Part One: Economics Of Nuclear Power with Arnie Gundersen http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/part-one-economics-of-nuclear-power-with-arnie-gundersen
In April of 2015, Fairewinds’ Chief Engineer, Arnie Gundersen and the Fairewinds Crew headed to Quebec City for the World Uranium Symposium. Attended by more than 300 delegates from 20 countries that produce uranium for nuclear power and weapons, the symposium brought together experts who are calling on governments throughout the world to end all uranium mining.
In this video, Part One: Economics Of Nuclear Power, Arnie presents an economic analysis of the cost of nuclear power. http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/part-one-economics-of-nuclear-power-with-arnie-gundersen
and that link also contains the transcript of this presentation
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Gordon has a great saying on the issue of nuclear waste, though. And he will call it, instead of waste storage, Gordon calls it waste abandonment. And I think that’s a really great concept, Gordon. My hat’s off to you there. That we are not just putting this nuclear waste in the ground so that we can go back in and check it. It’s not like your self-storage unit, you can undo the door and look in and take something out. Once this stuff is there, you have abandoned it forever. And I think that’s a critical piece in this. Is it clean? It’s not clean on the front end with the mining and it’s not clean on the back end with abandoning waste.

There’s a saying that when you find yourself in a deep hole, to prevent it from getting deeper, you have to stop digging. And I think that’s really what we need to think about here is that when we stop building nuclear plants, we will stop the nuclear waste production.

Savannah River is between Georgia and South Carolina. And it’s a nuclear waste dump that dates back to the bomb age. And I thought the locals would love to hear that. And I was told, no, you don’t want the locals to even know you’re doing it because they want the jobs. And the same thing happened – I was at Sellafield last month and we wanted to take dust samples inside people’s homes. And we were told, they’re not going to help you because they want the jobs. But the money stops flowing long before the risks end. And I think that’s an important piece here.

Okay, safety. The policymakers are looking at the risk of nuclear as a one-in-a-million event. But we know that we’ve had five meltdowns in 35 years.

We’ve had TMI – partial meltdown; Chernobyl, complete meltdown; and three meltdowns at Fukushima. Thirty-five divided by five is the odds of a nuclear meltdown somewhere on the plant are about once every seven years.

I have a saying that sooner or later – I think nuclear fits this very well – sooner or later in any foolproof system, the fools are going to exceed the proofs. And that’s nuclear. So that’s clean? No. Safe? No. Reliable.

And of course, Japan lost 35 percent of its capacity – 54 nuclear plants – and still continued to function as a society. Yes, there were hardships. But they got through without nuclear. So it can be done.

So I submit to you at the end of this conference, we should probably say, yes, I’m against mining and I’m against waste abandonment and I’d love to shut nuclear power plants down. But if that’s what we’re saying, policymakers’ eyes will glaze over, and they’ll say what are you going to do without it. So we all need to take the opposite approach here and talk about a future that can be nuclear free and be inexpensive as well.

And I think given an alternative, they’ll jump at it.
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SEE ALSO: What's life after nuclear disaster? http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/what-if-your-life-was-destroyed-by-a-nuclear-disaster
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World Uranium Symposium 2015 - TMI and Chernobyl Workshop http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/world-uranium-symposium-2015-tmi-and-chernobyl-workshop
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World Uranium Symposium 2015 Fukushima Workshop http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/world-uranium-symposium-2015-fukushima-workshop
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State Senate Listens, Will NRC Hear? http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/state-senate-listens-will-nrc-hear
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Voices From Chernobyl http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/voices-from-chernobyl
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Writing the Nuclear Meltdown Playbook http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/writing-the-nuclear-meltdown-playbook
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Decommissioning Stakeholders' Fund-amental Rights http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/decommissioning-stakeholders-fund-amental-rights
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Remove VY Carcass - Veto SAFSTOR http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/remove-vy-carcass-veto-safstor
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Alone in the Zone http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/alone-in-the-zone
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A Cheaper Way to Save http://preview.tinyurl.com/o72guhu
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Nuclear Containment Risk http://preview.tinyurl.com/o5h7jh5