In an excellent post at the Enterprise blog, my AEI colleague Ken Green makes a point I wish I’d had more room for in my own column: Agnosticism about nuclear power.
I’ve long been agnostic on nuclear power, unconvinced that it is economical: trying to figure out the real cost of nuclear power when you factor in all the government involvement and risk is extremely difficult, and there are environmental and health trade-offs to consider as well. Still, given that we have the assets, and they generate a considerable percentage of U.S. baseload, I hope our policy makers stick to the “let’s learn from Japan” example, and shy away from Germany’s “Let’s panic” approach.
I am not wildly pro-nuclear power, but I find that I am also anti-anti-nuclear.
If you take environmentalists at their word about how much they care about greenhouse gases and the rest, then it’s impossible to reconcile their sincerity with their hatred of nuclear power. I like cheap, reliable, safe, unsubsidized electricity. If we can get that from nuclear power, I’m all for it. If not, not.
For what it’s worth, my suspicion is that we will be getting a lot more electricity from natural gas and continue to get a lot from coal for a very long time, thanks to this calamity.