There are examples of nuclear power plants in the world that were extremely costly. There are several factors that must be considered when discussing these examples. Firstly, the nuclear industry is the most heavily regulated industry on the planet. Canada specifically has extremely strict guidelines about human exposure to radiation and chemical wastes. We also have extremely strict guidelines regarding the physical construction of a nuclear plant. For example, the safety systems of a nuclear plant built today must include two independant shut-down systems which do not require any human intervention and cannot be turned off by an operator. The standards for waste, both radioactive and chemical, from a nuclear power plant are much more strict than those for a corresponding coal power plant.

High quality workmanship sometimes is hard to attain in areas that build nuclear plants. A good example of this is how a nuclear project in Finland in 2009 faced massive budget overruns. Some of the contractors involved tried to cut corners, including some outsourcing of cement pouring to a Polish company. The Polish company produced low-quality work, not up to the standards of the project. This issue has ended up costing the project a tremendous amount of money due to delays. Delays cost a lot of money in nuclear power plant projects because billions of dollars have been taken out on a loan in order to build the plant. Paying interest on several billion dollars for months and years can add up rather quickly. A very substantial part of the cost of nuclear power is interest on the loan. Delays introduced by the tight regulation of the industry can thus have huge financial consequences for a project.

The vast majority of nuclear plants are much closer to being on schedule and on budget, especially as the experiences of the past add to our predictive capacity for such projects. Nuclear power is also estimated to cost roughly the same as other competing technologies for producing baseload power, such as wind combined with storage and trade or natural gas to produce power when the wind isn’t blowing.

That said, there is no single answer to the energy question. It can certainly be the case that nuclear power will be more expensive than other options available for a certain region. Any reasonable energy planning must take into account population densities, distribution systems, the availability of cooling water, and the availability of different forms of heavy industry.

Answer: Not True

It is not true that nuclear power is more expensive than all of its competing technologies in every location. In some locations it makes a fair bit of sense. In others, such as Saskatchewan, it faces numerous challenges that reduce its feasibility. It is possible that nuclear power will be more expensive than its alternatives, but this is certainly not always the case.

In the book, Krutch argues that though humanity seems to be on a rough course, there are still possibilities for us. He eloquently deconstructs the wholesale mechanistic evaluation of humankind by pointing out a myriad of gaps in the reasoning of this ideology. The crux of the discussion is exemplified in the following snippet:

“Obviously, then, we have to begin by telling the mechanist that, however inconvenient he may find our insistence, we simply will not permit him to disregard any of the facts; not any of the facts and, especially, not so tremendous a fact as the fact of consciousness. Descartes, we shall say, was right. That we think–or rather that we are aware–is, of all things the one which we know most directly and incontrovertibly. It may be a difficult fact to deal with but it is primary. Consciousness is the one thing which incontrovertibly is, and if there is one thing which we cannot afford to leave out of consideration it is that. To refuse to concern ourselves with it is to make the most monstrous error that could possibly be made.”

To the response that consciousness is merely mechanistic, Krutch devotes a significant portion of the book. One argument in particular is very interesting. He argues that by using the word ‘mechanism’ to try to explain a concept like consciousness means that we are operating under a very different definition of ‘mechanism’ than what it normally implies. Having broadened the definition of ‘mechanism’ to include the phenomena of consciousness, we no longer know what ‘mechanism’ is. I find this very interesting in light of my background in psychology and physics. Understanding even normal physical phenomena mechanistically can be incredibly difficult. To continue to use the term with a system as complex as the human brain is to use the term in a different sense than we would use to describe something like a Rube Goldberg Machine.

Drawing upon a diverse array of areas of human knowledge, Krutch demonstrates that the human being seems to be capable of some extent of conscious will. This most minimal conception of a human being necessarily must include some measure of freedom in the form of conscious will. From this basis, Krutch argues that perhaps humanity has a chance at surviving because of our ability to change our lives and our circumstances through conscious action.

In one section of the book, the author discusses the fact that sociology necessarily depends on the statistical mean average for many of its findings. A consequence of this is that many facets of society are planned, not for the possible heights that humanity might reach with their will and intellect, but for the average. A quote which I found very poignant went as follows: “If some are more likely than others to exercise their freedoms then is not sociology unwise to plan society in terms which minimize the importance of those who are most capable of free choices?”

This struck me powerfully when I read it. I was immediately reminded of a quote from Abraham Maslow that I ran across several years ago:

“If we want to know how fast a human being can run, then it is no use to average out the speed of a ‘good sample’ of the population; it is far better to collect Olympic gold medal winners and see how well they can do. If we want to know the possibilities for spiritual growth, value growth, or moral development in human beings, then I maintain that we can learn most by studying our moral, ethical, or saintly people…Even when ‘good specimens,’ the saints and sages and great leaders of history, have been available for study, the temptation too often has been to consider them not human but supernaturally endowed.”

Our conception of what people are is dominated by the statistical average. We must be careful that this does not extend into the area of determining what people might be capable of. If we are to plan our society, let us plan it in light of what we understand our potential as human beings to be as well as the facts of the current world and our place in it.

The messages of this book are very relevant today. We live in an age in which people, even in the most affluent places in the world, are increasingly stressed by their lives and unhappy with the direction the world is going. We live in an Age of Anxiety perhaps more strenuous than that following the second world war. Fifty-six years have passed since this book was written, and yet we still live with the fear that humanity will destroy itself. Five and a half decades of development have given us wars as well as technological marvels.

We today are wrestling with new dangers such as climate change, pollution, rogue nuclear powers, and an ever-growing world population. We are each personally aware of more than ever before in the history of humankind. Every time we turn on the news, or read on the Internet, the world’s issues become our questions to ponder. I hope that in our daily lives each and every one of us, drawing upon a literal world of experience, can hopefully find some answers.

In a related story, the people of El Salvador have fought to keep mining companies from having a free reign in their country. Pacific Rim Mining Corp has in response attempted to press charges against El Salvador on the basis of CAFTA (The Central American Free Trade Agreement).

International corporations have been lobbying for decades for changes to the system of international trade that will give them more ability to access resources and markets. The continued empowerment of the corporation is worrying to many people. In some cases such as these, it appears that companies are using these powers to try to bully their way to wealth. In some cases, such as in Under Rich Earth, it appears that the question has become: human rights or corporate rights?

In October 2008, the Uranium Development Partnership committee was formed by the government of Saskatchewan. We noted that the mandate of the committee was to recommend the best ways for Saskatchewan to enjoy prosperity by developing nuclear industries. We also noted that the committee seemed to be filled primarily with industry representatives. These were not necessarily people we would expect to keep Saskatchewan’s best interest at heart.

We decided to conduct our own investigations into the feasibility of expanding the nuclear industries of Saskatchewan. This was an entirely volunteer effort, usually conducted on weekends and during lulls in semesters. Most of us were still working on finishing our respective degrees. The result was our critique of the UDP report.

Arguments Polarized Too Far

In our studies, we found that many of the arguments both for and against nuclear power were in the range of dubious to outright myth. In hindsight we realize this is an understandable outcome, with nuclear power being such an important, complex and emotionally charged issue.

Most people find arguments agreeing with their biases to be very convincing. This is known as the confirmation bias. Statements are thus not analyzed for their correctness. They are instead used as weapons to keep people convinced or confused. In areas as complex as nuclear physics and engineering, the layperson has few methods to ascertain the truth of a statement. Throw economics into the mix and the task of understanding what is actually going on becomes incredibly difficult.

Break The Problem Up

Our solution to this issue was to start with facts that are verifiable, and work from there. We broke the arguments down into smaller pieces and began to analyze each one. We ended up with dozens of fundamental claims that people have made about the nuclear industry. Many are actually true. The problem is that most of these are in some way misinterpreted when they are presented as high-level arguments for or against nuclear power. Again, this is understandable to some extent because of the complexity of the issue we are dealing with.

Our Project: Nuclear Myth and Fact

We are now beginning to publish our work on this subject. Today the first post on the subject of why nuclear plants need backup power was publicized. Many more are in the process of being written, so stay tuned.

A power utility has to have the capability of calling into service enough power to make up for the loss of its largest generator on short notice. For a nuclear generator, this would be between 300 and 2000 MW. In our home province of Saskatchewan, the largest single generator SaskPower has to keep backup capacity for currently is a 300MW coal unit. However, if the entire Boundary Dam facility went down, the Saskatchewan system could be missing as much as 813 MW of power.

During routine refueling, at least 300 MW of capacity would have to be supplied to make up for a partially idle nuclear unit. This number could be as high as 1-2 GW with some nuclear plant designs. Some of the newer designs have the ability to keep producing 2/3 to 3/4 of their power output while they are being refueled.

Additional capacity is often available from more costly sources such as natural gas, as well as from neighboring jurisdictions. Most major power grids in the world are connected with their neighbors. A failure on one system can be compensated for by another part of the system, for a price. Importing electricity can sometimes be extremely expensive.

During a heat wave, drought, or other event causing an entire nuclear facility to be turned off, multiple gigawatts of capacity would have to be available on short notice, and this would require a large amount of additional capacity to be built by SaskPower above and beyond the costs associated with the nuclear facility. Another option would be trying to import enough power in such a case. This would leave SaskPower in a relatively weak bargaining position unless agreements had been made much earlier for trading power in such a circumstance. With a functioning nuclear plant, Saskatchewan would likely be a huge exporter of power. A neighbor such as Manitoba could use Saskatchewan’s power when the Nuclear Plant is running, and they would turn on more of their hydroelectric generators if the nuclear plant had to go down. This is thanks to the energy storage capability of hydroelectric reservoirs. They can keep the energy waiting until it is needed.

All in all, this is not a myth, but it must be understood that this is a property not just of nuclear power, but of all forms of electricity generation. This is because good method yet exists for storing electricity cheaply on a large scale. This is an issue that has been worked on for many decades. The possible solutions are many, and the most likely result is a patchwork of: reducing demand, buying power from neighbors, and ramping up extra generation.

Power From The Sun

Most forms of renewable energy have the sun as their original source. All the various forms of direct solar energy are obviously from the sun. Less clear is the connection between the wind and the sun. Wind is caused primarily by the uneven heating of the earth’s surface by the sun. By using a wind turbine, we are actually drawing out a little bit of the solar energy that went into creating that wind.

Additionally, the water cycle is driven by the sun. Water is heated by the sun, and rises in tiny droplets (which we humans might feel as humidity) which eventually finds its way upwards until it is high in the atmosphere. These tiny droplets eventually form larger drops that become rain. So when we run water through our dams to turn turbines, we are actually using energy that had its origin in the sun. Lastly, the sun is the source of energy for plants to grow. If we use plants for our biomass energy, we are actually using stored solar energy. If we use our plants faster than they grow however, or use non-renewable inputs such as fertilizers based on potash or natural gas, our use of them may be distinctly non-renewable.

‘Green’ Energy Might Not Be Renewable

People often refer to things like landfill gas plants as renewable. This is not really accurate. Being a renewable form of power depends on what form of energy is being tapped into. In the case of landfill gas, the energy comes from all the garbage we throw away. The origin of this energy could be solar, if the garbage is based for instance on plants. However, in this era, all major sources of garbage will be heavily based on petroleum products such as plastics. If the original energy source is petroleum, it is distinctly not renewable. Petroleum is known to take a long time to make (millions of years), and we are certainly pumping it out of the ground faster than it is made. Petroleum is one of the proverbial non-renewable resources along with coal.

Landfill gas plants are desirable in some places as they allow us to capture more of the energy from our garbage that would otherwise be waste. Efficiency is certainly a positive goal for the world, which is why technologies such as these are often heaped in with the renewable forms of energy. These may be a good idea in some places where an opportunity exists to exploit the resource created by our garbage. These plants might deserve the label ‘green‘, but not renewable.

Fusion Is Renewable

The sun runs on the energy created by fusion reactions that take place near its core. If we are able to create fusion energy in power plants on the earth, we will be tapping into the same power source that drives the sun. If we can master the techniques necessary to make fusion power work, we can have energy for many millions to billions of years just based on the easy-to-access hydrogen in the earth’s oceans. This is a form of energy that could outlive the sun. Humanity may settle places beyond the solar system, and continue using fusion power after the sun dies billions of years from now. If any form of power deserves the name renewable, it is fusion.

Is Fission Renewable?

This is a dicey question. Fission seems to lie somewhere between fusion and non-renewable sources such as coal. Currently fission reactors produce nuclear waste. The actual mass and volume of the waste is extremely small when compared with the fly ash and pollutants from coal production, but it is still notable. It is interesting to note that a typical reactor in this era will unlock only a tiny fraction of the energy stored in the fuel it uses.

There are economic and political reasons for why we are not using techniques to unlock vastly more energy from the fuel. These techniques would involve ‘reprocessing’ the fuel and sending it back through the reactor. In order for the fuel to work again, scientists need to do some chemistry to separate out chemicals that stop the reactions from proceeding safely. Once this separation is complete, the fuel can be used again. In theory, this process can be repeated until we have unlocked almost all of the energy that was in the original fuel. The volume of nuclear waste in this case would be much smaller. This is known as ‘closing’ the nuclear fuel cycle.

It seems safe to say that if we close the nuclear fuel cycle, fission will be renewable. It will be able to turn matter into energy with only a small amount of waste. This small amount of waste could actually be made harmless (not radioactive) by a particle accelerator. This day may be a long way off, but there are currently some interesting developments. Interested readers are encouraged to learn about the Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor.

As things exist today, the amount of waste produced by a nuclear reactor is enough of a problem that we may safely say that this technology is non-renewable in its current form. Options exist that would make this power source incredibly clean, safe and cheap in the future. We aren’t there yet though, and today’s fission power should get the label ‘non-renewable’ but we should keep in mind that we can choose to make it ‘mostly-renewable’ if we choose to support the development of these new reactors.

Geothermal is Mostly-Renewable

Geothermal power uses the heat of the earth, deep under the surface, as its source of energy. By using this heat as an energy source, we cool a small volume of the earth’s crust. Once we stop, these spots are eventually warmed back up by the heat around them, but usually in a slow manner on a scale of decades to centuries. So if we use a geothermal loop to take heat out of the crust and use it to make electricity, eventually we cool that area down. If we shut down our plant and wait a really long time, it should be relatively hot again when we check. On the time scales that we normally discuss with regards to power plants and society, geothermal can be considered to be mostly-renewable.

There are a number of places on the earth where the heat is carried much closer to the surface, such as Iceland. In places such as these, geothermal power is incredibly cheap by comparison and is certainly one of the best options for renewable energy. Iceland has a number of energy-intensive industries because they have such an amazing energy resource that they use for instance to refine Aluminium.

Geothermal power looks different when considering energy on a scale of centuries or eons. The energy contained in the heat of the earth is not infinite. It is a very large amount of energy but it is very hard to get to after we have cooled off all of the easy to access places. In theory the mantle of the earth contains a tremendous amount of energy, but it is not feasible with any technology we are aware of to tap even a large percentage of that energy. Geothermal is a nice addition to our bag of renewable tricks for the coming decades and centuries, but it is not a power source as long lived as fusion.

I wrestled with the ideas of personal and social change for several years before putting the proverbial pen to paper. To be honest I wrestle with them still, and I certainly consider change to be a fundamental facet of being alive. I decided then that I would embrace the yearning within me. I decided to try to do my best to better both my life and those lives that I could touch in the best way that I knew how.

The most immediate result of this decision is that I penned a paper entitled “Conscientious Future”. I wanted to change the world for the better and I needed to get a grasp of how it was possible as well as why it was necessary. Since its original form, the paper has undergone a number of critical readings by friends and interested intellectuals. Their comments and suggestions led to a clearer, more meaningful, and more compelling statement than what I could have written alone. They have my most heartfelt thanks.

The Vision of Earth website was the next major step. A close friend of mine found the domain name and it struck both of us profoundly from the first moment we considered it. Another friend volunteered some server space and bandwidth, so we bought the name and never looked back. What you see before you is the result of years of efforts by myself and the other volunteers who contribute to this project.

The paper is now available on this website for the first time. You can also find it on the top menu bar by hovering the mouse over “The Project”. You should see menu appear with “Conscientious Future” as one of the items.

It is our expectation that this server will provide faster access to the site. Speed was an issue in the past, so we are hoping that this will address it. If there are any issues with the site, please do not hesitate to contact us.

The forum in its current state was designed by Ben with the help of the rather impressive plugin Simple:Press Forum. The most daunting thing about this plugin for us was the sheer amount of flexibility it offered us. Swimming through the options it is possible to change a great number of things relevant to the configuration and function of the forum.

One of our favourite features is the fact that we can now link blog posts to forum topics. On the forum page you can find a forum named Discuss Articles or News. In this forum will appear topics that link directly to posts made on the main blog. It should be easy to find the forum discussion about a specific post because at the bottom of a post such as this one there will be a link encouraging you to join in on the forum discussion of this post. Come on in!

Seer CBC coverage for more details.

At the same time, Canadians are facing a deregulation of their environmental assessment process. The Conservatives’ Budget bill contains within it a large number of changes to the Canadian Environmental Protection Act (CEPA). These changes were not called attention to, and it seems likely that it was hoped that they would escape notice by the Canadian people.

For more information on the subject, see Eco Justice, or The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society.