Nuclear electricity 'should be abandoned'
Published on : 23/02/2009
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Nuclear power should be abandoned in favour of focusing on renewable energy, it has been claimed.
According to Tony Juniper, director of Friends of the Earth and Green Party general election candidate for Cambridge, nuclear power only provides electricity and so in the short term will not reduce greenhouse gas emissions significantly.
He claims that doubling nuclear capacity in Britain would reduce emissions by just eight per cent, which could easily be outweighed by the benefits of renewable energy if the same amount of investment was put forward for sustainable electricity generation.
"No one seriously expects nuclear power stations to be built without some official subsidies, so we must ask if public funds will achieve the best impact through this route," Mr Juniper says.
He states that a US study showed for every dollar spent on energy efficiency, seven would have to be spent on nuclear power to have the same reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.
Meanwhile, Hartlepool and Heysham have both switched on their offline nuclear reactors in the past week.
