Nuclear energy can be our salvation

In the current debate over the energy bill, one important factor is being all but ignored: A global renaissance in nuclear energy is gaining momentum, and it could have greater implications than any or all of the other proposed methods being discussed for dealing with our energy problems.

Today some 440 civil nuclear reactors, in 30 countries comprising two-thirds of humankind, produce 16 percent of the world's electricity. Under current plans, these nations will construct several hundred more reactors by 2030.

China and India will lead the way, but the expansion will be broad-based. Nuclear power will also extend to new countries as diverse as Poland, Turkey, Indonesia and Vietnam. Meanwhile, nuclear "phaseouts" in countries such as Italy and Germany seem sure to be reversed.

Around the world, there is a new realism about nuclear energy, a recognition of its essential virtue, which is its capacity to deliver power cleanly, safely, reliably and on a massive scale. This thinking is eclipsing old-school anti-nuclear environmentalism.

Increasingly, thoughtful environmentalists see anti-nuclearism as counterproductive. They worry not about the growth of nuclear energy but about the likelihood that it is not growing rapidly enough to produce the clean-energy revolution the world urgently needs.

Carbon fuel emissions — 900 tons each second — continue unabated, even as science warns that we are fast reaching a point of irreversible global warming with consequences for sea levels, species extinction, epidemic disease, drought and severe weather events that will disrupt all civilization.

To avert climate catastrophe, greenhouse emissions must be reduced over the next 50 years by 60 percent — even as population growth and economic development are combining to double or triple world energy consumption.

Every authoritative energy analysis points to an inescapable imperative: Humankind cannot conceivably achieve a global clean-energy revolution without a rapid expansion of nuclear power to generate electricity, produce hydrogen for tomorrow's vehicles and drive seawater-desalination plants to meet a fast-emerging world water crisis.

This reality requires a tenfold increase in nuclear energy during the 21st century. Fortunately, advances in technology and practice can facilitate this expansion by meeting legitimate public concerns: