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Could the Climate Be Changing for Britain's Nuclear Option? STORY OF THE WEEK: Atomic Energy May Be a Dirty Word to Thousands of Protesters Worldwide, but Vicky Collins Examines Whether It Could Provide a Reliable Source of Power in an Uncertain Future

Posted on: Saturday, 26 November 2005, 12:00 CST

By Vicky Collins

IT is a sunny day in May, 1978, and Britain's first major protest against nuclear power stations is taking place on the east coast of Scotland.

Nearly 4000 people are camped in a field six miles from Dunbar.

They are listening to music and learning the tricks of peaceful protest from those in the movement who are marginally more experienced in such things.

Peter Roche is there, amazed at the numbers who have turned out to try to stop Torness nuclear power station from being built.

"We felt at the time that we were creating the anti- nuclearmovement, " he remembers. "Groups like Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace were in their infancy, but we still managed to get all these people to come."

It was a different time then.

Chernobyl was still to come and the general public had not begun to worry seriously about the disposal of nuclearwaste orwhat would happen when the atomic plants reached the end of their lifespan. Theirmain motivation was what they believed was the misuse of public money.

"Everyone there just had this impression of a government way down in Westminster that was doing stupid things with taxpayers' money in Scotland, " says Roche.

That battle was lost, but the anti nuclear movement has become powerful in the years since - so much so that Roche recalls a time, not so long ago, when he was beginning to feel that he and his fellow anti-nuclear campaigners had won the war. Now, however, he is preparing to enter the fray all over again.

Next week, Tony Blair will set out the terms of a wide-ranging review into the future sources of the UK's energy. With climate change, security of supply, and the rising price of gas all putting pressure on energy policy, the review is expected to examine the possibilities of nuclear power, despite it being described as an unattractive option just two years ago in the energy white paper.

The reviewwill lead to a decision in principle by the middle of next year on whether to replace Britain's ageing nuclear plants.

Roche is preparing to fight any such proposals, which he again believes would be a waste of public money. "Nuclear plants are simply not cost-effective, " he said.

Looking at their record in Britain to date, that seems true.

When Margaret Thatcher decided to privatise the nuclear industry, what emerged was a business so inefficient that private investors baulked at the prospect of involvement.

Initial building costs of around GBP2bn, the even higher price of decommissioning (Dounreay in Caithness is expected to cost more than GBP2.7bn), and the money spent on disposing of waste made nuclear power incapable of competing with coal and gas.

The government admitted partial defeat. The 12 oldest nuclear power stations - of which half are still operating today - remain in the public sector.

Privatisation of the remaining eight nuclear power stations proved a disaster, with British Energy being forced to go cap- inhand to the government in 2002, seeking immediate and massive financial support to keep it afloat.

The government had little choice but to provide it.

So much for the claim by the proponents of nuclear power that it would produce electricity too cheap to meter.

However, the arguments over cost-effectiveness may not hold water in the future.

The technology has undoubtedly moved on and government figures show that Britain's latest nuclear reactor - the 10-year-old Sizewell B - is producing energy at a cost of 6pence/kilowatt hour (p/kWH), even when the costs of building, running, and decommissioning the station are taken into account.

New-build nuclear plants are likely to be even more efficient, with some predictions placing future prices as low as 3p/kWH by 2020. They are also claimed to be safer, with third generation reactors in the US using a much simpler and more effective cooling system - one of the most important components of a nuclear plant because it prevents the core from melting.

True, gas and coal remain cheaper at just over 2p/kWH.

However, this is where the argument becomes complicated.

Climate change and the UK's commitment to reduce polluting emissions mean coal is no longer the easy option.

European regulations have forced ScottishPower to commit to closing its plants at Cockenzie and Longannet by the end of 2015 rather than fitting pollutionreducing filters, which would cost GBP400m.

And these filters - designed to reduce the gases that cause acid rain - do nothing to tackle CO2 emissions. Technologies for cutting these would add to the costs which operators of coal-powered plants will have to meet if they wish to continue. Coal, in short, is likely to become an increasingly expensive method of energy generation.

As is gas, for completely different reasons. The fossil fuel was originally seen as the best back-up for renewable energy sources, as it is less polluting than coal and is in plentiful supply close to Britain's shores.

At least it used to be. North Sea supplies are running out and the UK has to import gas to meet demand - even though it accounts for only a third of electricity generated across the country and 6- per cent of energy consumed in Scotland. To rely even more heavily on this form of generation could necessitate good relations with places like Russia and the Middle East, possibly tying the UK government's hands in the event of political disputes.

Then, there are renewables.

These are looking promising, with a recent report for the Scottish Executive predicting that the potential for renewable energy both onshore and offshore is so great in Scotland that it could, one day, account for 75-per cent of the UK's energy capacity.

That day is a long way off, though. Onshore wind development is progressing quickly and, according to some estimates, the cost of producing energy this way has already come down to around 7p/kWH, with further reductions likely as the technology continues to improve.

There is, however, one major barrier to windfarms - public opinion.

Already, the growing number of turbines has led to the formation of community campaign groups, who are joining forces to create national organisations and attracting the support of wellknown names such as David Bellamy and Prince Charles.

It is unlikely that windfarms can proliferate indefinitely.

Other technologies are still at an early stage. Trials of wave and tidal energy generators are ongoing off the north coast of Scotland and there are plans for the creation of the country's first offshore windfarm, in the Moray Firth.

Biomass, carbon capture, and othermethods of reducing pollution are also being explored.

The time it will take these forms of energy generation to make a significant contribution means the government targets for renewables are already ambitious: the Scottish Executive wants them to produce 40-per cent of electricity by 2020.

To expect renewables to meet the gap left by coal, as well as by the closure of the nuclear power plants that will be decommissioned over the next two decades, and to have an increasingly unreliable gas supply as the only back-up, would be folly.

In light of these issues, nuclear begins to seem a reasonable option. It has the potential to be cleaner, cheaper, and more reliable than coal and gas might be in the future.

Some countries have already put their faith in it, most notably France. Bruce Cromby, founder and president of the Paris-based international campaign group Environmentalists forNuclear Energy, believes it is the only green solution available.

"The planet is facing a major crisis today. We are dependent on the huge amounts of energy we use yet the climate is warming and we have to do something now about this crisis that the world is facing.

"The French experience is that it takes a long time to build a new nuclear plant and around quarter of a century to develop an effective nuclear programme.

"I am pleased Tony Blair is now considering nuclear, but he needs to make a decision quickly because climate change is going to start affecting us in less than 25 years. Whatever can be done with renewables will be welcomed, but we should not overestimate their power. The solution is only one, and that is nuclear."

Nuclear could provide the backup so essential to renewable technologies, which will never be able to meet the country's energy needs alone because of fluctuations in the strength of wind, wave, and tide.

However, if nuclear is given the go-ahead, the government will have significant barriers to overcome in order to avoid widespread opposition.

Foremost of these are safety concerns. Even if the new generation of reactors are as reliable as is claimed, it will be difficult to convince a public who have been made sceptical by repeated safety breaches.

Three Mile Island suffered the United States'worst-ever nuclear accident in 1979. One of the two reactors on the Susquehanna Riverwas shut down permanently after it overheated. The facility lost coolant water and appeared in danger of meltdown as radioactive gases leaked into the atmosphere.

The horror caused by the disaster in Chernobyl in 1986 is also unlikely to be forgotten.

In 1999, two workers died following a breach of safety regulations at a plant in Japan and a year later the UKAtomic Energy Agency was fined more than GBP100,000 for two major safety breaches at the Dounreay plant - one of which resulted in three workers being contaminated with radiation.

A catalogue of smaller incidents in the UK, reported quarterly by the Health and Safety Executive, continue to damage public confidence in those responsible for safety at plants.

The advantages of choosing nuclear could well be many, but they have yet to be proved. The one certainty about choosing this option is also its main drawback:

public acceptance will be extremely hard to win.

"I will be back out there protesting at any attempts to build new nuclear power stations, "Mr Roche said.

"Nuclear power has had its chance and it failed. Why should we give it another go?"

THE RACE FOR RENEWABLES - Charts and graph showing sources and comsumption of electricity in Scotland and the futiure predictions

Not available on database - see hardcopy or PDF

Source: Herald, The; Glasgow (UK)

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