� Melvin R. Laird, Moderator @ THE AMERICAN ENTERPRISE IN­ EXECUTIVE STITUTE FOR PUBLIC POLICY RE­ COMMITIEE SEARCH, established in 1943, is a publicly supported, nonpartisan re­ Herman J. Schmidt search and educational organization. Chairman of the Board Its purpose is to assist policy makers, William J. Baroody scholars, businessmen, the press and President the public by providing objective William G. McClintock analysis of national and international Treasurer issues. Views expressed in the insti­ Richard J. Farrell tute's publications are those of the Dean P. Fite authors and do not necessarily reflect Richard B. Madden the views of the staff, advisory panels, officers or trustees of AEI. SENIOR STAFF ADVISORY BOARD Anne Brunsdale Paul W. McCracken, Chairman, Ed­ Director of Publications mund Ezra Day University Professor Joseph G. Butts of Business Administration, Univer­ Director of Legislative sity of Michigan Analysis R. H. Coase, Professor of Economics, Robert B. Helms University of Chicago Director of Health Policy Studies Milton Friedman, Paul S. Russell Dis­ tinguished Service Professor of Eco­ Thomas F. Johnson nomics, University of Chicago Director of Research Gary L. Jones Gottfried Haberler, Resident Scholar, Assistant to the President American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research for Administration Richard M. Lee C. Lowell Harriss, Professor of Eco­ Director of Planning nomics, Columbia University and Development George Lenczowski, Professor of Po­ Edward J. Mitchell litical Science, University of Califor­ Director, National nia, Berkeley Energy Project Robert A. Nisbet, Albert Schweitzer W. S. Moore Professor of the Humanities, Colum­ Director of Legal Policy bia University Studies James A. Robinson, President, Uni­ Robert J. Pranger versity of West Florida Director of Foreign and Defense Policy Studies Louis M. Thompson, Jr. Assistant to the President for Communication IS NUCLEAR POWER SAFE? @ Melvin R. Laird, Moderator @ Daniel Ford Craig Hosmer Ralph E. Lapp Lawrence I. Moss Ralph Nader An AEI Round Table held on May 15, 1975 at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research Washington, D.C. THIS PAMPHLET CONTAINS THE PROCEEDINGS OF ONE OF A SERIES OF AEf ROUND TABLE DISCUSSIONS. THE ROUND TABLE OFFERS A MEDIUM FOR INFORMAL EXCHANGES OF IDEAS ON CURRENT POLICY PROBLEMS OF NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL IMPORT. AS PART OF AEI'S PROGRAM OF PROVIDING OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE PRESENTATION OF COMPETING VIEWS, IT SERVES TO ENHANCE THE PROSPECT THAT DECISIONS WITHIN OUR DEMOCRACY WILL BE BASED ON A MORE INFORMED PUBLIC OPINION. AEI ROUND TABLES ARE ALSO AVAILABLE ON AUDIO AND COLOR-VIDEO CASSETTES. © HJ75 BY AMfcHICAN ENTERPRISE INSTJTUTE FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH, WASHINGTON, D.C. PERMISSION TO QUOTE FROM OR REPRODUCE MATERIALS IN THIS PUBLICATION IS GRANTED WHEN DUE ACKNOWLEDGMENT IS MADE. ISBN 0-8447-206�-2 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOG CARD NUMBER 75-34738 PRINTED IN UNITED STATES OF AMERICA LVIN R. LAIRD, Reader's Digest and the AEI National Energy Project; moderator of M the Round Table: We have a very interest­ ing topic to discuss today, Is nuclear power safe? Our panelists are five distinguished Americans. First, I would like to introduce former Congressman Craig Hosmer from California, who served in the Congress for eleven terms. He is a graduate of the University of Michigan Law School, served in the United States Navy in World War II, and retired from the Naval Reserve as a rear admiral in 1973. During his time in the House of Representatives, he served on the Joint Atomic Energy Committee and was its ranking minority member at the time he retired. He was known in the Congress as the real champion of nuclear power, a champion of nuclear power plants for the U.S. Navy and of nuclear power throughout the United States. Next is Ralph Nader. Mr. Nader, a graduate of Prince­ ton and the Harvard Law School, has been doing great research in the legal rights of the consumer. His book, Unsafe at Any Speed, published in 1965, dealt with the American automobile industry and automobiles in general. In 1969, he established the Center for the Study of Re­ sponsive Law, which has received and still receives a great deal of attention, as all of you know. At present, he is supporting in the Congress, through letters to various mem­ bers of the House and the Senate, the proposed Nuclear Energy Reappraisal Act, which would provide for a five­ year study of the safety and economic problems of nuclear power. 1 On my left is Laurence Moss, a very fine young man whom I first got to know in 1969 when he came to Wash­ ington as a White House fellow. He is a chemical engineer and a nuclear engineer; he has served as executive secre­ tary of the Committee on Air Quality and Power Plant Emission Control of the National Academy of Sciences. From 1973 to 1974, he was president of the Sierra Club. He has also served as chairman of the Federal Power Commission's Subcommittee on Environmental Aspects of Energy Production and Conservation. He is now chairman of the National Science Foundation Subcommittee on En­ vironmental Aspects of Energy Facility Siting. He is not speaking to us today as a member of those committees, however, but as an individual interested in this subject. Next to him is Dr. Ralph Lapp. A graduate of the University of Chicago, Dr. Lapp was associate physicist with Arthur Dempsters in the discovery of uranium-235. From 1943 to 1946, he was division director of one of the great laboratories at the University of Chicago, which was dealing in this field of research. He is now a consultant for the Senate Public Works Committee and also for the General Accounting Office, an arm of the United States Congress. He is the author of a recently published book, Nader's Nuclear Issues, 1975. The last member of our panel is Daniel Ford, who received his B.A. degree in economics from Harvard. He then worked as a technical interrogator in the AEC's rule­ making hearings on emergency cooling systems, as co­ ordinator of environmental research for the Harvard eco­ nomic research project, and as a consultant on atomic energy regulations to the Senate Government Operations Committee. He is now executive director for the Union of Concerned Scientists. The union is involved in a number of studies on the impact of advanced technology upon society and provides technical information on the nuclear program to environmental groups around the country. We will first have an opening statement from Con­ gressman Craig Hosmer. CRAIG HOSMER, former member of Congress (Republi­ can, California): Thank you, Mel. One problem of nuclear 2 safety is that it is something like relative humidity; you must ask yourself, compared to what? And you also have to ask, what are the costs and what are the benefits, what are the risks and the rewards? For instance, this country must get 20 percent of its entire energy supply from overseas, and 40 percent of its gasoline and oil. So what is the risk of continued depen­ dence on imported energy to turn the wheels of this coun­ try, to keep the men employed in the factories-what is the risk of continued dependence on foreign oil? We could have our own domestic energy supply and energy inde­ pendence if we increased the use of coal and nuclear power and displaced the imported oil. We have to ask ourselves, what's the comparison of risks? Is it wise for a country like ours to continue to bear these overseas risks? And also, is it wise for our country to continue to pay more than it has to for its power-because nuclear power is cheaper than other kinds of power? One risk we shouldn't hear about anymore is the one that most people think is inherent in nuclear reactors­ and that's the risk of their exploding. Mr. Nader, himself, denied that one on 28 April in a hearing in the Congress when he said, "No, these things won't explode." The other risk that people worry about is that nuclear power plants will release some radioactivity-and there is a possibility of that happening. But our best scientists tell us that that possibility, that risk, isn't very large. For instance, the Rasmussen study indicates that the risk of a loss-of-fluid accident releasing radioactivity is about 1 in 250,000 for a hundred reactors. Now that, indeed, is a very, very small risk to take in return for independence from overseas oil, jobs for people here at home, and so on. As we get into this discussion today, I intend to hark back to that subject, because we simply cannot consider this topic in isolation. We have to consider it as you do every other human activity-in the context of risks versus benefits, what is best for the individual, what is best for the country. MR. LAIRD: Ralph Nader? 3 RALPH NADER, Center for the Study of Responsive Law and consumer advocate: I think we should look at our energy future in two directions. One direction would focus on rigorous energy conservation. We waste at least 40 per­ cent of the energy in this country. We consume per capita more than twice the energy that the Swedes and West Germans consume, and they have very high standards of living. If we prevented this waste and consumed energy efficiently, if we controlled the pollution from the fossil fuels that we have in considerable abundance in this coun­ try and if we initiated a program of research and develop­ ment in order to phase in solar and geothermal energy over a forty- to fifty-year period, we would pursue a path of employment, of safety, of respect for future generations, of respect for our environment-a program that would re­ duce inflation, reduce pollution, and enhance the ability of this country to raise the capital it needs for other areas besides energy.