Perspectives

Can Be Part of the Solution? by Robert Costanza, Cutler Cleveland, Bruce Cooperstein, and Ida Kubiszewski

japan_tsunami_edit.pdf 4/5/11 12:53:36 PM

s the unfolding nuclear disaster Ain Japan has shown, the costs of cleanup after a nuclear meltdown 80-kilometer evacuation zone are borne in large part by national recommended by U.S. Embassy governments and taxpayers rather 2 million residents than the industry. Paying for cleanup 20-30 kilometer evacuation zone mandated by Japanese government C is just one of many hidden costs of 62,000 residents nuclear energy that make judging M 20-kilometer evacuation zone the value of nuclear power difficult. Y mandated by Japanese government Many countries, including the United 77,000 residents States, are rushing to build a new CM generation of nuclear power plantsMY to reduce carbon emissions. However,CY the disaster in Japan should force us CMY to take into account the full costs Hitachinaka of nuclear power (and other energy K sources). Here we propose that all forms of energy incorporate their full costs (including climate impacts, the risk of accidents, and the safe disposal of waste) so that their true value to society can be revealed and better decisions made. Richard Morin/Solutions Taken as a whole, the safety This map shows the evacuation zones around the Fukushima Daiichi in Japan. As record of nuclear energy has been of March 25th, the Japanese government has urged people living 20-30 kilometers from the plant to relatively good.1 In addition, new voluntarily evacuate. plant designs, so-called generation III reactors, have enhanced safety features compared to the 1970s-era On the other hand, the Fukushima new power plants have encouraged generation II designs like those at the Daiichi plant disaster demonstrates the relicensing of existing nuclear Fukushima Daiichi facility in Japan. that even with all the precautions plants beyond their design lifetimes, And even the Fukushima reactors taken and multiple redundancies to increasing vulnerability and risk. did not completely melt down after guard against disaster, major unfore- Also, as more nuclear reactors come a magnitude 9.0 earthquake and a seen problems can occur and can online—60 are currently being con- relatively direct hit from a massive have huge, long-term economic and structed in 15 countries—and those tsunami. The number of people killed ecological consequences. For example, that were built before the 1990s begin or injured globally from the nuclear the nuclear power plant is to show their age, the chances for energy system is far smaller than now encased in a huge sarcophagus another disaster grow. the number killed or injured, for that will have to be maintained for In addition, the long-term waste example, producing energy from coal hundreds of years to prevent radiation disposal problem has yet to be solved or even hydropower. France generates leakage, and a 2,800-square-kilometer for nuclear power, and decom- about 75 percent of its electricity area around the plant will be com- missioning costs are still highly from nuclear power and has been run- pletely off-limits for a similar amount uncertain. In the United States, after ning nuclear power plants for decades of time.3 The economic and social decades of trying, a long-term waste with no major incidents.2 hurdles of locating and constructing storage plan still does not exist. The

www.thesolutionsjournal.org | May-June 2011 | Solutions | 29 Perspectives

GeoEye/Google Satellite images taken before (left) and after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan was damaged by a 9.0 earthquake and subsequent tsunami in March 2011. The image on the right shows severe damage to three of the four cube-shaped containment buildings. Cracks in the reactors themselves were also later discovered at the plant.

proposed storage facility at Yucca A suite of new subsidies in the 1. Eliminate subsidies for nuclear Mountain, Nevada, was recently last decade has extended government power, especially those that shift rejected by President Obama, partly support to new reactors and upstream long-term risk. Government subsi- on the grounds that it could only fuel cycle facilities. The effect of these dies directly reduce the private cost guarantee that radioactive material new subsidies is simple: they exter- of capital for new nuclear reactors wouldn’t leak after 10,000 years of nalize the cost of building nuclear and shift the long-term, often mul- storage, while the minimum safety reactors, thus distorting the price tigenerational risks of the nuclear requirement established by the US of electricity generated by cycle away from investors to Environmental Protection Agency energy. For example, the US govern- the general public.5 is 1 million years. President Obama ment requires that a nuclear facility 2. Require nuclear power plant has set up a commission to examine be insured only up to $12.6 billion. owners to buy full-coverage insur- these issues—revealing the stark Although this seems like a large ance against accidents. This can reality that no one has yet found amount, consider that damage from be accomplished by repealing the a safe way to store radioactive the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill was Price-Anderson Act, which limits waste for the very long time period estimated at $34 billion to $670 bil- liability for nuclear accidents to required. Even if the Yucca Mountain lion,4 and the US government called $12.6 billion, and similar subsidies facility is approved, the current for an initial $20 billion fund for res- in the United States and also elimi- proposal would not have the capac- toration. The cleanup costs from the nating limits on liability in other ity to handle the country’s existing Fukushima disaster could far exceed countries. Insurance companies , let alone what a these numbers. Large government are in the business of assessing and new generation of power plants will subsidies for nuclear energy lead to monetizing risks. Since new power produce. suboptimal decisions by consumers, plant designs are, according to Government subsidies have made investors, and society in general. their supporters, inherently safer, nuclear energy appear to be a rela- Faced with these grave issues, it is the insurance premiums should be tively cheap option. Legacy subsidies time to change our approach to evalu- lower. If the insurance companies lowered capital and operating costs ating nuclear power. It is time to make are unwilling or unable to insure through the . Ongoing subsidies sure the full costs and benefits are these nuclear power plants, plant offset the costs of , insurance clear and that enough information is operators should be required to and liability, plant security, cooling available for society to make informed maintain an assurance bond (i.e., , waste disposal, and plant decisions. To do this we propose a few self-insurance) adequate to cover decommissioning. straightforward steps: a worst-case-scenario accident or

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to create new models of nuclear fuel sources does not reflect environ- References industry risk sharing.4 This would mental and health externalities. A 1. World Nuclear Association, Hore-Lacy, I & Cleveland, ensure that, if an accident did recent study by Paul Epstein of the CJ in Encyclopedia of Earth (Cleveland, CJ, ed), Safety of nuclear power reactors (Environmental occur, costs would not be borne by Harvard Medical School and his col- Information Coalition, National Council for the public but by the plant owners. leagues estimated that if the health Science and the Environment, Washington, DC, It would also make the cost of that and environmental externalities 2009) [online]. www.eoearth.org/article/Safety_of_ risk apparent in the short term and from coal’s life cycle were included nuclear_power_reactors. thus part of the price of electricity in its price, the US public would pay 2. World Nuclear Association. World Nuclear Power from nuclear plants. an additional $0.3 to $0.5 trillion Reactors and Uranium Requirements [online] (March 2, 2011). www.world-nuclear.org/info/ 3. Require plant owners to also main- per year, which is triple the current reactors.html. tain an assurance bond adequate to price of electricity per kilowatt-hour 3. Kubiszewski, I, Cleveland, CJ, & Saundry, S in 6 cover decommissioning and waste from coal. This would make wind, Encyclopedia of Earth (Cleveland, CJ, ed), Chernobyl, disposal costs. This approach is solar, and other renewable sources Ukraine (Environmental Information Coalition, often used for mining operations to of energy, which have much smaller National Council for Science and the Environment, Washington, DC, 2009) [online]. www.eoearth.org/ ensure that the mines are properly subsidies and external costs, economi- article/Chernobyl,_Ukraine. reclaimed. In most countries there cally more competitive. 4. Costanza, R et al. The perfect spill: Solutions for are already some funds set aside How would nuclear power fare if averting the next Deepwater Horizon. Solutions for nuclear plant decommission- the subsidies were removed and the [online] 1(5), 17–20. www.thesolutionsjournal.com/ ing and waste disposal, but it is full costs internalized? It is hard to node/629. almost certainly not enough to predict, but the answer to whether 5. Koplow, D. Nuclear Power: Still Not Viable without Subsidies (Earth Track, Cambridge, MA, 2011). cover the real costs. The size of the nuclear power can be part of the 6. Epstein, PR et al. in Ecological Economics Reviews bond would reflect the worst-case energy solution lies in how the full (Costanza, R, Limburg, K & Kubiszewski, I, eds), scenario for decommissioning costs of nuclear compare with the Full cost accounting for the life cycle of coal, 73–98. and waste disposal and could be full costs of fossil fuel, hydro, and Special issue Annals of the New York Academy of lowered (or raised) as more infor- renewable energy. For example, most Sciences 1219 (February 2011). 7. Lenzen, M. Life cycle energy and greenhouse mation is accumulated about the people believe that nuclear energy is emissions of nuclear energy: A review. Energy real costs involved. either completely free of greenhouse Conversion and Management 49(8), 2178–2199 (2008). or contributes negligible Taking these steps would internal- amounts. However, this is not true ize many of the costs associated with when one considers the entire life nuclear power and would create a cycle of the nuclear power complex. system in which the price of electricity A 2008 study showed that if the price from nuclear plants more accurately of nuclear energy included the cost reflects the full costs and benefits of of greenhouse gases, nuclear power the technology to society. How much would cost more than not only fossil this would raise the price of electricity fuel technologies but also wind from nuclear plants would depend on energy.7 Including the cost of the risk the design of the plant, its location, of accidents and waste disposal, as how it is operated, how old it is, and discussed above, would raise the price other factors. This would give society significantly further. a better (and more discriminating) pic- So let’s remove the subsidies, ture of the true costs of nuclear power require nuclear power plants to be and would make comparing nuclear fully insured, and put aside adequate energy with other energy sources funds for decommissioning and long- more direct and rational. term radioactive waste disposal. Let’s We should do the same for other do the same for all energy sources. sources of energy as well, many of Then we can use the market mecha- which also receive huge subsidies. nism to find out whether nuclear For example, what consumers pay power plants should be part of the for electricity produced from fossil energy solution.

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