Decouple

Vogtle was supposed to be the beginning of a nuclear renaissance. The two AP1000's at this site were the first new reactors to be built in the USA in the 21st century. There was optimism that a novel modular design that economized space and materials would be on budget and on time. Vogtle, however, has become the poster child of the United States' inability to build affordable nuclear reactors.&nb...

Nuclear energy is only possible thanks to a highly-skilled, largely unionized workforce. In popular culture, nuclear workers have been portrayed as incompetent (e.g. the Simpson) or as evil incarnate by anti-nuclear activists like Dr. Helen Caldicott. In Canada, nuclear generation is publicly owned and run by a highly unionized workforce. It provides cheap, clean, and reliable energy to the common...

Seth Klein, a writer and public policy researcher, joins Dr. Keefer to discuss his book, A Good War: Mobilizing Canada for the Climate Emergency . Klein draws on the history of Canada during World War II, when the country massively industrialized to help Britain with the war effort in what he describes as a "true society-wide mobilization." He uses this history to argue for a similar society-wide,...

Gaopalelwe Santswere, a nuclear physicist and regulatory expert, joins Dr. Keefer to discuss the electricity sector in South Africa whose aging coal fleet is in need of replacement. Despite operating the only two nuclear power reactors on the continent at Koeberg, and plans in the early 2000’s for nearly 10,000MW of nuclear, the government is pursuing an energy policy that prioritizes wind and sol...

Returning guest Zion Lights, a powerhouse pro nuclear advocate whose most recent initiative has been to launch the group Emergency Reactor, joins me this episode with reflections on her activism in the pandemic; her observations speaking with more receptive, younger generations about nuclear power; navigating political media; "lifestyle politics" versus data-driven activism; and confronting backwa...

At its birth, nuclear energy entered a highly competitive market for electricity generation. Oil was so cheap that it was stealing market share for electricity generation from coal and driving prices to all-time lows. Despite being a brand new technology 1960s nuclear plants were hitting prices of 3 cents/kWh in today's dollars. Gaddafi and OPEC then contributed to the price of oil skyrocketing. A...

The Taishan nuclear plant in the Guangdong province of China houses two French-built EPR reactors, the first of their kind in the country. For the past couple of weeks, equipment has registered slightly elevated radiation readings inside and directly outside the plant. The cause so far appears to be leaks from one or more fuel rods. Mark Nelson joins me in this brief episode to reflect on this bre...

A special crosspost from the WeCANDUIt podcast. Jay Harris, an indigenous energy consultant and proponent of small modular reactor (SMR) for remote locations talks about the energy, nutrition and water challenges facing remote northern communities.  We explore the fascinating history of SMRs in remote environments which goes back to the 1950's and we look at the possibilities and challenges o...

Edgardo Sepulveda, a telecoms regulatory economist, returns to the Decouple podcast to discuss energy equity and how it relates to discussions of energy poverty and energy democracy with a deep dive of the June 2 Public Power Resolution tabled by Cori Bush and Jamaal Bowman.  Electricity is considered a “necessity good” in economics. For a variety of reasons in the industrialized world people...

Its a basic truism but every material object that we use as humans that we did not farm or harvest from the land was mined. In the developed world we have offshored much of this mining activity and it is thus largely invisible to us. How do we decouple mining from its environmental impacts? Stringent regulation of environmental and labour practices. How does modern Uranium mining measure up?  With...

Humanity has emitted over 1 trillion tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere since the industrial revolution, raising atmospheric concentrations of CO2 from 280 to 417ppm. Every year, we add another 50 billion tonnes of CO2 equivalent, meaning that in 20 years we will double our total emissions.  There are signs that global emissions are plateauing, and many governments around the world have penned...

Isabelle Boemeke, the nuclear influencer behind Isodope, joins me again to talk about Diablo Canyon, her experience as an unconventional advocate, staying positive, being honest about nuclear power, meeting people where they are in their understanding of nuclear power, dealing with false accusations, and how her communication styles vary between platforms. We also reflect on the women in nuclear a...

The Byron and Dresden nuclear plants, which supply 30% of Illinois CO2-free energy will power down in 4 months without government intervention. These plants, which are licensed to operate well into the future, are uneconomic amid deregulated energy markets and the cheap natural gas unlocked by the fracking revolution. Keeping existing nuclear plants operating in the northeast USA has a carbon abat...

In New England it has been calculated by Reiner Khur that the carbon abatement cost of rooftop solar is 800$/ton, utility wind and solar ~300$/ton and keeping existing nuclear on line ~25$/ton. In the context of a social cost of carbon and proposed carbon tax of 50$/ton the premature closure of Indian Point is a shocking indictment of the environmental NGO's that fought so hard to kill the plant....

Adam Blazowski is a co-founder of the Polish pragmatic environmentalist group FOTA4Climate. FOTA came together in 2018 out of frustration with the limits of the mainstream environmental movement. The organization includes a broad spectrum of experts and activists ranging from energy analysts to herpetologists and characterizes itself as a “tech agnostic group.” FOTA are supportive of nuclear energ...

Carbon capture and storage. Loved by some, hated by others, essential to many an energy transition modeller for achieving net zero emissions. On today's show we explore some of the science and engineering challenges underlying Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS.) We look at CO2 capture at the stack, from the air and oceans examining the technical possibilities, the energy and material costs and...

On May 1st at 11am in a matter of minutes New York State lost more clean energy than all of it’s solar and wind energy fleet combined. This act of climate vandalism occurred in the context of the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act which mandates 100% carbon free electricity by 2040 and a massive increase in electrification of the heating and transportation sectors. On the sidelines en...

Heather Hoff is the co-founder of Mothers for Nuclear, and the mother of Zoe. She is a materials scientist, nuclear reactor operator and lifelong environmentalist.    In the words of their website Mothers for Nuclear is an organization of environmentalists, humanitarians, and caring human beings.     "We were initially skeptical of nuclear, but learned through asking a lot...

I am joined by Edgardo Sepulveda, a telecoms regulatory economist with an interest in the electricity sector, focused on restructuring and privatization. Edgardo provides a comparative and long-term perspective on the sector. We begin with the first private companies at the dawn of electrification in the 1880’s and the populist push to exert some form of public control to curb abusive pricing, inc...

Environment, Social, Governance investing is a paradigm that is quickly becoming a driving force for global finance. Investors are increasingly paying attention and demanding disclosure of ESG metrics to guide their decisions. At best, nuclear energy sits in an ESG limbo. At worst, it is listed alongside alcohol, tobacco, and pornography as a sin stock. In the EU, the battle over whether to includ...

Russia has been in the nuclear energy game now for over 75 years and its nuclear industry has bounced back to become the leading exporter of reactors around the world. What accounts for this success?    In the context of oligarchs balkanizing and profiteering off of sectors of the USSR's formerly centrally planned economy the Russian nuclear industry managed to re-consolidate itself into...

The decision by the Japanese government to begin releasing 1.25 million tonnes of treated water from the Fukushima nuclear plant site over a 10 year period has caused a major stir not only amongst environmental NGO's but also regional countries with historic emnity to Japan.    Greenpeace alleges that radionuclides released into the sea "may damage DNA of humans and other organisms." Chi...

While hydrogen fuel cells were once hyped for use in personal transportation, hydrogen is now being marketed as an energy panacea and a vital part of a 100% renewables grid. Most of the world's hydrogen is currently produced through steam methane reformation and is used as a very carbon-intensive feedstock for ammonia for fertilizer and other chemical industry applications. Decarbonizing this sect...

We live in a world transformed by big tech and exponential advances in computing. It is no surprise we hope this pattern can be repeated with an energy transition as anxieties mount over the implications of climate change. Unfortunately, magical thinking leaves us far from deep decarbonization and brings with it some staggering implications when it comes to resource extraction and the waste stream...

Mark Z Jacobson's roadmap is cited by politicians like AOC, Bernie Sanders, and many others as an article of faith that a 100% renewables system is achievable and desirable. With great power comes great responsibility, and it is essential that those in the political class wrestling with climate change are well-informed about the consequences of their policy decisions.  Enter Michael Conley an...