Do you fear nuclear power? Since the beginning of its use, nuclear power plants have been a topic of strong controversy. With individuals and groups fighting vigorously for both sides of the argument, the general public has grown a universal fear of nuclear power. With movies such as “China Syndrome” and the way the media portrays radiation, fear of using nuclear energy is growing, driving our world in the wrong direction . This fear has clouded our opinion on using nuclear energy, but can using this energy actually be a cleaner and safer alternative to the other sources currently operating?
The movie “China Syndrome” depicts a nuclear power plant in Los Angeles, California, that is being operated by corrupt and greedy business men. The plant is shown to be extremely unsafe with employees disobeying government regulations in order to produce more energy, representing the workers to be evil individuals who put profits over safety. When an incident within the plant is secretly recorded by a team of news broadcasters, management within the plant act fast in order to censor and protect the footage. Throughout this fictional film, the audience is taught that these nuclear plants are dangerous and lucrative business schemes. At one point in the movie, a worker for the plant realizes the dangers present, and attempts to share these dangers with the media. His life is threatened by the higher up employees, and he is driven to extreme lengths to share the information. Once he does share it in an interview with the news team, the plant workers immediately disregard what he says, claiming him to be a lunatic drunk.
This film, created in the 1970’s, put nuclear power into the dark for its viewers. The newly discovered fear for nuclear plants had slowly began to bubble. This fear came to a boil as the Chernobyl disaster occurred shortly after the release of the film. The Chernobyl disaster sent a radioactive plum of fear across the atomic world. This disaster drew a holt to the continuation of nuclear power, as it became something to fear.
The movie “Nuclear Nightmare” assesses the radiation released from this disaster, and conduct other radiation studies across the world. Through studying wildlife still present in Chernobyl, comparing the actual death tole to the theoretical death tole, and studying the effects of background radiation, the scientific community was baffled. A very shocking discovery was made from these studies, as a conclusion was drawn that radiation is not as dangerous as we previously believed it to be. The death tole caused by the Chernobyl disaster was significantly lower than expected, as only 1.4% of the expected amount of people to die actuallly passed away. The media and other news outlets feed on fear, as they manipulated the incident to be a much more horrific disaster than it was. This spawned an extreme fear of radiation, and nuclear plants became immensely disliked by the general public. A new word had been created for the pandemonium that swept the population; Radiophobia. How do these images make you feel? Do you have Radiophobia?
Claims of radiation causing mutation and death were being spread without any real scientific back up. Claims of thousands dying, nuclear chaos, and a world in Fallout were headlining tabloids. The atomic symbol became a sign that struck fear and anxiety in the hearts of civilians. This immense fear started the decline of nuclear energy, and the fallout of clean power.
Many people believe we are in a clean energy revolution at the moment, as Germany gets half of its energy from solar, and India is planning on having 20x more solar energy than California by the year 2022. To the understanding of general public, solar and wind energy is saving our environment and slowing down global warming. As this may be slightly true, there is a darker side to using this source of energy. Although clean energy is on a rise, the percentage of electricity from clean energy is strongly declining.
Solar and wind energy only provide power for us 20% of the time. If the sun isn’t shining, or the wind isn’t blowing, people still urgently need power for hospitals, homes, cities, and much more. When these power sources fail to support us, we heavily rely on natural gasses. These natural gasses can leak, such as in early 2015 when a leak in Aliso Canyon occurred. This leak had as much methane gas released into the environment as adding half a million cars on the road at once. The carbon levels emitted from these natural gasses are very dangerous to our environment, and cause serious harm. The United Nations has looked at the carbon content of many different energy sources, and nuclear is one of the lowest.
Nuclear power runs through the day and night, and can supply us with clean energy for 92% of the year. There is just one major problem with nuclear energy, people are very, very afraid of it. During a study on the publics opinion on nuclear energy, it was ranked extremely low on the scale.
The three main things people fear about nuclear energy are the safety of the plants, the waste produced, and the association with weaponry of mass destruction. Despite what people think, nuclear power is very safe, and it is hard to make it much safer. The popular British journal, Lancet, states that nuclear power is the safest source of power available.
The vast majority of harm caused by nuclear power is the panic and fear of the general public. In other words, the harm that’s caused isn’t caused by the machines, but instead caused by our fear and emotions.
Another thing people strongly fear is the waste. There is actually very little nuclear waste out there in our world. If all the nuclear waste produced in the United States was put onto a football field, it would only stack 20ft high. If this waste is properly monitored it cannot harm anybody, and is very safe. In contrast, the waste we produce from other energy sources that is not controlled is called pollution, and this kills 7 million people every year, and strongly affects global warming. There is currently a nuclear reactor being constructed in China that runs on nuclear waste, although it is only set to be purchasable by countries by 2040.
The fear of nuclear plants also spawns from the use of nuclear weapons. This is a hard fear for the general public to overcome. A great way to reduce this fear is to decommission nuclear bombs, and use the plutonium in the warheads to power reactors. If we want to rid the world of nuclear weapons, we’re gonna need a lot more nuclear power.
There is an exceptional nuclear reactor located right here in Canada called the CANDU Reactor. The CANDU Reactor is much safer and cheaper than other reactors, yet other places in the world still do not wish to associate with nuclear energy. The reactor is unique in that it uses natural, unenriched uranium as a fuel; with some modification, it can also use enriched uranium, mixed fuels, and even thorium. Thus, CANDU reactors is ideally suited for using material from decommissioned nuclear weapons as fuel, helping to reduce global arsenals. CANDU reactors can be refuelled while operating at full power, while most other designs must be shut down for refuelling. The reactors are exceptionally safe. The safety systems are independent from the rest of the plant, and each key safety component has three backups. Not only does this redundancy increase the overall safety of the system, but it also makes it possible to test the safety system while the reactor is operating under full power. Even with all of these amazing benefits, fear has caused people to see this reactor, and others, as evil.
The cause of the energy crisis isn’t from within our machines, it’s from within ourselves. Fear of nuclear plants has become very mainstream, and therefore we are loosing sight of them. The government works their best to make the people happy, and if they fear nuclear energy then the government will not support it. When it comes to nuclear power, the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. Our best public health data shows that nuclear has already saved 1.8 million lives that would have been lost if we burned fossil fuels instead. How many could have been saved if we hadn’t been spooked by the China Syndrome and other media outlets? How will we change our opinion on nuclear energy, and make it a safer alternative to electricity? We must overcome this fear of nuclear energy, starting by accepting its controversial past.
