The Green Party Is Unhinged

A lack of critical thinking skills is not exclusive to the right. This malaise infects the left, as well. I'm talking about the great Saskatchewan Nuclear Debate. More specifically, the Saskatchewan Green Party's stance. Look, I get that they don't like stuff that actually functions and has a stellar track record. They don't have to make stuff up, though.

"People are very concerned," she (Larissa Shasko, Green Party Leader) said. "I think that people definitely have an obligation to get informed on this issue and I urge everyone to please get informed on the issue of nuclear power." (bolding mine)

You first. Here's a place to start, The World Nuclear Association. More specifically, the safety of modern reactors. The criticism from environmentalists will be what it always is "It's a website for a group with an agenda, therefore nothing of value is to be had!" This criticism only applies to websites of industry, and not to websites of environmentalists.

Safety relative to other energy sources

Many occupational accident statistics have been generated over the last 40 years of nuclear reactor operations in the US and UK. These can be compared with those from coal-fired power generation. All show that nuclear is a distinctly safer way to produce electricity. Two simple sets of figures are quoted in the Table below and that in the appendix. A major reason for coal's unfavourable showing is the huge amount which must be mined and transported to supply even a single large power station. Mining and multiple handling of so much material of any kind involves hazards, and these are reflected in the statistics.

Comparison of accident statistics in primary energy production.

(Electricity generation accounts for about 40% of total primary energy)

Fuel	Immediate fatalities 1970-92	Who?	Normalised to deaths per TWy* electricity
Coal	6400	workers	342
Natural gas	1200	workers & public	85
Hydro	4000	public	883
Nuclear	31	workers	8

* Basis: per million MWe operating for one year, not including plant construction, based on historic data which is unlikely to represent current safety levels in any of the industries concerned.
Source: Ball, Roberts & Simpson, Research Report #20, Centre for Environmental & Risk Management, University of East Anglia, 1994; Hirschberg et al, Paul Scherrer Institut, 1996; in: IAEA, Sustainable Development and Nuclear Power, 1997; Severe Accidents in the Energy Sector, Paul Scherrer Institut, 2001).

This is specifically in response to the most idiotic thing I heard yesterday from the "esteemed" Saskatchewan Green Party leader, paraphrased: 'no one really knows the effects of nuclear power!' What complete and utter garbage. It's not some new technology. This method of generating electricity has been used by the public for over 50 years.

Who's being conservative now? 50 years of data isn't enough to make a rational decision on the viability of nuclear power? Since when? If 20 years of problematic data is enough to demand that our electrical infrastructure and economy take crippling hits in order to stave off Global Warming, then the debate on nuclear energy should be over. It isn't about viability, it's about agenda.

This idiocy doesn't stop with demands we be informed, or that no one really knows anything about nuclear power. Oh no, it gets better.

The Green Party leader also spoke to concerns about the possible export of nuclear power to Alberta and the United States and the theoretical provision of weapons-grade plutonium to the latter country. She also accused the government of rushing the decision-making process, only providing information that supports one side of the issue, failing to fund renewable energy and energy conservation research, and not immediately providing answers to questions raised by the public in the UDP consultations.

It's not nuclear power, it's electrical power. Why should we be concerned if Alberta or anyone else purchases our energy? We already export all manner of stuff to the states, including uranium. None of Canada's reactors actually make weapons grade anything. However, it's up to the general public to get educated. I think they have that backwards.

If anyone needed to be further convinced that these people, holding the environmentalist banner high, are slightly nuts, it's this:

"It's very scary to think about Lingenfelter winning," she said. "It is the worst thing that could happen for the policy goals of the Green Party of Saskatchewan, (but) it would be incredible for growing our membership and helping us form government in the next election."

If they are that divorced from reality in the political sphere, it leads me to the conclusion that everything else they say is equally suspect. The Green Party will never form government on any level in the foreseeable future. Also, Lingenfelter is hardly scary.

There isn't a debate for them. If the consultation process takes 1 year or 10, it will have been rushed. Their decades of propaganda have, ultimately, failed. We, in this province, were supposed to choose "renewable" resources. Nuclear was supposed to be off the table. Once it became clear that they were losing, they became more shrill.