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Another Perspective

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The ridiculous counterpart to all this is that Al Gore and liberals are themselves stonewalling on the only technology that's ever going to get us out of this mess -- nuclear power.

When you look at the science of nuclear power, you realize nothing will ever match it for minimizing the impact of human civilization on the environment. Nuclear is the perfect solution to global warming. The energy transformations that take place in the nucleus of the atom are a million times greater than transformations that occur in the electron orbits, which is where coal, oil, and gas derive their energy. That means the "environmental footprint" of nuclear is a million times smaller than fossil fuels.

The average 1,000-megawatt coal plant puts out 3,000 tons of carbon dioxide per hour. We now burn a billion tons of coal a year. This produces three billion tons of carbon dioxide -- 20 percent of the world's total. China will surpass us in coal burning by 2015. There's no way the world is ever to reduce carbon emissions unless these countries turn to nuclear power.

Yet what does Al Gore propose? In An Inconvenient Truth he uses the "seven-wedge" approach introduced by Robert Socolow of Princeton's Carbon Mitigation Initiative. Socolow and his group posit that to solve the problem we need seven different wedges -- improved energy efficiency, fuel substitution, renewable energies, carbon sequestration, reforestation, improved agriculture, and nuclear power. That will stabilize the atmosphere by 2050, giving us a much warmer world but not a global steam bath. When Gore presents this approach in the movie, however, he conveniently drops nuclear power. There is no explanation for the missing wedge.

The answer is simple. Gore and all the other progressive environmentalists are enthralled with the myth of solar energy. Wind is the latest solution to the problem. Both European and American governments, confident that wind is the future, are eagerly granting tax incentives and mandating that utilities buy wind energy wherever possible. Spurred by these incentives, windmills are being constructed everywhere. Denmark now claims 25 percent of its electricity comes from wind.

Yet wind energy is hopelessly flawed in a way that will probably never be overcome. It is completely fickle, rising and falling in cycles that have nothing to do with demand. Balancing supply and demand on an electric grid is an extremely delicate task. Unexpected power drops can cause brownouts while unexpected power surges can wipe out data and ruin equipment. Under these constraints, utilities view wind as more a liability than an asset. Ireland recently refused to take any more wind energy on its grid. In August Japanese utilities announced they too had had enough. Electrical engineers everywhere generally regard wind as little more than an expensive nuisance.

Most important, wind is doing nothing to reduce carbon emissions. Even when the wind is blowing full blast, utility companies must keep their coal and gas plants running in case it suddenly dies down. At best, windmills only produce one-third their rated capacity of electricity. In a recent study, Denmark found that only 9 percent of its 3,000 MW in wind energy was available when most needed on hot summer afternoons. Despite the claim of generating 25 percent of its electricity from wind energy, Denmark's carbon emissions continue to rise and not a single fossil fuel plant has been shut down.

There's lots of hard-headed thinking needed to deal with these problems. But conservatives are never going to contribute unless they join the debate. The Kyoto Protocol is not perfect, but it's the only thing going right now. Endorsing it and entering the global discussion is the only way the Bush Administration is ever going to make a contribution.

topics:
Environment, Global Warming, Law, Energy, Alaska, Oil