The real costs of nuclear power
17 June 2010
Earlier this week Darren Johnson AM, Green Party spokesperson on Trade and Industry, responded to the nuclear industry's "no subsidies" claim in a letter to The Guardian.
Paul Spence says the nuclear industry expects to pay the full cost of decommissioning a new generation of nuclear power stations (1). But his words about "our full share of waste management and disposal costs" were carefully chosen. The consultation document reveals that EDF considers their full share of these costs to be around 20% of the total. As our report Nuclear Power? No Point!(2) highlighted last year, nuclear is only responsible for 4% of the energy consumed in the UK. More energy can be saved by energy conservation measures in homes and businesses. Focusing on the nuclear industry takes resources away from building new renewable capacity, which, given sufficient political will, could provide more than enough electricity for the UK.
Notes:
1. See: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cif-green/2010/jun/15/nuclear-waste-subsidy-edf-energy
2. See: http://www.greenparty.org.uk/reports
Share
