Brand, a member with writer Ken Kesey in the radical Merry Pranksters in San Francisco during the 1960s and later publisher of the Whole Earth Catalog, says he feels guilty that he and fellow environmentalists created so much fear of nuclear power.
In an interview with the New York Times , Brand, who now lives on a tugboat in Sausalito, said alternative energy and conservation are fine ways to reduce emissions, but nuclear power is proven and “working on a scale to make a serious difference.”
“There were legitimate reasons to worry about nuclear power, but now that we know about the threat of climate change, we have to put the risks in perspective,” Brand said. “Sure, nuclear waste is a problem, but the great thing about it is you know where it is and you can guard it. The bad thing about coal waste is that you don’t know where it is and you don’t know what it’s doing. The carbon dioxide is in everybody’s atmosphere.”
Democracy is utterly dependent upon an electorate that is accurately informed. In promoting climate change denial (and often denying their responsibility for doing so) industry has done more than endanger the environment. It has undermined democracy.
There is a vast difference between putting forth a point of view, honestly held, and intentionally sowing the seeds of confusion. Free speech does not include the right to deceive. Deception is not a point of view. And the right to disagree does not include a right to intentionally subvert the public awareness.
This is a guest post by Josephine Ferorelli, originally published at Occupy.com.
There is not enough room in the national headlines for all the battles between fossil fuel expansion projects and climate activists occurring right now. But the Keystone XL proposal’s public comment period ends on April 22nd, so we can shift our focus to coal exportation for a moment. Domestic coal use is one of the few figures that has been steadily dropping, with...
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The heresy lies with the poster of this blog
In a report issued today (Feb 27th) entitled "CONFRONTING CLIMATE CHANGE: AVOIDING THE UNMANAGEABLE AND MANAGING THE UNAVOIDABLE", the United Nations Foundation and the Sigma Xi Scientific Research Society stated on page 69:
"The key to making the needed large reductions in CO2 emissions is a multi-pronged strategy that addresses all of the major emission sources. This means pursuing in parallel:
(a) the possibilities for lowering the energy intensity of economic activity through increases in the efficiency of vehicles, buildings, appliances, and industrial processes;
(b) the possibilities for lowering the carbon-emissions intensity of energy supply through additions of renewable and nuclear energy supply and through modifications to fossil fuel technologies that enable the capture and sequestration of CO2; and
(c) the possibilities for reducing the carbon emissions from land-use change by means of reforestation, afforestation,avoided deforestation, and improved soil-management practices in agriculture."
A press story on the report can be found here: http://www.usatoday.com/weather/climate/globalwarming/2007-02-27-scientists-un_x.htm?POE=NEWISVA
The report can be downloaded here: http://www.unfoundation.org/staging/seg/ (13 megs)
...................................
UNITED NATIONS-SIGMA XI
SCIENTIFIC EXPERT GROUP ON CLIMATE CHANGE
Authors, Reviewers, and Contributors
Coordinating Lead Authors
Rosina Bierbaum, Professor and Dean, School of Natural Resources and Environment, University of Michigan,United States
John P. Holdren, Director, The Woods Hole Research Center, and Teresa and John Heinz Professor of Environmental Policy, Harvard University, United States
Michael MacCracken, Chief Scientist for Climate Change Programs, Climate Institute, United States
Richard H. Moss, Senior Director, Climate and Energy,United Nations Foundation and University of Maryland,United States
Peter H. Raven, President, Missouri Botanical Garden,United States
Lead Authors
Ulisses Confalonieri, Professor, National School of Public Health and Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Jacques "Jack" Dubois, Member of the Executive Board,Swiss Re, United States
Alexander Ginzburg, Deputy Director, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Russian Academy of Sciences, Russian Federation
Peter H. Gleick, President, Pacific Institute for Studies in Development, Environment, and Security, United States
Zara Khatib, Technology Marketing Manager, Shell International, United Arab Emirates
Janice Lough, Principal Research Scientist, Australian Institute of Marine Science, Australia
Ajay Mathur, President, Senergy Global Private Limited, India
Mario Molina, Professor, University of California, San Diego, United States, and President, Mario Molina Center,Mexico
Keto Mshigeni, Vice Chancellor, The Hubert Kairuki Memorial University, Tanzania
Nebojsa "Naki" Nakicenovic, Professor, Vienna University of Technology, and Program Leader, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Austria
Taikan Oki, Professor, Institute of Industrial Science, The University of Tokyo, Japan
Hans Joachim "John" Schellnhuber, Professor and Director, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research,Germany
Diana Ürge-Vorsatz, Professor, Central European University, Hungary
Special Technical Advisor
James Edmonds, Senior Staff Scientist, Joint Global Change Research Institute at University of Maryland College Park, United States
Research Assistant
Nathan L. Engle, School of Natural Resources and Environment, University of Michigan, United States
Reviewers at the AAAS Annual Meeting, 2006
Anthony Arguez, NOAA National Climatic Data Center,United States
Ann Bartuska, USDA Forest Service, United States
Sally Benson, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, United States
Norm Christensen, Duke University, United States
William Clark, Harvard University, United States
Robert Corell, The Heinz Center, United States
Gladys Cotter, US Geological Survey, United States
Partha Dasgupta, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom
Geoff Hawtin, Global Crop Diversity Trust, United Kingdom
Daniel Kammen, University of California, Berkeley, United States
Edward Miles, University of Washington, United States
Per Pinstrup-Andersen, Cornell University, United States
Richard Thomas, International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas, Syrian Arab Republic
Thomas Wilbanks, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, United States
Sorry Ben
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Brand and nuclear