Stanford University Professor Mark Z. Jacobson Sues Prestigious Team of Scientists for Debunking 100% Renewables
Stanford University Professor Mark Z. Jacobson Sues Prestigious Team of Scientists for Debunking 100% Renewables

Stanford University professor Mark Z. Jacobson has filed a lawsuit, demanding $10 million in damages, against the peer-reviewed scientific journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) and a group of eminent scientists (Clack et al.) for their study showing that Jacobson made improper assumptions in order to claim that he had demonstrated U.S. energy could be provided exclusively by renewable energy, primarily wind, water, and solar.

Jacobson’s lawsuit is an appalling attack on free speech and scientific inquiry and we urge the courts to reject it as grossly unethical and without legal merit.

Further, we urge all environmentalists — including those that support the 100 percent renewables framework, such as Environmental Defense Fund, Sierra Club, and Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) — to join us in denouncing Jaconbson’s legal action.

What Jacobson has done is unprecedented. Scientific disagreements must be decided not in court but rather through the scientific process. We urge Stanford University, Stanford Alumni, and everyone who loves science and free speech to denounce this lawsuit.

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Energy and Environment, EssayMichael LightSierra Club, NRDC, EDF, United States, Energy Sources, UCLAComment
Another Pro-Nuclear Victory!! This time in Connecticut, USA! Here's what it means
Another Pro-Nuclear Victory!! This time in Connecticut, USA! Here's what it means

In another big victory for pro-nuclear forces, Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy has just signed legislation to prevent that state's sole nuclear plant from closing.

The victory comes just a week and a half after the upset pro-nuclear victory over anti-nuclear forces in South Korea, whose citizen jury voted 60 percent to 40 percent to continue that nation's nuclear build-out.

Environmental Progress was intensively involved in advocating to save the plant, publishing an open letter signed by the world's leading climate scientists and environmentalists — as well as Pulitzer Prize-winner Richard Rhodes and Harvard's Stephen Pinker — and publishing an in-depth analysis of the environmental consequences that would result from its closure.

This is the fourth big victory for Environmental Progress and our pro-nuclear allies saving nuclear plants. Last year we won in New York and Illinois. This year we've won in South Korea and Connecticut.

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Charts, EssayMichael ShellenbergerConnecticut, United States, Illinois, James Hansen, Sierra ClubComment
Saving Power in Danger: Michael Shellenberger Keynote Address to IAEA
Saving Power in Danger: Michael Shellenberger Keynote Address to IAEA

Nuclear power is the only energy source that can lift all humans out of poverty while protecting the natural environment. Why, then, is it in danger of going away? 

In my keynote address yesterday to the IAEA’s quadrennial ministerial meeting in the United Arab Emirates, I trace the anti-nuclear movement’s roots to a famous essay by the German philosopher (and, yes, Nazi) Martin Heidegger.

Intermittent renewable energies like wind, Heidegger and his anti-humanist, anti-nuclear followers argued, were the key to restraining human ambition.

Should we thus be surprised that the big increases in solar and wind over the last decade still weren’t enough to make up for even the decline of nuclear over the last decade?

Sting said it best last year: “If we’re going to tackle global warming, nuclear is the only way you can create massive amounts of power.”

Nuclear power’s important for something else, I argue: averting thermonuclear war between the US and North Korea.  

Atomic humanists must take a page from South Korea — whose “citizen jury” decided to continue that country’s nuclear expansion — and seek our saving power precisely where the danger lies. 

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Charts, Letter, WasteMichael ShellenbergerUnited Arab Emirates, Abu Dhabi, IAEA, Eisenhower, UN, War on Nuclear, Energy Sources, Solar, South Korea, North KoreaComment
“James Hansen Courage Award” to Be Given to South Korean Labor, Student, and Academic Leaders in Recognition of Pro-nuclear “Citizens Jury” Victory
“James Hansen Courage Award” to Be Given to South Korean Labor, Student, and Academic Leaders in Recognition of Pro-nuclear “Citizens Jury” Victory

Ten South Korean labor, student, and academic leaders will receive the James Hansen Courage Award for their successful defense of nuclear power on Thursday, October 26 in two separate ceremonies in Ulsan and in Gyeongju.

The distinction will be awarded to the 10 South Korean pro-nuclear leaders by Environmental Progress (EP) President and Time Magazine “Hero of the Environment” Michael Shellenberger.

The award is “For courageous leadership in fighting climate change with  nuclear energy and preserving the Earth for future generations.”

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South Korea, Essay, Energy and EnvironmentMichael LightSouth Korea, James Hansen, War on Nuclear, ElectricityComment
Victory! Pro-Nuclear Win in South Korea Gives Momentum to Atomic Humanists Everywhere
Victory! Pro-Nuclear Win in South Korea Gives Momentum to Atomic Humanists Everywhere

In a stunning come-from-behind victory, South Korean citizens on a special jury voted 60 percent to 40 percent to re-start construction of two halted nuclear reactors.

Environmental Progress applauds the citizens jury for choosing wisdom over ideology, and praises South Korean President Moon Jae-in for honoring their decision.

EP especially applauds the university students, professors, and workers who protested and fought for a re-start to construction.

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Report, Essay, Energy and EnvironmentMichael ShellenbergerSouth Korea, Greenpeace, FOE, The High Cost of FearComment
Energy Secretary Perry’s Electric Resiliency Rule Could Be a Big Win for Nuclear and the Climate. Here’s Why
Energy Secretary Perry’s Electric Resiliency Rule Could Be a Big Win for Nuclear and the Climate. Here’s Why

This morning Energy Secretary Rick Perry proposed that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issue a rule requiring payments to nuclear and coal power plants to maintain a resilient electrical grid.

The Trump administration can’t say it, but Environmental Progress can: the rule could be a huge win for the climate.

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Energy and Environment, Conservation, Health and Safety, War on NuclearMichael ShellenbergerFERC, United StatesComment
South Korea's High Cost of Nuclear Fear
South Korea's High Cost of Nuclear Fear

“The High Cost of Fear,” a new in-depth Environmental Progress report, uses publicly available data, the best-available peer-reviewed scientific research and simple methods to calculate economic and environmental impacts of a nuclear phase-out in South Korea. 

We find a nuclear phase-out would:

  • Cost at least $10 billion per year for additional natural gas purchases alone, the equivalent of 343,000 salaries of jobs paying South Korea’s per capita annual average salary of $29,125;
  • Almost all of the cost would be in the form of payments for fuel, thereby reducing South Korea’s trade surplus;
  • Require a significant increase in fossil fuel use given South Korea’s lack of renewable energy resources;
  • Increase premature deaths from air pollution by replacing nuclear plants instead of coal plants with natural gas;
  • Damage and perhaps destroy South Korea’s lucrative nuclear export business;
  • If measured against the average U.S. car mileage, it would increase carbon emissions the equivalent of adding 15 - 27 million cars to the road, an amount that would prevent South Korea from achieving its Paris climate commitments.
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Michael LightSouth KoreaComment
Renewables Can't Save the Planet. Only Nuclear Can
Renewables Can't Save the Planet. Only Nuclear Can

The lesson Vaclav Smil's Energy and Civilization does not draw, but that flows inevitably from his work, is that for modern societies to do less environmental damage, every country must move toward more reliable and denser energy sources. In recent decades, governments have spent billions of dollars subsidizing renewables, with predictably underwhelming results. It’s high time for countries to turn to the safer, cheaper, and cleaner alternative.

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Michael LightComment
Are we really going to allow global nuclear domination by Russia?
Are we really going to allow global nuclear domination by Russia?

Sometime this fall, a U.S. federal bankruptcy judge in New York will decide the fate of Westinghouse, the venerable nuclear power company that failed financially earlier this year.

When the decision is made, it will determine something far more important: whether the West will play an active role in mitigating the twin threats of nuclear proliferation and climate change, or instead cede the global market for nuclear energy to Russia.

To succeed, a reorganized Westinghouse will need a management team capable of breaking from the past and adopting a different, well-tested nuclear plant design; as well as the long-term, low-interest financing required to compete with the Russians.

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Minshu DengComment
New South Carolina Nuclear Plant Would Cut Coal Use by 86%, New Analysis Finds
New South Carolina Nuclear Plant Would Cut Coal Use by 86%, New Analysis Finds

In 2016, the president of the Sierra Club stated publicly that he opposed replacing nuclear plants with fossil fuels generating attention that green groups had softened their strident anti-nuclear position.

But just a few weeks later, Sierra Club loudly endorsed closing Indian Point and Diablo Canyon nuclear plants in New York and California respectively.

Now, Sierra Club and Friends of the Earth (FOE) are celebrating the temporary halting of construction on a new nuclear plant in South Carolina — V.C. Summer — which they had lobbied strenuously to kill.

A new Environmental Progress analysis finds that if Summer were completed, the share of electricity South Carolina generates from coal would decline by 86 percent — the equivalent of 3.8 million cars.

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Minshu DengComment
Greenpeace’s Dirty War on Clean Energy, Part I: South Korean Version
Greenpeace’s Dirty War on Clean Energy, Part I: South Korean Version

Last fall, a South Korean filmmaker released the trailer for "Pandora," a feature-length disaster movie that opens with a nuclear power plant exploding. After it was accused of secretly financing the film, whose filmmaker claimed cost just a half-million dollars, Greenpeace insisted it had merely funded the screenings, street protests and lawsuits.

Atomic humanists will likely never have the resources of Greenpeace and other anti-humanists. But we don’t need them. We have something far more important on our side: the truth.

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Minshu DengSouth KoreaComment