malaysiakini: Nuclear lessons for Malaysia (Part 2)... by Dr Ronald S McCoy

Nuclear lessons for Malaysia (Part 2)

Ronald S McCoy
Apr 20, 2011, 11:22am

Vexing questions

Radiation is invisible and cannot be recalled. In a nuclear crisis, there will be many questions about radiation. As the Japanese people are now discovering, it is a nightmare trying to make sense of the uncertainties.

1. How do you know when you are in danger?
2. How long will this danger persist?
3. How can you reduce the danger to yourself and your family?
4. What level of exposure is safe?
5. How do you get access to vital information in time to prevent or minimise exposure?
6. What are the potential health risks and consequences of exposure?
7. Whose information can you rely on or trust?
8. How do you rebuild a healthy way of life in the aftermath of a nuclear disaster?

These questions are difficult to answer, and they become even more complicated when governments and the nuclear industry maintain tight control of information, technological operations, scientific research, and the bio-medical lessons that shape public health response.

Transparency and accountability

Transparency and accountability do not sit well with an industry addicted to filtering and censoring information. It explains why there is no clear consensus on the local and global health consequences of Fukushima.

There is no safe threshold for radiation. The claim that exposure to low-level radiation does not pose a risk to health is a myth, generated by governments and the nuclear industry. During the nuclear arms race of the Cold War, scientific findings on health risks from nuclear fallout that contradicted the official narrative were censored. Scientists with integrity were discredited, punished or blacklisted.

In 1994, the US Advisory Commission on Human Radiation Experimentation concluded that the literature on radiation and health during the Cold War was heavily sanitised and scripted to reassure and pacify public protests.

Decades of official censorship have reinforced the false core message: Human beings have evolved in a world where background radiation is present and is natural, and that any adverse health effect of radiation exposure is the occasional and accidental result of high levels of exposure.

There are other sources of conclusive data that allow a very different interpretation of the health hazards posed by a nuclear disaster. These include several declassified records of US and Soviet human radiation experiments, Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission records, long-term research on Chernobyl survivors, and proceedings of the Marshall Islands Nuclear Claims Tribunal.

From these records, some important facts have emerged. For example, nuclear fallout and radioactive contamination of ocean and land ultimately enter the food chain and the human body, and therefore represent significant health risks.

Chronic exposure to radiation does more than increase the risk of cancers. It threatens the immune system, exacerbates pre-existing conditions, affects fertility, increases the rate of birth defects, and can retard physical and mental development.

Japan's ongoing nuclear crisis demonstrates the degree to which the state prioritises security interests over the fundamental rights of people and their environment.

Japan's response to Fukushima mimics the responses of other governments to catastrophic events, such as Chernobyl and Katrina. It has been to control the content and flow of information to prevent panic and mitigate the inevitable loss of trust in the government, reduce legal liability, and protect nuclear and other industry agendas.

It is more than likely that the Malaysian government will behave in the same manner in a similar crisis. We still remember its disgraceful attempt to cover up the 1992 illegal and reprehensible dumping of radioactive thorium near Bukit Merah New Village by Mitsubishi's Asian Rare Earth company.

There are many lessons to be learnt from Fukushima, not least of which is to recognise that nuclear energy is exceedingly dangerous and carries unacceptable, unnecessary risks to human health and the environment. In Malaysia, there must be strong public demand for transparency and accountability and an end to all plans to opt for nuclear energy.

Misleading information

Nuclear energy is not cheap, clean or safe. And yet, vested interests in the government and the nuclear industry are attempting to override common sense and reason. They continue to trumpet the imaginary virtues of nuclear power and play down the enormous cost of nuclear power, the problem of nuclear waste, and the risks of an accident.

Nuclear reactors, like nuclear weapons, do not forgive mistakes of judgment, simple negligence, human error or mechanical failure. Malaysia's poor record of industrial safety and its bad maintenance culture underlie concerns about public safety in the event of a nuclear accident.

The nuclear industry has a history of making misleading claims about nuclear safety that have often confused and misled the uninformed. Genuine debate and critical examination have been avoided, evidence ignored, opponents silenced or marginalised, and critical issues of public health and welfare have been answered with standard bland platitudes.

Nuclear regulatory bodies have too often acted out of expediency and ignored the health and protection of the public.

Proliferation of nuclear weapons

Nuclear power is directly linked to the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Member states of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty have the “inalienable right” to peaceful uses of nuclear energy. All civilian nuclear energy programmes provide a convenient cover, as well as the training, technology and plutonium necessary for the proliferation of nuclear weapons.

That was the route taken by India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea to become nuclear weapon states. A typical 1,000 megawatt reactor produces enough plutonium each year for 40 nuclear weapons.

The government of Malaysia has consistently opposed nuclear weaponry and supports the abolition of nuclear weapons. Unless circumstances change dramatically, I feel confident that policy will not change.

Radioactive nuclear waste

Nuclear power plants produce lethal radioactive waste that will remain radioactive for thousands of years. The half-life of plutonium-239 is 24,000 years and that of uranium-235 is 731 million years. We are talking about radiation forever.

No country in the world has been able to safely dispose of its nuclear waste, which is accumulating in pools or casks alongside nuclear reactors in forty-four countries, waiting for a solution. Finding satisfactory underground geologic repositories has proved to be an intractable problem.

After 20 years and US$9 billion of investment, the Obama administration has declared that the proposed repository site in Yucca Mountain is “not an option.”

When questioned about nuclear waste, the nuclear industry argues that spent nuclear fuel should be reprocessed or 'recycled' into fresh fuel. Only the French experience with reprocessing has been technically successful, but economically it has been a failure.

If medieval man had ventured into nuclear energy, we today would still be managing his waste, assuming we had survived. Nuclear waste is not a legacy we should bequeath future generations.

Cost of nuclear energy

Cheap nuclear power is a myth. “Too cheap to meter” was the false slogan in 1954. Forbes business magazine has described the failure of the US nuclear industry as “the largest managerial disaster in business history.”

After 50 years of substantial government subsidies, nuclear power remains prohibitively expensive. Even among business and financial communities, it is widely acknowledged that nuclear power would not be economically viable without government subsidies.

In the United States, the most important subsidy comes in the form of loan guarantees, which promise that taxpayers will bail out nuclear utility companies by paying back their loans if and when their projects fail.

The nuclear industry's opaque methods of accounting make it difficult to determine the full economic costs of nuclear energy. Costs are often buried in generous government subsidies or conjured into debt legacies for future generations.

Tenaga Nasional Berhad claims that it could build a 1,000 megawatt nuclear reactor for RM1 billion, but there is no mention of other costs. Real costs, such as operating costs, accident insurance, maintenance of reactor security, nuclear waste management and decommissioning costs, are buried in the nuclear industry's creative, opaque methods of accounting

Capital costs remain a critical problem. Objective data on nuclear economics do not exist. Examination of the limited number of published capital cost estimates shows that the estimated capital cost of a new nuclear power plant has escalated rapidly since 2005 and that estimates are largely derived from manufacturers of reactor systems.

It follows that it is extremely risky to accept a manufacturer's estimates and to sign a contract that does not specify a fixed cost, and yet some purchasers do exactly that.

The only relatively reliable data on the costs of nuclear power come from the United States, the United Kingdom, France and Finland. Within this limited data base, we know that cost overruns and construction delays are customary and that no nuclear power plant has been built within budget or a contractual time-frame.

As recent as May 29, 2009, two financial reports in the business section of the New York Times exposed the risky economics of nuclear power by highlighting two fiascos: the virtual collapse of Canada's global flagship, Atomic Energy of Canada Limited and the problems facing the French company, Areva, over the construction of a new third generation pressurised water reactor in Olkiluoto, which is four years behind schedule and more than US$2 billion over budget.

Both companies were overtaken by cost overruns, amounting to billions of dollars, and long delays in completion schedules extending into decades.

A recent study in the United States, which focussed on business risks and the cost of building new nuclear power plants, identified several significant risks. The cost of capital for building new nuclear power plants has been rising much faster than inflation.

Major construction delays result in cost overruns of billions of dollars. Long lead times for construction also result in a “premium risk” which increases the cost of capital. In the end, to keep afloat, new nuclear plants will have to impose high electricity rates which will make consumers very unhappy and the economy less competitive.

After more than 50 years in the business, the nuclear industry cannot attract private funding or liability insurance, cannot demonstrate an ability to build new reactors within a contractual time-frame and budget, and cannot deal with its radioactive waste.

Instead of investing billions in nuclear power, it would be far wiser and more justifiable to commit Malaysia's limited resources to research and development of renewable sources of energy, energy conservation and energy efficiency.

Conclusion

The Malaysian government has approached the crucially important issue of nuclear energy in its customary authoritarian manner and its embrace of the private business sector. It smacks of a domineering, arrogant, undemocratic, corrupt government that has been in power for too long.

There has been no attempt to engage the people of this country in a balanced, rational, informed dialogue on a form of energy that is dirty, dangerous and expensive.

Contrary to what the government may believe, going to the polls periodically is not democracy, when freedom of speech and freedom of the press are constrained and people are intimidated by arbitrary laws, such as the Printing Presses and Publications Act and the Internal Security Act, and by the large number of custodial deaths.

In the same way, funding of vested commercial and political interests in the local nuclear industry to disseminate misinformation about nuclear energy to captive audiences cannot be equated with public education about one of the most dangerous forms of energy. Everything is being done to persuade the public that nuclear energy is good for the economy, the climate and the country.

Malaysians must wake up, cast aside apathy, stand up and insist on their democratic right to have an honest, comprehensive national debate and a national referendum on nuclear energy, with independent oversight.

I call on the people of Malaysia to form a people's coalition to mount a national campaign against the introduction of nuclear energy.

Yesterday: Nuclear lessons for Malaysia (Part 1)

DR RONALD S McCOY is the founding president of Physicians for Peace and Social Responsibility and the co-president of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW).

Malaysiakini: Nuclear lessons for Malaysia - Part 1.... by Dr Ronald S McCoy

Nuclear lessons for Malaysia - Part 1

Dr Ronald S McCoy
Apr 19, 2011, 11:37am

 

 

Introduction

Since March 11, Japan has been reeling from an unprecedented natural disaster of awesome proportions, followed by a man-made nuclear crisis. First, a record-breaking earthquake, 8.9 on the Richter scale, off the north-eastern coast of the Japanese island of Honshu. Then, a towering 10-metre tsunami which killed tens of thousands of people and destroyed almost everything in its path.

Finally, the release of radioactivity into the environment from a nuclear power plant, damaged by overheating and explosions.

The earthquake had automatically shut down the six nuclear reactors of the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant, owned by the Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco). But it also knocked out the power grid, forcing operators to fall back on diesel generators to keep coolant flowing into hot reactor cores of radioactive uranium and plutonium fuel rods.

Then the tsunami swept in, knocked out the generators and cut off power to the plant's cooling systems. All at once, four out of its six nuclear reactors were in dire trouble from overheating. Explosions then damaged fuel rods and the integrity of the primary containment structure, and radioactivity was released into the environment.

There are few environmental dangers more lasting or more fearsome than radiation from a nuclear accident. We saw this in the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl disasters, and now in Fukushima. The truth of Murphy's Law is inescapable: “If something can go wrong, sooner or later it will go wrong.”

Public health

The public health implications of nuclear power should not be subordinate to the economic considerations of the nuclear industry and government energy policies. There is a need to review the scientific evidence for public health impacts of nuclear power, to assess occupational hazards faced by nuclear industry workers, and to assess evidence that challenges the legitimacy of the underlying assumptions of nuclear safety.

A common thread running through these health concerns is the risk posed by ionising radiation. There is no safe threshold. Over the past 50 years, the claims of the nuclear industry, that nuclear power is both safe and vital for our future, have proven false and contentious.

Ionising radiation can damage DNA, causing cancer and inherited mutations. However, whether an individual develops cancer following exposure to ionising radiation depends on whether the DNA is damaged, what part of the DNA is damaged, whether the cell line can reproduce, whether the damage is completely repaired, and whether the cell completes transformations that lead to malignancy.

The most important evidence regarding risks from exposure to radiation comes from epidemiologic studies that examine incidence of cancer in exposed populations, such as children exposed to radiation in utero, people exposed to background radiation, nuclear plant workers, patients exposed to diagnostic or therapeutic radiation, and people exposed to radiation from nuclear explosions.

The risk of mutation-related damage, including cancer, is proportional to the radiation dose. There is no threshold below which ionising radiation produces no damage. This means that background radiation from any source causes cancer and genetic mutations among exposed populations.

What happens in a nuclear accident

When a reactor is operating, fuel rods containing uranium and plutonium pellets produce heat through nuclear fission and get very hot. The fuel is immersed in water and the heat produces steam, which is used to drive a turbine to produce electricity.

The water also serves to keep the fuel from overheating and is continuously circulated to carry away excess heat. Even if the reactor shuts down, the fuel will remain hot for a long time and so must still be cooled.

If the pumps that circulate the cooling water are not operating, the water will heat up and evaporate, and the fuel can be exposed to the environment. At this point, the zirconium cladding on the fuel rods will start to heat up, blister, and then rupture.

If the fuel is not covered by water and is exposed for a few hours, it will start to melt. The molten fuel will collect at the bottom of the steel reactor vessel, and it will be a matter of hours before the fuel melts through the steel and settles on the concrete floor of the primary containment vessel.

In an accident, the amount of radioactivity released into the environment will depend on the integrity of the primary and secondary containments. The radioactive isotopes of greatest concern in a nuclear accident are iodine-131 and caesium-137.

Uncertain geological knowledge

Nuclear power requires stability - political stability and geological stability. Countries considering the option of nuclear power need to soberly assess their plans, particularly if they are located in active volcanic regions.

But geological knowledge is incomplete and imperfect. And we rely on such knowledge too heavily when making policy decisions about locating hazardous technologies.

Designed and built to withstand what is termed “design basis accidents,” nuclear power plants are usually sited in geologically stable and physically secure environments, determined by geologists. The possibility of a “design basis accident” is based on “credible events,” which are determined by an analysis of probabilities.

The Fukushima disaster was a “beyond design basis accident” because the analysis was wrong. It was calculated that the probable “credible event” expected to occur in Fukushima would be an earthquake no greater than a magnitude of 7.9 and a tsunami no higher than 6.7 metres.

It was not in the analysis of probabilities that Fukushima would be struck by an 8.9 magnitude earthquake or a 10-metre high tsunami. But geologists and the nuclear industry, like all human beings, sometimes get it wrong.

It is noteworthy that there are a number of unknown geological faults and processes which make it more difficult to accurately predict a “credible event.” In other words, it is very much an intelligent guessing game, but guessing it is nevertheless.

Incidentally, the recent earthquake in Christchurch occurred on an unknown and unexposed geological fault, and was therefore unpredictable. In fact, damaging earthquakes have been known to originate from unknown faults.

Malaysia has so far not been traumatised by a severe earthquake or tsunami, although located on the western margins of the Pacific Rim of Fire and close to earthquake-prone Indonesia and the Philippines. But with such incomplete and imperfect geological knowledge, we cannot rule out the possibility of a damaging earthquake in the future.

Human error

But earthquakes and tsunamis are not the only causes of a nuclear accident. Human error alone can lead to a nuclear accident. It happened in Windscale (later renamed Sellafield), Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. So, it could happen in Malaysia. Building two nuclear reactors in error-inclined Malaysia would carry the potential for an incalculable catastrophe. The chances of a nuclear accident in Malaysia are not negligible.

I have heard the facetious argument that plane crashes are not sufficient reason to abandon air travel. But the scale of a nuclear accident is incomparable. Radiation could kill and injure thousands, cause cancers, and contaminate and render uninhabitable a large part of Malaysia.

Nightmare at Fukushima

Japan, the only country to have experienced nuclear warfare, now faces another nuclear nightmare. Months may pass before we can fully understand what went wrong and learn from Fukushima. It is a high price to pay for using potentially dangerous and replaceable technology. It has rekindled fading memories of Chernobyl and shifted the balance in the debate on climate change and the risks and benefits of nuclear energy.

It is forcing many countries to review the safety of their nuclear facilities and their energy policies. Germany has responded to strong public anti-nuclear sentiment by reinstating and accelerating its nuclear phase-out policy, and temporarily shutting down the oldest seven of its 17 reactors.

Both India and China, with their expanding economies and energy needs, are reviewing nuclear safety measures, but have not shelved plans to build more reactors in the next ten years.

A number of studies conclude that nuclear power cannot meet energy needs; that it is excessively expensive; that it is not carbon neutral; that it creates additional environmental and security risks. Most importantly, new evidence indicates that environmentally safe and sustainable energy technologies can be developed to meet growing energy needs.

There is a growing conviction worldwide that nuclear power should be phased out and a serious commitment made to invest in renewable energy, energy efficiency and energy conservation.

Malaysia's nuclear energy plans

Apparently, the Malaysian government is continuing its plans to build two 1,000 megawatt nuclear reactors, in spite of a 40 percent energy reserve.

In responding to the Fukushima nuclear crisis, the Energy, Green Technology and Water Minister covered his back politically when he said that the decision to build the reactors will only be made after his colleagues in cabinet have evaluated a paper to be submitted by the new Malaysian Nuclear Power Corporation, a creature of the Economic Transformation Programme.

Serious questions are in order:

• Does the green minister believe that nuclear energy is green
• Does the government realise that nuclear energy is dirty, dangerous and expensive?
• What is the urgency in embarking on a nuclear energy project when Malaysia enjoys a 40 percent energy reserve and does not need to rush into nuclear power?
• Has the government really considered the realities of nuclear power economics?
• How much of taxpayers' money will be required as subsidies to make nuclear power economically feasible?
• Is it wise to invest billions in expensive nuclear energy when investments should be made in alternative renewable energy and energy efficient technologies?
• Is it not time for the government to join with other governments in a holistic approach to climate change by implementing ecologically sustainable economic development?
• Has the government considered the health, environmental and human security dangers of a reactor meltdown or a terrorist attack on nuclear facilities?
• Will it be possible in the long term to prevent diversion of nuclear materials to nuclear weapons proliferation or to a terrorist group?
• Where and how does the government plan to dispose of nuclear waste, that will remain radioactive for thousands of years, when the nuclear industry and advanced countries have not found a solution?
• Does the government not think that such a crucial issue as nuclear energy deserves a national debate and a referendum?
• Does the government really think that it can make a unilateral decision and then justify it by claiming that it has studied and accepted a report from the very company that will benefit from it?
• Does the government realise that the billions of ringgit invested in nuclear energy will divert scarce resources away from the imperative of renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies?
• Is the government beginning to believe its own propaganda and misinformation about nuclear energy?

Public distrust

The nuclear industry has carried the stamp of secrecy like a birthmark. From its very beginning, the nuclear industry has had a long history of cover-ups and downright deception, with the occasional lapse into silence - the silence of guilt. Public trust in the promoters of nuclear power is almost non-existent.

In Britain, America, Germany, Russia, Japan and other countries, people have not been told the truth about the real economic cost of nuclear energy and the health and environmental consequences of nuclear mishaps and near-misses.

The stricken Japanese population is well aware of the culture of nuclear cover-ups. The Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) owns and operates the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant.

In 2002, Tepco's chairman and senior executives had to resign when the Japanese government discovered that they had covered up the existence of structural damage to reactors. In 2006, Tepco admitted that it had been falsifying data about reactor coolant materials.

Tomorrow: Nuclear lessons for Malaysia - Part 2

DR RONALD S McCOY is the founding president of Physicians for Peace and Social Responsibility and the co-president of International Physicians for the Preventive of Nuclear War (IPPNW).

Alternate Viewpoint: We should stop running away from radiation... By Wade Allison,

Alternate Viewpoint: We should stop running away from radiation  

By Wade Allison, University of Oxford, 

BBC, 26 March 2011 Last updated at 12:50 GMT 

More than 10,000 people have died in the Japanese tsunami and the survivors are cold and hungry. But the media concentrate on nuclear radiation from which no-one has died - and is unlikely to.

 

Modern reactors are better designed than those at Fukushima - tomorrow's may be better still

Nuclear radiation at very high levels is dangerous, but the scale of concern that it evokes is misplaced. Nuclear technology cures countless cancer patients every day - and a radiation dose given for radiotherapy in hospital is no different in principle to a similar dose received in the environment.

What of Three Mile Island? There were no known deaths there.

And Chernobyl? The latest UN report published on 28 February confirms the known death toll - 28 fatalities among emergency workers, plus 15 fatal cases of child thyroid cancer - which would have been avoided if iodine tablets had been taken (as they have now in Japan). And in each case the numbers are minute compared with the 3,800 at Bhopal in 1984, who died as a result of a leak of chemicals from the Union Carbide pesticide plant.

Becquerels and Sieverts

• A becquerel (Bq), named after French physicist Henri Becquerel, is a measure of radioactivity
• A quantity of radioactive material has an activity of 1Bq if one nucleus decays per second - and 1kBq if 1,000 nuclei decay per second
• A sievert (Sv) is a measure of radiation absorbed by a person, named after Swedish medical physicist Rolf Sievert
• A milli-sievert (mSv) is a 1,000th of a Sievert

 

So what of the radioactivity released at Fukushima? How does it compare with that at Chernobyl? Let's look at the measured count rates. The highest rate reported, at 1900 on 22 March, for any Japanese prefecture was 12 kBq per sq m (for the radioactive isotope of caesium, caesium-137).

A map of Chernobyl in the UN report shows regions shaded according to rate, up to 3,700 kBq per sq m - areas with less than 37 kBq per sq m are not shaded at all. In round terms, this suggests that the radioactive fallout at Fukushima is less than 1% of that at Chernobyl.

The other important radioisotope in fallout is iodine, which can cause child thyroid cancer.

This is only produced when the reactor is on and quickly decays once the reactor shuts down (it has a half life of eight days). The old fuel rods in storage at Fukushima, though radioactive, contain no iodine.

But at Chernobyl the full inventory of iodine and caesium was released in the initial explosion, so that at Fukushima any release of iodine should be much less than 1% of that at Chernobyl - with an effect reduced still further by iodine tablets.

Unfortunately, public authorities react by providing over-cautious guidance - and this simply escalates public concern.
 

Over-reaction On the 16th anniversary of Chernobyl, the Swedish radiation authorities, writing in the Stockholm daily Dagens Nyheter, admitted over-reacting by setting the safety level too low and condemning 78% of all reindeer meat unnecessarily, and at great cost.

 

Bottled water was handed out in Tokyo this week to mothers of young babies

Unfortunately, the Japanese seem to be repeating the mistake. On 23 March they advised that children should not drink tap water in Tokyo, where an activity of 200 Bq per litre had been measured the day before. Let's put this in perspective. The natural radioactivity in every human body is 50 Bq per litre - 200 Bq per litre is really not going to do much harm.

In the Cold War era most people were led to believe that nuclear radiation presents a quite exceptional danger understood only by "eggheads" working in secret military establishments.

To cope with the friendly fire of such nuclear propaganda on the home front, ever tighter radiation regulations were enacted in order to keep all contact with radiation As Low As Reasonably Achievable (ALARA), as the principle became known.

This attempt at reassurance is the basis of international radiation safety regulations today, which suggest an upper limit for the general public of 1 mSv per year above natural levels.

This very low figure is not a danger level, rather it's a small addition to the levels found in nature - a British person is exposed to 2.7 mSv per year, on average. My book Radiation and Reason argues that a responsible danger level based on current science would be 100 mSv per month, with a lifelong limit of 5,000 mSv, not 1 mSv per year.
 

New attitude People worry about radiation because they cannot feel it. However, nature has a solution - in recent years it has been found that living cells replace and mend themselves in various ways to recover from a dose of radiation.

These clever mechanisms kick in within hours and rarely fail, except when they are overloaded - as at Chernobyl, where most of the emergency workers who received a dose greater than 4,000 mSv over a few hours died within weeks.

"Some might ask whether I would accept radioactive waste buried 100 metres under my own house?”

  

However, patients receiving a course of radiotherapy usually get a dose of more than 20,000 mSv to vital healthy tissue close to the treated tumour. This tissue survives only because the treatment is spread over many days giving healthy cells time for repair or replacement.

In this way, many patients get to enjoy further rewarding years of life, even after many vital organs have received the equivalent of more than 20,000 years' dose at the above internationally recommended annual limit - which makes this limit unreasonable.

A sea-change is needed in our attitude to radiation, starting with education and public information.

Then fresh safety standards should be drawn up, based not on how radiation can be excluded from our lives, but on how much we can receive without harm - mindful of the other dangers that beset us, such as climate change and loss of electric power. Perhaps a new acronym is needed to guide radiation safety - how about As High As Relatively Safe (AHARS)?

Modern reactors are better designed than those at Fukushima - tomorrow's may be better still, but we should not wait. Radioactive waste is nasty but the quantity is small, especially if re-processed. Anyway, it is not the intractable problem that many suppose.

Some might ask whether I would accept it if it were buried 100 metres under my own house? My answer would be: "Yes, why not?" More generally, we should stop running away from radiation.

Wade Allison is a nuclear and medical physicist at the University of Oxford, the author of Radiation and Reason (2009) and Fundamental Physics for Probing and Imaging (2006).

malaysiakini: Japan's nuclear morality tale... by Brahma Chellaney

Japan's nuclear morality tale

Brahma Chellaney
Mar 15, 2011, 11:33am

COMMENT The troubles at the Fukushima nuclear power plant and other reactors in northeast Japan have dealt a severe blow to the global nuclear industry, a powerful cartel of less than a dozen major state-owned or state-guided firms that have been trumpeting a nuclear power renaissance.

But the risks that seaside reactors like Fukushima face from natural disasters are well known.

Indeed, they became evident six years ago, when the Indian Ocean tsunami in December 2004 inundated India's second-largest nuclear complex, shutting down the Madras power station.

Many nuclear power plants are located along coastlines because they are highly water-intensive. Yet natural disasters like storms, hurricanes and tsunamis are becoming more common, owing to climate change, which will also cause a rise in ocean levels, making seaside reactors even more vulnerable.

For example, many nuclear power plants located along the British coast are just a few metres above sea level. In 1992, Hurricane Andrew caused significant damage at the Turkey Point nuclear-power plant on Biscayne Bay, Florida, but, fortunately, not to any critical systems.

All energy generators, including coal- and gas-fired plants, make major demands on water resources.

But nuclear power requires even more. Light-water reactors (LWRs) like those at Fukushima, which use water as a primary coolant, produce most of the world's nuclear power.

The huge quantities of local water that LWRs consume for their operations become hot water outflows, which are pumped back into rivers, lakes and oceans.

Because reactors located inland put serious strain on local freshwater resources, including greater damage to plant life and fish, water-stressed countries that are not landlocked try to find suitable seashore sites.

But, whether located inland or on a coast, nuclear power is vulnerable to the likely effects of climate change.

As global warming brings about a rise in average temperatures and ocean levels, inland reactors will increasingly contribute to, and be affected by, water shortages.

During the record-breaking 2003 heat wave in France, operations at 17 commercial nuclear reactors had to be scaled back or stopped because of rapidly rising temperatures in rivers and lake. Spain's reactor at Santa Mara de Garoa was shut for a week in July 2006 after high temperatures were recorded in the Ebro River.

Paradoxically, then, the very conditions that made it impossible for the nuclear industry to deliver full power in Europe in 2003 and 2006 created peak demand for electricity, owing to the increased use of air-conditioning.

Indeed, during the 2003 heat wave, Electricite de France (EDF), which operates 58 reactors - the majority on ecologically sensitive rivers like the Loire - was compelled to buy power from neighbouring countries on the European spot market. The state-owned EDF, which normally exports power, ended up paying 10 times the price of domestic power.

Similarly, although the 2006 European heat wave was less intense, water and heat problems forced Germany, Spain and France to take some nuclear power plants offline and reduce operations at others.

Central dilemma

Highlighting the vulnerability of nuclear power to environmental change or extreme weather patterns, in 2006 plant operators in western Europe also secured exemptions from regulations that would have prevented them from discharging overheated water into natural ecosystems, affecting fisheries.

France likes to showcase its nuclear power industry, which supplies 78 percent of the country's electricity. But such is the nuclear industry's water intensity that EDF withdraws up to 19 billion cubic metres of water per year from rivers and lakes, or roughly half of France's total freshwater consumption.

Freshwater scarcity is a growing international challenge, and the vast majority of countries are in no position to approve of such highly water-intensive inland-based energy systems.

Nuclear plants located by the sea do not face similar problems in hot conditions, because ocean waters do not heat up anywhere near as rapidly as rivers or lakes. And because they rely on seawater, they cause no freshwater scarcity. But, as Japan's reactors have shown, coastal nuclear power plants confront more serious dangers.

When the Indian Ocean tsunami struck, the Madras reactor's core could be kept in safe shutdown condition because the electrical systems had been ingeniously installed on higher ground than the plant itself.

And, unlike Fukushima (left), which bore a direct impact, Madras was far away from the epicentre of the earthquake that unleashed the tsunami.

The central dilemma of nuclear power in an increasingly water-stressed world is that it is a water guzzler, yet vulnerable to water.

And, decades after Lewis L Strauss, the chaiperson of the US Atomic Energy Agency, claimed that nuclear power would become “too cheap to meter”, the nuclear industry everywhere still subsists on munificent government subsidies.

While the appeal of nuclear power has declined considerably in the West, it has grown among the so-called nuclear newcomers, which brings with it new challenges, including concerns about proliferation of nuclear weapons.

Moreover, with nearly two-fifths of the world's population living within 100km of a coastline, finding suitable seaside sites for initiation or expansion of a nuclear power programme is no longer easy.

Fukushima is likely to stunt the appeal of nuclear power in a way similar to the accident at the Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania in 1979, not to mention the far more severe meltdown of the Chernobyl reactor in 1986.

If the fallout from those incidents is a reliable guide, however, nuclear power advocates will eventually be back.

BRAHMA CHELLANEY is Professor of Strategic Studies at the Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi and the author of, among others, 'Asian Juggernaut: The Rise of China, India, and Japan' (Harper Paperbacks, 2010) and 'Water: Asia's New Battlefield' (Georgetown University Press, 2011).

Reuters: Japan plant leak sparks nuclear power debate... by Gerard Wynn and Bernie Woodall

Japan plant leak sparks nuclear power debate

Gerard Wynn and Bernie Woodall
Mar 12, 2011; 1:39pm

The growing risk of a significant radiation leak at two Japanese nuclear power plants following yesterday's earthquake and tsunami threatens to hurt an industry that has enjoyed a rebirth since the Three Mile Island accident in 1979 and the Chernobyl disaster in 1986.

Malaysia has plans to built two nuclear power plants that will generate 1,000 megawatts each with the first plant ready for operation in 2021.

On Friday, nuclear power advocates and environmentalists staked out familiar ground over the incident in Japan.

But a wider public debate may be ignited if a major radiation leak occurs, said Paul Patterson, an energy analyst with consultants Glenrock Associates in New York.

That debate has been largely muted since the 1980s when rock concerts were held to galvanise opposition to nuclear power after the Three Mile Island incident in Pennsylvania and the popular movie 'The China Syndrome', that raised awareness of the dangers of a nuclear reactor meltdown.

"The severity of what happens is what is important," Patterson said of the impact of the Japanese incident.

If there is a substantial radioactive release, there could even be questions about whether it could travel on the Pacific jet stream to the US West Coast.

"It is serious and it could lead to a meltdown," said Mark Hibbs, a nuclear expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "And what we're seeing, barring any information from the Japanese that they have it under control, is that we're headed in that direction."

But Naoto Sekimura of the University of Tokyo, said that a major radioactive disaster was not likely.

Cooling system fails

An 8.9-magnitude earthquake centered in northern Japan triggered a series of events at two Tokyo Electric Power Co plants that created conditions for a radioactive leak because
there wasn't electric power to circulate cooling water over superheated uranium fuel rods.

The two Tepco plants, the Daiichi plant and the Daini plant are around 60km from the epicenter of the earthquake that led to a tsunami and probably killed more than 1,000.

Nuclear industry advocates on Friday were saying that the ability of the nuclear reactors in Japan to largely withstand the power of the earthquake shows how safe nuclear power is.

But that was before a series of scary announcements from Tepco that it had lost the ability to control pressure at several reactors and that it was having trouble with a valve that would allow reactor pressure to be eased.

Thousands of residents were evacuated from the immediate area of the Fukushima plants, about 150 miles 240km north of Tokyo.

Industry experts said the precautions taken at Fukushima showed that enhanced security at nuclear power plants should prevent any disaster. But green groups said the threatened leak showed that the risks were still too high.

"I wouldn't expect there to be a radiation emergency ultimately, they may have something to fix but it's a precaution more than anything else," said Sue Ion, former chief technology officer at British Nuclear Fuels, after Japan declared an atomic power emergency.

Altogether, some 11 Japanese reactors shut down after the earthquake.

Successive layers of security should prevent any leak of radiation, said Jeremy Gordon, an analyst at the World Nuclear Association based in London.

Yet another proof that it can't be safe

"The reactor designs that are up for consideration today are generation three where the safety systems operate at an even higher level," said WNA analyst Jonathan Cobb.

But environmental groups said the threat of a radiation leak underscored the general risks from atomic energy.

"We've opposed nuclear power for decades, and this is another proof that it can't be safe," said Sven Teske, director of renewable energy at Greenpeace International.

A leading US scientist group said the incident highlighted the grave risk of inadequate back-up power to cooling systems at US facilities.

New interest from governments and investors in nuclear power follows the development of more advanced plants, and a new focus on security of energy supply and moves to reduce
carbon emissions.

Nuclear plants generate low-carbon power in contrast to fossil fuels and can produce constantly unlike wind and some other clean energy sources.

The Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) estimated last month that about 10 countries have decided to introduce nuclear power and started preparatory infrastructure work, up from four in 2008.

- Reuters

Irrational fears give nuclear power a bad name, says Oxford scientist

Wade Allison says misplaced health stigma has prevented the full benefits of nuclear energy being explored

• Alok Jha and Sarah Boseley
• guardian.co.uk, Sunday 10 January 2010 20.32 GMT

Protesters carry a mock-up of a nuclear waste drum during a demonstration against Germany's nuclear power policies. Photograph: Theo Heimann/AFP/Getty Images

The health dangers from nuclear radiation have been oversold, stopping governments from fully exploiting nuclear power as a weapon against climate change, argues a professor of physics at Oxford University.

Wade Allison does not question the dangers of high levels of radiation but says that, contrary to scientific wisdom, low levels of radiation can be easily tolerated by the human body.

Most scientists who have responded disagreed with Allison's conclusions, but his comments have highlighted the lack of understanding of how the body deals with low doses of radiation, a crucial issue given it is increasingly used in modern medical procedures such as scanning and cancer treatment.

Nuclear crises, from the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to the meltdown of a nuclear reactor at Chernobyl, have created widespread fear and distrust of nuclear power, and global pressure to keep radiation at the lowest possible level, according to Allison, a particle physicist who makes his arguments in a self-published book, Radiation and Reason. He says long-term data on the health of survivors of the atomic bombs have demonstrated how good the human body is at protecting itself from radiological and chemical attack.

"The ability to repair damage and replace cells, we discovered in the last 50 years, show how radiation doesn't cause damage except under extreme circumstances," he says. "The radiation that a patient gets in one day from a course of radiotherapy treatment, it would take a million hours of exposure for someone standing in the radioactive waste hall of Sellafield. And, if you have radiotherapy, it goes on for several weeks."

Ionising radiation, the type from nuclear reactions, can break strands of DNA in cells and these can make a cell cancerous unless the body's machinery can fix the damage. Scientists have used data from Hiroshima and Nagasaki, plus that from experiments on animals and cell cultures, to create a measure of how much damage is caused by high levels of radiation. This has then been extrapolated back, in a straight line, to estimate the potential damage from low levels of radiation to create what is called the linear non-threshold (LNT) model.

"The problem with a lot of these discussions is that you eventually get to the point where you don't have any more data," said Professor Gillies McKenna of Oxford University, Cancer Research UK's expert on radiation oncology. "Even the data from Hiroshima and Nagasaki – there weren't enormous numbers of cancers created in those cases, so we have to extrapolate what we think would happen at low dose."

Since the end of the second world war, scientists have worked on the basis that there is no dose of radiation so low that it is not dangerous. Allison, however, believes there is a threshold below which any radiation exposure is fully repaired by the body – but this is a view mainstream scientists disagree with.

"I wouldn't say Allison's ideas are fanciful but when you weigh up all the evidence, the scientific authorities come to the conclusion that the LNT dose-response relationship for low doses is the best we can do," says Richard Wakeford, an epidemiologist specialising in the health effects of radiation at the University of Manchester.

Allison's hypothesis assumes that all of the DNA damage caused below a threshold of radiation dose can be fixed by the cells' internal machinery. "I can't see and nor do the majority of experts in the field how these processes can be 100% effective," said Wakeford.

"Radiation is particularly effective at causing double-strand DNA breaks, which make it difficult for the repair mechanisms in the cells to repair them properly."

Where McKenna and other scientists do agree with Allison is that fear of radiation is a problem. McKenna's expertise is in the use of radiation to kill cancer cells. "People become so fearful of radiation that they avoid diagnostic tests that might save their lives or avoid radiotherapy when they have cancer that is much more likely to kill them than exposure to radiation. He [Allison] is right that it has become a little bit hysterical. People are now avoiding CT scans or avoiding building nuclear power stations when in most aspects, radiation is a very useful thing."

Half of cancer patients will be given radiotherapy and more than half of those will be cured by it, McKenna said. "In most instances, where you use radiation – certainly in medicine and in most other forms of industry – the benefits greatly outweigh the risks."

Treatment involves a dose of radiation directed at the cancer cells which is 10 to 20 times the dose that would be fatal directed to the whole body.

Some areas of the country, such as Devon and Cornwall, have naturally high levels of radiation in the rock, and yet they do not have high incidence of cancer. "It would suggest to me that we can tolerate relatively higher doses of radiation, unless you add things on top like smoking," said McKenna, adding that there were good scientists on both sides of the debate, "but you reach a point where you can't generate the data you need and I do think we need to be careful not to exaggerate the risks and increase the fears."

Nothing has generated quite as much cancer concern in the UK as Sellafield power station in Cumbria. Concern about radiation leaks at the plant, known as Windscale when it was commissioned in 1956, grew over the years until in 1983, Yorkshire Television produced a documentary called The Nuclear Laundry, suggesting low-level radiation emissions posed a risk. In the 1990s clusters of childhood leukaemia cases were identified near the site.

Investigating those concerns has been the preoccupation of Comare, the government's expert committee on the medical aspects of radiation, since it was set up in 1985. After years of painstaking work and many reports, it has yet to establish a link between radiation and childhood leukaemia. The evidence for some sort of infection, possibly caused by the movement from one area to another of people working at the plant, is far stronger.

Comare's chairman, Alex Elliott, a professor of clinical physics at Glasgow University, says there is a wide spectrum of views on the dangers of low-level radiation. "There are those who believe people like me are part of an international conspiracy to hide the dangers of radiation from the public," he said. At the other end are the believers in "radiation hormesis", who say we live in a beneficent soup of low-dose radiation, which is essential for life and may even prevent cancer deaths.

Elliott steers a middle path. "The Comare view, along with the consensus worldwide, is that the current risk estimates are broadly correct," he said. "They keep being revised but if they are wrong, it is by no more than a factor of two or three in each direction." And, he said, "we believe the linear hypothesis should continue to be used."

It is almost impossible, he said, to carry out experiments that would prove that low-level radiation is dangerous or is not, because the risks are so small.

But radiation generates fear, he said. "Because we can't see, hear, smell or touch it, we are much less tolerant of radiation than anything else. We are definitely hysterical about radiation. We go to enormous lengths on the precautionary principle.

"I don't know how many people are killed on the roads each year, but we live with that. We're not thinking of banning trucks. We're incredibly bad at risk-benefit analysis."

But Wakeford said that calculating the risks of low-level radiation is becoming increasingly important. "One of the big issues today is just how you manage these new, relatively high-dose diagnostic procedures like CT scans. This is probably the big issue as far as low doses are concerned. In the US, remarkably, the average citizen receives more dose from medical diagnostic procedures than he receives from background radiation, which is a dramatic increase from the last time this was assessed about 20 or so years ago. When you come to make an assessment about balance of risk about whether to give a child a CT scan or not, these are real considerations, not hypothetical at all."

Comare, in a rare respite from studying leukaemia clusters at nuclear installations, recently produced a hard-hitting report on sunbeds, calling for a ban on their use by under-18s. "At the minute, it would appear that more people are damaged by sunbeds than by nuclear power in the UK," Elliott said.

Reasons to be fearful? Expert views

Mike Clark, scientific spokesman for the Health Protection Agency
"There is an international scientific consensus about the health effects of ionising radiation which is based on decades of research worldwide. This is the so-called linear hypothesis, by which you extrapolate health effects observed at high doses to calculate risks at low doses. There are scientists who disagree with this and clearly Professor Allison is one of them. However there are also some scientists who claim the linear hypothesis can underestimate risks.

"The Health Protection Agency accepts the scientific consensus and bases its advice on recommendations from the International Commission on Radiological Protection."

Professor Steve Jones of Westlakes Research Institute, who published research on the health of the former British Nuclear Fuels workforce and the link between high radiation doses and heart disease
"One of the problems, is that the effect of radiation at low doses is very difficult to determine from observational science because the effects are small. The cancer risk to any group of people over a lifetime is 25% and if you look at whether radiation will increase over that you will struggle to get a clear result. Another reason to be cautious is because some studies suggest that the risk of radiation may be an increase in circulatory diseases as well. A good judgement based on all the scientific information available is it would be unwise to move away from what we have."

Richard Wakeford, visiting professor of epidemiology at the University of Manchester
"I do not find [Allison's] these arguments particularly convincing. I have to say, when I've reviewed the evidence, it is very difficult to detect the adverse effects of radiation at low levels because the predicted excess risk of cancer is small and is easily hidden in the noise of other factors like smoking and diet and drinking. All the people who hang on to these arguments are missing the point. If you take the evidence as a whole from radiation epidemiology, there's probably a risk from cancer arising from small doses of radiation [and] they're around about what you get from a linear no-threshold dose response."

Susan Short, clinical senior lecturer in oncology at University College London
"I do have sympathy with the view that the effects of radiation have been overestimated but it reflects ignorance in the community about radiation; it's still portrayed as a dangerous unknown though we understand a lot about it really. People have such poor understanding of risk – these people who go and demonstrate against local nuclear power plants are the same as those who will happily smoke 20 cigarettes a day or lead high-risk lifestyles and don't see the irony."

PPSR: A Plea for A NUCLEAR–FREE MALAYSIA...

A NUCLEAR–FREE MALAYSIA
Dato' Dr Ronald S. McCoy

Introduction
If current trends continue, by the end of the twenty-first century, it is likely that the world’s population and the world’s demand for energy will have doubled. Even if there are major improvements in energy efficiency technologies and renewable energy supply, there will still be an overriding need to control population growth, reduce consumption and energy demand, and fundamentally transform the global economy into a low-carbon, ecologically sustainable system, that will totally discredit the god of economic growth.

Despite the machinations of the fossil-fuel-industrial-political complex, it is now undeniable that greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion are the principal cause of global warming and climate change, which increasingly threaten planetary and human survival in the twenty-first century. This has spurred governments to find ways to reduce carbon emissions without undermining their economies, although many are still hesitant and will have to be dragged screaming to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Copenhagen this December.

The Malaysian government is absolutely right to be concerned about climate change and to take measures to reduce carbon emissions and mitigate global warming, but opting for nuclear energy is not the right answer to climate change and energy supply security.

Our last speaker, Dr Mark Diesendorf, has presented convincing evidence and argued that nuclear energy is not a viable option for Malaysia. He has highlighted the numerous negative features of nuclear energy - the risks of nuclear weapons proliferation, nuclear terrorism and reactor accidents; the inability of the nuclear industry to safely dispose of high-level nuclear waste and to contain escalating costs and delays in construction of nuclear power plants; and finite global uranium reserves.

At present, with Malaysia’s consistent record in nuclear disarmament initiatives, there is no danger that Malaysia will develop nuclear weapons, even if it does opt for nuclear energy. But one cannot be certain about future political and social changes in the country and region, which may lead to weapons proliferation in the future.

No case for nuclear energy
So, what is the government’s case for introducing nuclear-generated electricity, when national electricity reserves are still substantial and nuclear energy is not cheap, clean or safe. We in civil society believe that Tenaga Nasional Berhad (the National Power Company) has initiated plans to commission its first nuclear power plant by 2025. Surely, TNB and the government have no grounds to assume that it is a done deal.

On 21st June 2009, then Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said that the government was willing to consider the use of nuclear energy, but not before exploring alternative renewable energy resources, such as biomass, solar, wind and hydro power. There is still no clarity that the government has formulated a national green energy policy. Any attempt to paint nuclear power as green technology will indicate environmental colour-blindness. The 2006 report of the International Energy Agency has indicated that greenhouse gases can be reduced, without making a Faustian bargain with the nuclear industry.

As citizens, we are extremely concerned that there has not been a national debate over such a critical issue as nuclear energy, which has the potential to wreak havoc and destruction. We must adhere to the Precautionary Principle and heed Murphy’s Law. I have been hearing the argument that accidents are part of everyday life and that a plane crash cannot justify abandoning air travel. It is facetious to compare a plane crash with a nuclear accident, just as it is naïve to consult with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which has a vested interest in promoting nuclear energy.

Realities of nuclear energy
Good intentions on the part of the government and TNB are not enough. Proponents of nuclear energy must avoid generating disinformation about its virtues. Instead, they must face up to the realities of nuclear energy and answer serious questions:

• What is the urgency in embarking on a nuclear energy project in Malaysia?
• What are the realities of nuclear power economics and time-frames for nuclear reactor deployment, relative to other means of reducing carbon emissions and generating electricity?
• What quantum of subsidies will be required to make nuclear energy economically feasible?
• What are the health, environmental, and security dangers associated with a reactor accident or a terrorist attack on a nuclear power plant?
• Will it be possible to prevent the diversion of nuclear materials to nuclear weapons production or to a terrorist group?
• How do we cope with the depletion of global reserves of uranium?
• Most importantly, how do we manage the safe disposal of lethal radioactive waste that will remain radioactive for thousands of years?
• Is it wise to embark on nuclear energy when there are alternative renewable energy sources and energy efficiency technologies?
• Is it not time for the Malaysian government to join with other governments in committing itself to holistically addressing climate change and opting for sustainable energy?

By far, the most objectionable feature of nuclear energy is the production of high-level nuclear waste that remains radioactive for several hundred thousands of years. The long-term management of waste only exists in theory. The world’s growing accumulation of nuclear waste continues to pile up in casks, along nuclear power plants in 31 countries, not one of which has yet been able to build a safe, functioning, geological repository anywhere in the world. The nuclear industry might have a case if and when it can provide a fail-safe method of waste disposal.

The half-lives of uranium and plutonium isotopes are virtually unending:

* U-238 : 4.51 billion years

* U-235 : 731 million years

* Pu-239 : 24,400 years

Such radioactive longevity goes far beyond the time horizons of any human institution, including governments and nation states. In other words, we will have to contend with life-threatening nuclear dangers from nuclear waste forever. This totally disqualifies nuclear energy as a feasible form of energy. In the long-term, nuclear energy must be phased out, not given a new lease of life.

If medieval man had resorted to nuclear energy, today we would still be burdened with managing his nuclear waste. This is not a legacy we should leave future generations of Malaysians. It would be morally wrong to embark on nuclear energy and subject them to nuclear dangers, when climate mitigation can be achieved through developing energy efficiency technologies and harnessing renewable energy.


Energy efficiency and renewable energy
Malaysia would do well to emulate Denmark, where a range of new technologies have made energy efficiency and the use of renewable energy feasible. Denmark, which derives most of its renewable energy from burning biomass, including biodegradable waste, aims to increase the proportion of renewable energy to 20 per cent in 2011 and to 30 per cent in 2020. It also derives a fifth of its electricity from its five thousand wind turbines, another renewable energy source.

Denmark has taken on the greatest share of the burden of achieving the total emissions target for the European Union under the Kyoto Protocol. Its energy policy focuses on research, energy saving, and decreasing dependence on fossil fuels. As early as 1990, Denmark set concrete targets, aiming to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 8% between 2008 and 2012.

Denmark serves as an example of how a country can secure a high level of growth, without a corresponding increase in energy consumption or greenhouse gas emissions. Although Denmark does not have any hydroelectric power or nuclear power, it tops the world in having the most energy-efficient and climate-friendly economy.

Denmark has achieved this by having a strong political focus on energy policy. A large part of its success in the field of renewable energy and sustainable energy technologies is based on a unique cooperative relationship between researchers, businessmen and politicians. Danish industry also has a long tradition of embedding the principle of sustainability into the development of its products.

Denmark’s focus on climate, which has impelled traditional industrial companies towards sustainable technology, is virtually a national endeavour. The best example of this is probably the development of wind turbines from pioneer projects, located in small machine shops, into a billion-dollar international industry. Wind turbines represent one of the most realistic possibilities for a renewable alternative to fossil fuels.

Both the Danish government and business sectors have shown a strong commitment to saving energy, as well as developing and implementing energy-efficient measures, such as insulating houses. The rules for new buildings promote energy efficient construction. By 2020, regulations for energy consumption in new buildings will be tightened by a further seventy-five per cent. The Malaysian government should encourage and reward architects who design energy efficient houses and buildings which are well ventilated and require little or no cooling.

Other energy-saving initiatives in Denmark range from carbon dioxide-neutral fuels in public transport to intelligent electricity meters, which give consumers greater control over electricity bills. Denmark has designed an electricity supply system that is capable of competitively handling wind turbines, which periodically swing from supplying more than 100 percent of energy requirements to no energy at other times. In 2009, Denmark has emerged as a dynamic, working laboratory, which combines new energy technologies with old fashioned common sense in its relationship with the environment. Malaysia should emulate Denmark’s dynamic and innovative approach in mitigating global warming.

A Nuclear-free Malaysia
So, how do we remain a nuclear-free Malaysia? I have singled out Denmark, not only for its vigour and commitment to the environmental cause, but also for its ethos of social solidarity, transparency, accountability and common purpose. Denmark could be a beacon of light for Malaysia which is on the verge of making a momentous decision on energy. The wrong decision could have the most serious consequences. Nuclear technology is not to be trifled with. It’s not as inconsequential as purchasing a submarine that the country does not need. The worst it could do is to sink.

This conference was organised in order to inform public opinion and clarify the many serious issues associated with nuclear energy, so that decision-makers will learn about the realities of nuclear energy, understand that carbon emissions can be reduced significantly without resorting to nuclear energy, and discover that nuclear energy does not deserve to be considered as the last option in the country’s energy supply mix.

Deliberative, participatory democracy and public involvement in decision-making are not robust concepts or practices in Malaysia, ruled for more than fifty years by the same authoritarian government, which has not only not nurtured public debate, but also punished dissent.

My concept of decision-making and decision-makers will not coincide with the government’s concept. Who are the decision-makers? Are they the politicians the electorate elects to office? Or are they the voters who vote the politicians in?

In many ways, the question of nuclear energy defines the relationship between the government and civil society. In many countries, nuclear energy would be an issue of great national importance, that would merit wide consultation, free discussion and open debate at all levels of society. The time is late, but it is not too late for Malaysians to claim back their country from those who would usurp their right to choose. The issue of nuclear energy must be above partisan politics and business interests. It must not be turned into a money-spinner for some politically-connected company or a career-builder for those connected to the nuclear industry.

If the people of Malaysia seriously want a nuclear-free Malaysia, then they must be prepared to clearly voice their views and stand by their convictions. The stakes are extremely high, particularly for future generations.

The prime minister has recently talked about “engaging” with the people. This has not happened, certainly not with regard to nuclear energy. It is not good enough to hold predetermined seminars and meetings among pro-nuclear groups with vested interests, including analysts, industrialists, and business people, or superficial interviews broadcast on television or published in newspapers.

I hope this conference will succeed in ringing alarm bells and making it clear that nuclear energy is not the answer to climate change or energy supply security. It would be foolish to try to resolve one problem by replacing it with another problem. .

Let us also not gloss over the huge economic cost of nuclear energy, which is difficult to determine. The nuclear industry does not follow transparent methods of accounting. Costs, such as accident insurance, waste disposal and decommissioning, are often buried in opaque government subsidies or conjured into debt legacies for future generations. Cost is rightly a problem with any public project, but the high cost of building a nuclear reactor would not become a key issue, if nuclear energy were the only option for mitigating climate change and addressing energy security. But it is not the only option.

Instead of a huge investment in nuclear power, it would be more productive for Malaysia to commit its limited resources to research and development of renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies. As recent as 29 May 2009, two financial reports in the Business Section of the New York Times highlighted the incredible economics of building a nuclear power plant. The reports revealed two fiascos: the construction of a new reactor in Olkiluoto, Finland, by the French company, Areva, and the virtual collapse of the once touted global flagship, Atomic Energy of Canada Limited. Both companies were overtaken by cost overruns amounting to billions of dollars and by long delays in completing construction schedules, extending into decades, not years.

This bodes ill for the nuclear industry, whether in France, Canada or South Korea, which is rumoured to be the country favoured by the government and TNB to build a reactor. After more than 50 years in business, the nuclear industry cannot get private funding or liability insurance, cannot deal with its radioactive waste, and now cannot demonstrate its ability to build new reactors within a contractual time-frame and budget.

The energy path to a sustainable future lies elsewhere. First, we must harness the massive potential of solar radiation, bioenergy, hydropower, wind energy, wave power, tidal
energy and geothermal energy, by investing in and advancing research and development in renewable energy.

Second, we must develop policies and technologies in energy efficiency, such as reducing energy use in buildings, increasing automobile efficiencies, expanding mass public transport, designing compact communities, and creating practices of industrial ecology that recycle materials and energy.

Third, we must redefine development in terms of human well-being and sustainable living patterns, not unfettered consumption and economic growth.

Malaysia must reject nuclear energy and not be deceived by trends in other countries. Nuclear energy will subject future generations to the grievous dangers of nuclear devastation and radioactivity that will last for thousands of years. This is tantamount to unintentional genocide on a grand scale in slow motion. Malaysia must not take such a path. It would be immoral and unethical to leave future generations with such a legacy.

________________________________________________________________________
Dato' Dr RS McCoy is past president of the MMA, past co-president of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) for more than 10 years, and is currently founding president of the Physicians for Peace and Social Responsility (PPSR), soon to be renamed Physicians for Social Responsibility of Malaysia.

Paper presented at PPSR/CETDEM Conference on Nuclear Energy: Does Malaysia Need Nuclear Energy? 10 October 2009