A WARMING WORLD - OpEd
NO TO NUKES
It's tempting to turn to nuclear plants to combat climate change, but alternatives are safer and cheaper.
Los Angeles Times, July 23, 2007
To the Editor:
As Californians who have campaigned since the 1970's for safe and renewable energy, we are deeply grateful for your excellent editorial outlining why we should reject atomic power.
Like the Times, we're disturbed by the earthquake that has severely damaged seven reactors at the world's largest nuke power complex, at Kashiwazaki, Japan. For decades Japanese experts have warned that far worse could happen. We worry that parallel warnings about the two reactors each at Diablo Canyon and San Onofre are being ignored.
Since September 11, 2001 we've been increasingly concerned that these and other reactors might become terror targets. They need to shut as soon as possible. And we agree, the idea of building more is pure folly.
In the 1980s, California generated more than 90% of the world's wind-driven electricity. But we have lost that lead to Germany and Spain.
We also led the world in solar power. But we still have power tower technology, concave mirror farms, solar rooftops and more. California has seen, definitively, that these green technologies are effective, profitable producers of economical energy and employment opportunities for a prosperous, sustainable future.
The impetus for going green is not just to solve our global warming and other environmental problems. It's to regain the jobs and income we've lost by diverting our precious resources to the proven failure of atomic energy.
The time to go green is now. We all agree with you that it's essential to finally leave those Nukes behind.
Sincerely,
Bonnie Raitt
Jackson Browne
Graham Nash
- Raitt, Browne, and Nash are among the co-founders of MUSE (Musicians United for Safe Energy)