Re: Seaborg on Nuclear Power -Reply

[Bob Flood <bflood@SLAC.Stanford.EDU>]

At 05:03 PM 12/18/97 -0600, you wrote:
>2 comments.  1) Since it is common knowledge that nuclear power is clean
and does
>not contribute to global warming, why aren't we being begged by the
>environmentalists to build more plants.

The problem is that there isn't a single coordinated environmental
movement. There's an anti-nuclear movement, an anti-coal burning movement,
an anti-solar movement, an anti-wind farm movement, and now a
tear-down-the-dams anti-hydro movement. Not only do none of these groups
talk to each other, they don't want to or care to. Almost every
environmental activist I have met is a one-issue person, and is unwilling
to discuss any other issues, even if closely related.

It's clear that, if all of these groups succeed, the only way to achieve an
environmental state that would satisfy them requires an 18th century
standard of living without electricity. Of course, none will advocate that,
but none will allow themselves to cornered into admitting in public that
they know that the environmental movements are at cross purposes.


---------
Bob Flood
Dosimetry Group Leader
Stanford Linear Accelerator Center
(650) 926-3793
bflood@slac.stanford.edu