UN may Choose to go Nuclear in Fight against Greenhouse Gases
Tags: Emissions, Greenhouse Gases, Home, Hydroelectric, Nuclear
Rich countries may be allowed to invest in the construction of nuclear power plants in foreign developing countries and still get credit for cutting green house gas emissions back home.
The June 2-13th climate talks held in Bonn, Germany were attended by some 170 nations. Rich countries can gain credits for cutting green house gases by investing in wind farms or hydroelectric dams abroad.
But the debate is about whether investment by rich countries in foreign nuclear power plants should be allowed. Some nations are seeking to expand the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) so that it allows nuclear power to be developed in foreign countries. The CDM will run until 2012 as part of the United Nation's Kyoto Protocol which aims to decrease greenhouse gas emissions in the short-term.
As well as nuclear power, some nations believe that Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) should also be introduced into the Clean Development Mechanism. This process involves carbon dioxide emissions being captured as they leave the power plant's exhaust towers, and then later buried in porous rock for storage. Nations that enter replanting schemes also want to get credit for planting forests which absorb carbon dioxide and create oxygen.
Environmentalists - and some nations - are sceptical about CCS. They see it as a system that only exists to allow power plants to remain open for longer, thus prolonging our dependence on fossil fuels. The feud regarding nuclear power is more complicated however. People find it hard to forget the dire consequences of a nuclear accident - Chernobyl still haunts the minds of many government officials and environmentalists alike. Nuclear power does provide some benefits though. Not only does it produce a high amount of energy, but it is also emits almost no greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. It is seen as a quick fix to a serious long term problem.
Environmentalists disagree. They believe that nuclear power is not the energy of the future and that rich nations have a responsibility to the planet to push renewable energy solutions in developing countries instead. Martin Hiller of WWF says that nuclear power "should not be in the CDM. The CDM should be about renewable energy."
Should we put our trust in nuclear power to help fight against rapidly increasing levels of greenhouse gas emissions or would nuclear fallout be too much of a deterrent? If nuclear waste is disposed of in a suitable and efficient fashion then there is surely no issue. But staff hired in developing countries to run the plants must be trained extremely well to ensure that this will, in fact, be the case.
