NEW YORK - Energy conservation and renewable energy such as wind power would be a better investment for US taxpayers than subsidies for new nuclear plants, according to a study released on Thursday by several environmental, health and public interest organizations.
The organizations, including Friends of the Earth, GRACE Policy Institute and the US Public Interest Research Group, pointed to several problems that have plagued the industry, including higher-than-expected construction costs, terrorist threats and the unresolved issue of how to safely store spent radioactive fuel.
The US$1.5 billion to US$2 billion estimates of what it will cost to build the next generation of power reactors are "extremely optimistic and unlikely to be achieved" despite federal subsidies, the organizations said.
"Nuclear construction cost estimates have been notoriously inaccurate," the organizations said, noting actual costs for some operating nuclear reactors were two or more times their estimate.
Rather than throw money at the nuclear industry, the environmental organizations recommended the US invest more in conservation and renewable technologies, including wind power.
Steve Kerekes, a spokesman for the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), the industry trade group, however, said the groups opposed to nuclear power "seem to be stuck in the past."
Kerekes blamed past cost overruns on an unwieldy licensing process and said the industry believed a new, streamlined licensing process would reduce construction costs.
To date, nine companies have announced plans to file for licenses to build up to 20 new reactors. But none of the companies has made firm plans to build a new reactor.
ACCIDENTS AND TERRORISM
The environmental groups noted that the Three Mile Island accident in 1979 caused utilities to stop work on several units at high cost to ratepayers, and they warned that a terrorist attack or accident at a nuclear plant could halt construction of new power reactors.
They cited a near-accident at FirstEnergy Corp.'s Davis-Besse plant in Ohio in 2001.
NEI's Kerekes said the industry has adopted safer procedures and better training practices since the Three Mile Island accident. As for the threat of terrorism, he contended that power reactors were the "best defended industrial facilities in the nation's civilian infrastructure."
The study opposing nuclear power also warned the United States has yet to decide on a way to store used nuclear fuel.
The groups said the industry cannot count on a federal plan to reprocess used fuel. They noted that the planned Yucca Mountain repository in Nevada is behind schedule and said it may never open, while past attempts to reprocess fuel were not viable.
Kerekes conceded that the nuclear power industry was frustrated by the lack of a long-term storage solution.
"We want to see Yucca up and running and we would like to see reprocessing. Things are moving forward but not at the pace we want," Kerekes said.
Kerekes said alternatives to nuclear power were not practical.
"Nuclear reactors are baseload units that run around the clock and cannot be replaced by wind turbines or other renewables. We need renewables and we need nuclear reactors," he said.
Story by Scott DiSavino
REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
