-94, gives
an account of his working life in Thirty Six Years at the Atomic (£12,
from bookshops in Abingdon, Didcot and Newbury or from John Sandalls at
Tamara, Locks Lane, Wantage, p&p £1.50). He presents a strong case
for a return to nuclear power.
Terry Price, founding secretary-general from 197486 of the Uranium
Institute, now the World Nuclear Association, sets out his fascinating
autobiography going back to the earliest days of Harwell in the 1940s
in Political Physicist (Book Guild, £17.95).
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Last Updated ( Friday, 09 September 2005 )
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