Madam, - Cormac MacGowan (July 29th) presented the usual arguments against nuclear power, including some myths that need to be addressed.
He says nuclear fuel is a finite resource, just like oil. While the high-grade uranium ores so far identified are of course limited, there are very substantial reserves of recoverable uranium that can be mined economically far into the future.
In addition, various technologies, including breeder reactors, will ensure that nuclear power remains viable for centuries to come, if need be. Of course the price of uranium will rise in accordance with demand, but it would remain inconsequential even if it were 10 times the current price.
Furthermore, far from ever being the subject of global conflict, as suggested by Mr MacGowan, uranium is readily available from stable countries such as Canada and Australia. Uranium is also available in Ireland, although we don't know how much because Minister for Energy Eamon Ryan has prohibited exploration for it, in clear contravention of the Euratom Treaty. If fuel was an issue, there would not be 35 new plants under construction worldwide today.
Mr MacGowan also holds that the prevention of successful attacks on nuclear plants is nearly impossible. Not so. It is difficult to imagine why terrorists would choose to tackle an Irish plant in preference to any other, but even if terrorists managed to gain control of a nuclear power plant, it would be quite impossible for them to cause an incident, due to the layers of safety controls in modern plants.
He also says that nuclear power "leaves dangerous waste behind that is very troublesome to manage". There is one form of waste that it produces hardly at all: CO2. Realistically, CO2 threatens the destruction of human civilisation within the lifetimes of people living today. If the volume of spent nuclear fuels were to be multiplied a million times, it could not cause that damage. Nuclear power produces less CO2 than any of the other power options commonly discussed, even after accounting for the energy expended in the mining and transport of uranium.
As for the economics of nuclear power, let us leave it to the private sector and see what happens. As indicated above, the rush to nuclear power is already beginning.
As for wind power and wave power, they may well make a contribution (albeit a rather expensive one), but their limitations will mean that they cannot be the whole answer.
Mr MacGowan rightly admits the need for technologies to store the electricity output from wind and wave, in order to enhance their viability. In fact, all of these possibilities have been studied by professionals, and they are not cost-effective (otherwise they would be in widespread use, obviously), and it is easily demonstrated that none of them will ever be as cost-effective as nuclear energy.
There is little doubt that nuclear power is coming to Ireland - for the simple reason that it must, because there is nothing else to fill the gap. The only question is how many years we will have to endure some of the highest electricity prices in Europe before attitudes change. - Yours, etc.,
JOHN STAFFORD, Knocklyon, Dublin 16.