George Monbiot vs. Dr. Helen Caldicott: A Debate on the Future of Nuclear Energy. Part 1 of 2

DemocracyNow.org -
The crisis in Japan has refueled the global debate about the viability of nuclear power. Democracy Now! hosts a debate today about the future of nuclear energy between British journalist George Monbiot and Dr. Helen Caldicott. Nuclear energy remains a controversial topic in climate change discourse, as environmental activists argue how to best reduce the amount of greenhouse gases being emitted into the atmosphere—often the debate pits one non-renewable energy against another as renewable energy technology and research remains underfunded.

Watch Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pb5HItRpDY8

Monbiot has written extensively about the environmental and health dangers caused by burning coal for energy, and despite the Fukushima catastrophe, stands behind nuclear power. Caldicott is a world-renowned anti-nuclear advocate who has spent decades warning of the medical hazards posed by nuclear technologies, and while agreeing about the dangers of burning coal, insists the best option is to ban nuclear power.

For the video/audio podcast, transcript, to sign up for the daily news digest, and for Democracy Now!'s vast news archive on reporting on climate change, visit http://www.DemocracyNow.org.

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Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• george Monbiot
• Helen Caldicott
• nuclear
• power
• energy
• clean energy
• coal
• coal-fired power plants
• non-renewable energy
• debate
• climate change
• global warming
• democracy now
• amy goodman

[Frohicky1]

Also, Helen Caldicott, you are a douche.

[Frohicky1]

Bravo Mr Monbiot.

[ComradeSteve1917]

What matters is Energy Returned on Energy Invested.

That measure is how to set our strategic energy policy.

Wind power is one of the best. 

[marmaladekamikaze]

@TheConspiracyRealist

1 Acronym -- EROI Energy return on investment. become familiar with it before spouting your rubbish. Right now ''Renewable energy'' is heavily funded with R&D, it is not being held back because of a conspiracy you nut.

[TheConspiracyRealist]

We can easily replace nuclear power with SOLAR not coal. People look up nanosolars printable solar panels and Affinia's solar stirling engine. These known solar technologies alone could easily solve energy problem's if profit and evil weren't holding such technologies back. We the people and our technology are being greatly suppressed.

[TheEclipsenow]

@david222444 Too simplistic. If you can't understand that the Co2 in coal heats the planet but the sulphur in un-scrubbed chimney's *temporarily* blocks sunlight with a temporary cooling effect, then that's your malfunction. When Chinese power scrubbs their chimney's for public health reasons, we're going to see even faster warming than we did last decade, the hottest decade on record. You'll see.

[TheEclipsenow]

@david222444 Who cares about Co2? Climatologists care mate — and they are the scientists we listen to on this — not you. But because you don't like their conclusions you just sneer and wrinkle your nose like a child. And no sources of worth? How predictable. What Denialist myth are you going to quote next, "It's all cosmic rays?" It's been done. Dogma doesn't change to new data, but science does. You're all politics and no science my boy.

[david222444]

@TheEclipsenow I am trying to grt some science into your thick skulls. Who cares what wavelength co2 absorbs light at? it is insignificant to our climate. The main source of climate change is the Sun followed by the Oceans. I do not recall being your friend! No politics just science.

[TheEclipsenow]

@david222444 You, my friend, are a walking cliche, quoting from the top 28 Denialist myths.

Scan down to myth 8 "Human Co2 emissions are too tiny to matter".

newscientist[dot]com/article/d­n11462

If the universe applied your lack of confidence in spectrometry (which measures how particles and wavelengths interact) then the internet would evaporate and we would not have this conversation. I'm sorry that your political beliefs make you blind to the real world in front of you.

[david222444]

@TheEclipsenow Who needs the Sun to control our climate when the Sun shines out of Al Gore's arse. co2 is a minor trace gas in the atmosphere which has nothing at all to do with past warming. The abrupt cooling in future winters due to the grand solar minimum will disprove the greenhouse theory. The only things escalating and running out of control are egos.