Mohamed ElBaradei, Nobel Peace Laureate, speech this March.

[NNadir]

Some prominent Nobel Laureates who have been active in the promotion of peaceful nuclear energy as a global climate change arresting tool include the late Hans Bethe (Physics) and George Olah (Chemistry). Now we can add Mohamed ElBaradei, who justifiably won the Peace Nobel and who tried to kick the legs from under the nuclear scare mongering of the Bush administration in the run-up to Iraq.

Here is the text of a speech ElBaradei gave in Paris in March of this year:

http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/Statements/2005/ebsp2005n004.html

"I would like to begin by placing these topics in context — the context of our current global energy imbalance. I was personally reminded of this imbalance on a recent trip to Ghana and Nigeria. Per capita electricity consumption in Ghana is only about 300 kilowatt-hours per year, and in Nigeria it´s closer to 70 kilowatt-hours per year. That translates to an average availability of 8 watts — less than a normal light bulb — for each Nigerian citizen...

...The disparity in energy supply is directly related to the disparity in standards of living, which in turn creates disparities in opportunity and hope — and, I would contend, leads to the sort of despair and insecurity that give rise to tensions in many regions of the developing world. Here, in the "City of Light", it might be easy to forget the common estimate that approximately 1.6 billion people around the world lack access to modern energy services; but as we look to the century that lies before us, "connecting the unconnected" will be a key to progress...

...While the current outlook remains mixed, there is clearly a sense of rising expectations for nuclear power. The near term projections released in 2004 by both the IAEA and the OECD International Energy Agency are markedly different from those of just four years ago. The IAEA´s low projection — based on the most conservative assumptions — predicts 427 gigawatts of global nuclear capacity in 2020, the equivalent of 127 more 1000 megawatt nuclear plants than previous projections...

...Nuclear energy has long been marked by feelings of unease and concerns about safety and waste. Nuclear power was dealt a heavy blow by the tragedy of the 1986 Chernobyl accident (a blow from which the reputation of the nuclear industry has never fully recovered). Little distinction has been made, in the media or in public understanding, between the design characteristics of the Chernobyl reactor and the hundreds of other reactors in operation around the world — nor have we properly publicized the array of measures put in place since Chernobyl to offset the possibility of another severe nuclear accident..."

[goddess40]

1. Do you mean to tell us that Bush didn't win

That just can't be true!!

[struggle4progress]

2. Of course, promoting nuclear energy IS the job, so perhaps it's not ..

.. surprising to find him doing exactly that: the IAEA is part of the post-WWII political bargain under which the nuclear powers attempted to limit the proliferation of atomic weapons by offering "Atoms for Peace" incentives in exchange for "voluntary" limitations on dual use technology in countries that were NOT nuclear powers.

If ElBaradei opposed nuclear power, he simply wouldn't be at the IAEA.

His Nobel prize naturally results from his diplomatic talent, his skill in defusing volatile situations, and his ability to discourage brinksmanship: of course, these abilities don't show to best advantage when he's forced to work with people who've already decided to go to war ...

[NNadir]

3. And of course physics was Hans Bethe's job.

And your point is what exactly, that you know more about nuclear power than ElBaradei and Hans Bethe, two winners of Nobel Prizes notable for their peaceful intentions who emphatically supported commercial nuclear power?

I don't think so.

Obviously the world regards Elbaradei as a man of high moral integrity. There is no evidence whatsoever that he is working for nuclear weapons; there is considerable evidence that he is working against them.

To do his job, ElBaradei must have access to the highest thinkers in the nuclear field in the world: Nuclear engineers being a prominent subset, along with intelligence officials, environmental thinkers.

This is not a man hiding under the table because tritium exists somewhere on the planet, not a paranoid, not a weak thinker.

Unlike a Greenpeace twit mulling over the names of 1950's political programs to defend one more bit of untrue anti-nuclear stupidity , ie that a nuclear power program presupposes a nuclear war program, ElBaradei works for a survivable future. There are 437 nuclear reactors operating in 30 countries. Of these countries, only a small minority, 7, possess nuclear weapons. Two other countries thought to possess nuclear weapons that have no commercial nuclear power, Israel and North Korea. Certainly in his position ElBaradei, now adjudged by the world community to be a paragon of morality, is aware of these facts. Certainly if he bought into the immoral nonsense that nuclear power presupposes nuclear weapons, he would resign. But he doesn't. He continues to work at the IAEA an organization which in fact does function to provide for the peaceful use of nuclear energy, an organization that will share in the prestige of the Nobel Peace Prize.

This suggests that complete ignorance of history and international relations must go hand in hand with a complete ignorance of physics, chemistry, geology and risk analysis that one must embrace if one insists in being anti-nuclear. As I frequently point out, one must also be morally disfigured to buy into this position as well.

ElBaradei, for instance, can make the comparison between the overly inflated risks of global climate change and the still largely imaginary "what-if" fears expressed by "solar-will-save-us" immoral elitist jerk-offs. ElBaradei begins his speech not with some balderdash about some millionaire's home somewhere that has a solar system, but a perfectly targeted description of what the average Nigerian experiences.

He writes what a Greenpeace spoiled brat trust fund kid could never write:

"But I would like to begin by placing these topics in context — the context of our current global energy imbalance. I was personally reminded of this imbalance on a recent trip to Ghana and Nigeria. Per capita electricity consumption in Ghana is only about 300 kilowatt-hours per year, and in Nigeria it´s closer to 70 kilowatt-hours per year. That translates to an average availability of 8 watts — less than a normal light bulb — for each Nigerian citizen...

...The imbalance in energy availability in developed versus developing countries is a matter of great impact. When we consider the Millennium Development Goals proposed just five years ago — such as the eradication of poverty and hunger, universal access to fresh water, and improved health care — it is quickly evident that the availability of energy overall, and electricity in particular, is central to our ability as an international community to deliver on each of those goals.

The disparity in energy supply is directly related to the disparity in standards of living, which in turn creates disparities in opportunity and hope — and, I would contend, leads to the sort of despair and insecurity that give rise to tensions in many regions of the developing world. Here, in the "City of Light", it might be easy to forget the common estimate that approximately 1.6 billion people around the world lack access to modern energy services; but as we look to the century that lies before us, "connecting the unconnected" will be a key to progress..."

ElBaradei makes a key point. Access to energy is a key tool in the elimination of poverty, and in turn, the elimination of poverty will provide for a chance at addressing the environmental degradation of places like Africa.

One of the arguments of anti-environmental anti-nuclear twits is that nuclear power increases the risk of nuclear weapons. Like almost all other anti-nuclear arguments, it is only weakly connected with reality and to the extent it is connected with reality at all, it is antique reality; it is predicated on 40 year old thinking. I note that the two largest nuclear powers that ever existed, Russia and the United States, during the sane Clinton administration were very much engaged in reducing the risk of nuclear war through the agency of fissioning weapons grade material - i.e. destroying it forever - in commercial nuclear reactors. Without these reactors such a program is impossible.

I won't claim to understand the conservative rigid thinking that wants to pretend that the conditions in 2005 are same as those of 1965, especially when the question involves technology. It's not for me. Although I was only thirteen in 1965, I can tell that the world has changed since then. Irrespective of my inability to comprehend how stupidity becomes ossified, the fact is weapons grade plutonium exists and pretending that it doesn't exist not a rational course. To reduce the risk of weapons grade plutonium there is but one irreversible option, to fission it. As it happens, this option can be exploited in such a way as to address another extremely serious risk, a risk that now has a 100% probability of causing the loss of life and human distress since it is already killing people: the cause of Global Climate Change, which is the use of fossil fuels.

The effect is much like the age old pacifist dream, "beating swords into plowshares."

The fact is that the anti-environmental anti-nuclear crowd, unlike ElBaradei, has nothing to offer on the front of the global climate catastrophe, at least nothing to offer that will address the needs of people like those ElBaradei so eloquently describes in his address in Paris, in the City of Light, the lights in question being nuclear powered. Nothing, as in Zero.

End of story.

[struggle4progress]

4. I did not claim that ElBaradei was working for nuclear weapons.

[NNadir]

6. Well then let's ask what you meant by this statement...

"the IAEA is part of the post-WWII political bargain under which the nuclear powers attempted to limit the proliferation of atomic weapons by offering "Atoms for Peace" incentives in exchange for "voluntary" limitations on dual use technology in countries that were NOT nuclear powers..."

Are you implying that the IAEA mandate was a failure? What does the word "attempted" mean, exactly? That they did not largely achieve the goals of voluntary eschewing of nuclear weapons by states with nuclear power?

Is Sweden building nuclear weapons?

Switzerland?

Japan?

Lithuiana?

Is the Ukraine, which has two new nuclear reactors on order in spite of Chernobyl, a country that voluntarily gave its nuclear weapons away now about to reverse that decision?



It seems that this is no mere "attempt" in the world at large, it is in fact something that "solar as savior" twits promise but never achieve, an "accomplishment!"


Or is just possible that the association frequently raised in balderdash bullshit threads about the link between nuclear weapons and nuclear power is just that, bullshit balderdash?

[struggle4progress]

9. My statement is historically accurate. The word "attempted" is ..

.. appropriate because this has indeed been the imperfectly-effected objective: the attempt did not prevent South Africa or India or Pakistan (for example) from developing nuclear weapons.

[struggle4progress]

5. If there were NO connection between nuclear power and nuclear weapons

there would have been no reason for our old Atomic Energy Commission to oversee the development of both nor for our current Department of Energy to have its current bizarrely bifurcated mission to promote nuclear power and development nuclear weapons nor for the IAEA's similar mission to promote nuclear power and to conduct weapons inspections.

There would not have been any reason for historical concern about dual use technology, and nobody would be able to express any credible concern about the redirection of nuclear reactor technology for weapons production in Korea or Iran.

Nor would my country just have used a civilian reactor to produce tritium for hydrogen bomb maintenance.

[NNadir]

8. Really?

The old Atomic Energy Commission was necessary in Japan?

They produce tritium (gasp, gasp, fear, fear, terror, terror) in commercial nuclear reactors in Bulgaria?

One can choose to make nuclear weapons, of course, but it is very clear to people with minds that these choices, nuclear power or nuclear weapons are independent.

I note that not every country with access to refineries and oil has chosen to make napalm. Now one can argue that people with access to refineries will find it easier to make napalm than countries without refineries, but the existence of refineries does not presuppose napalm.

I do understand that the anti-environmental anti-nuclear crowd is completely indifferent and obtuse on moral questions - what with their contention that solutions available only to rich people are the only solutions that are acceptable being concrete evidence of the same, as well as the contention that it is also acceptable to risk putting the entire nation of Bangladesh under water to satiate some solar power fantasy involving Priuses and solar cells, but nonetheless the decision to develop nuclear weapons is a moral decision. It is demonstrably evident by the experience of 23 countries on the planet that nuclear power does not necessarily require a nuclear weapons program.

As ususual the anti-environmental anti-nuclear coal apologist crowd is pixilated nearly to the point of being incoherent. Once again, they are indifferent to numbers and indifferent to facts.

[struggle4progress]

10. As usual, you simply change the subject. eom

[struggle4progress]

7. Current schemes to "reduce" weapons-grade plutonium by blending ..

.. it down to lower enrichment levels and then using the blend as reactor fuel do not result in very much reduction in the amount of plutonium.

The actual effect of such schemes is rather to make the plutonium less readily available by ultimately ensuring that it is surrounded by a highly radioactive spent fuel rod.

Of course, if we had a viable reprocessing industry (which I seem to recall you would support with enthusiasm), this "advantage" could be completely lost, and the plutonium could be recovered again.

So if you want to argue that weapons-grade materials should be converted into civilian reactor fuel as a nonproliferation strategy, then your support for reprocessing seems incoherent.

[philb]

11. Something else he said has been overlooked-re: nuclear proliferation

Bush has spun the nuclear proliferation issue in a way that obscures that the U.S. is the main problem in dealing with nuclear proliferation- not Iran or North Korea where he has tried to focus all the attention.

The Nuclear Proliferation agreement of the 70s and 80s stated that the goal was to reduce nuclear stockpiles and weapons in all countries, especially those with the most such. The U.S. has been the biggest hinderance to pursuing the goals of making the world safe from nuclear proliferation. By pursuing increasing the U.S. advantage in offensive nuclear weapons, promoting the policy that use of nuclear weapons is reasonable and part of U.S. plans, initiating plans for new nuclear weapons, etc. it is the U.S. and attempting to dominate world policy and UN policy through threat of force, the U.S. is the largest force for destabilization and proliferation of nuclear weapons. Countries that don't have nuclear weapons consider that doing so is the only way to have any ability to stand up to threats and be taken seriously.