Understanding "Green" Attitudes Towards Nuclear Power in The UK

i
Dissertation: Understanding green attitudes to

nuclear power in the UK

Andrew Child, MSc Climate Change Management, Birkbeck College, University of
London. Submission: September 15, 2014
I certify that the work submitted is my own and that I have duly acknowledged
any quotation from the published or unpublished work of other persons
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Executive summary
Over the last 10 years the UK has witnessed a government-led reframing of nuclear
power as a means of climate change mitigation, which has been accompanied by a
softening of domestic opposition to this traditionally most controversial of energy
sources. While this reframing has had a limited positive impact on the attitude of
the general population, according to the academic literature, little attention has been
paid to the opinion of greens in the UK in relation to nuclear power. The present
research seeks to examine these attitudes, especially in light of leading greens
abandoning the traditional antipathy of the movement to themselves reframe
carbon as a much-needed low-carbon energy source. The research finds that the
terrain of the debate among greens may be shifting from around nuclear power such
as weapons proliferation to focus on issues like cost and the involvement of big
business. While the pro-nuclear views of writers and campaigners such as Mark
Lynas and George Monbiot appear to be shared by a sizeable minority of greens, the
successful development and deployment of alternative nuclear technologies such as
thorium or fast breeder reactors said to address green concerns over waste may
be needed if there is to be any hope of building a green pro-nuclear consensus.
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CONTENTS

Figures & tables
Acknowledgements
1. Introduction, aims and objectives
1.1 Research background
1.11 Government reframing of nuclear power
1.12 Prominent greens break ranks
1.13 Characteristics of green reframing of nuclear
(i) Fukushima highlights reliance on nuclear for carbon mitigation
(ii) Reappraising nuclear safety
(iii) The benefits of alternative nuclear technology
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1.2 Research objectives
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1.21 Why the focus on green attitudes?
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1.22 Why do Green attitudes towards nuclear power matter?
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1.23 Research questions
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2. Literature review
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2.1 Current public opinion
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2.2 Response to reframing
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2.3 A glimpse of the green response?
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2.4 Summary: a confusing picture
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3. Research methodology
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3.1 Addressing the gaps in existing research
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3.2 Survey design
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3.3 Survey distribution
25
3.4 Timeframe & analysis
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4. Overview of survey results
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(i) Section 1: General info
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(ii) Section 2: Environmental outlook & values
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(iii) Section 3: Existing nuclear technology
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(iv) Section 4: Future nuclear
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4.1 Attitude types
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5. Interviews/discussion
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5.11 Nuclear enthusiast
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5.12 Conditional nuclear supporter
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5.13 Nuclear sceptic
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5.14 Nuclear refuser
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5.2 Research critique
52
6. Conclusions
54
6.1 Policy implications
56
References
59
Appendices
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Appendix 1: Copy of online survey
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Appendix 2: Breakdown of survey data
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Appendix 3: Survey Comments
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3.1 Edited selected comments from Section 2: Environmental outlook & values

87

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3.3 Edited selected comments from Section 4: Future nuclear
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Appendix 4: Interview transcripts
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4.1 Nuclear enthusiasts
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4.2 Conditional nuclear supporters
101
4.3 Nuclear sceptics
108
4.4 Nuclear refusers
117
Figures & tables

Figure 1. Greens see local opposition limiting a perceived high potential for
renewables to meet the UKs energy needs. Is this pushing some towards nuclear as
it has for George Monbiot? P29

(Bar chart 1 Answers: Renewable energy can meet all the UKs energy needs)
(Bart chart 2 Answers: Current local opposition to onshore wind schemes in the
UK may severely limit the scale of renewable energy)

Figure 2. While waste is the overriding green concern, many more contemporary
concerns have come to the fore P32

(Bar chart 1 Answers: Nuclear power produces huge amounts of harmful waste
which cannot be safely stored)

(Bar chart 2 Answers: The financial cost of nuclear power is too great)
(Bar chart 3 Answers: Adding nuclear capacity in the UK could displace
renewables)

Figure 3. Survey answers and interviews suggest alternative technology may make
nuclear far more appealing to greens, but there is scepticism about its claims. P37

(Bar chart 1 Answers: If alternative nuclear technology can address concerns over
safety, waste and weapons proliferation, it should be considered)
(Bar chart 2 Answers: The claims made for alternative nuclear technology should
be treated with extreme caution)

Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Lambeth Green Party and the Federation of London Green Parties
for assisting in promoting the research as well as friends and colleagues who
provided vital insight and feedback. I am particularly indebted to all research
participants for the time they gave up and without whom this dissertation would not
have been possible.

1. Introduction, aims and objectives

1.1 Research background

1.11 Government reframing of nuclear power
Theres no disguising the fact that civilian nuclear power grew out of the
development of nuclear weapons and their requirement for plutonium (Mez 2012,
Doyle 2011, Penner et al 2008), created by burning (irradiating) uranium in a
nuclear reactor (WNA 2012). The initial framing of civilian nuclear power saw it
characterized as a cheap, clean and plentiful means of providing energy security,
especially amid the oil price shocks of the 1970s. This was accompanied by an
attempt to distance nuclear power from its military origins, typified in US President
Eisenhowers Atoms for Peace strategy (Mez 2012, Penner 2008). A serious
attempt to reframe nuclear power in the UK public sphere as a low carbon energy
source, capable of playing its part in mitigating climate change can be traced back to
the Energy Review published in July 2006 against a background of increasing alarm
over climate warming, declining North Sea oil and gas production and an ageing fleet
of nuclear power stations set to be decommissioned by 2025 (Doyle 2011, Pidgeon
et al 2008). This was swiftly followed by the publication of the Stern Review on the
economics of climate change in October of the same year, which emphasized the
need for early action on climate change mitigation (ibid). The public consultation
that lead up to the governments review was successfully legally challenged by
environmental group Greenpeace and there followed a second round of public
consultation in 2007 before the publication of an Energy White Paper in January
2008 which prepared the ground for a renewal of Britains nuclear fleet. The move
represented a U-turn for the Labour government, which had hitherto been
committed to phasing out nuclear power (Doyle, 2011). Instead nuclear was to make
a significant contribution to baseload power as the UK went on to set arguably the
most stringent legally binding carbon reduction targets in the world in the 2008
Climate Change Act: 80% on 1990 levels by 2050, and an interim reduction of 34%
by 2020 (Poortinga et al 2013). While official discourse over the period had
promoted both energy security and the new theme of carbon mitigation, the latter
was often ignored in dissemination of the issue in the UK media (Doyle 2011). As
pro-nuclear newspapers such as the Mail sought to simultaneously promote nuclear
power while challenging the scientific consensus on climate change the
governmental rebranding of nuclear as less risky than climate change is ignored, as
historically familiar nuclear discourses are redeployed. (Ibid, p121). It was
therefore open to question whether the governments nuclear-as-climate-mitigation
discourse had permeated the public consciousness.

1.12 Prominent greens break ranks
A second, distinct phase of reframing providing the starting point for this current
study was lead not by government but from two leading members of a broad-
based green movement in the UK which for so long had been at the forefront of
opposition to nuclear power, namely environmental campaigners and writers
George Monbiot and Mark Lynas. While this was in itself shocking to some,
especially many other UK environmental campaigners (Abbess 2011, Porritt 2011)
the greater surprise was perhaps in the timing of this coming out: in 2011 against
a background of the nuclear accident in Fukushima, Japan which followed a deadly
earthquake and tsunami and signs of waning commercial interest in the UKs nuclear
renewal programme (Macalister 2011). And it wasnt so much public opinion that
the two had in mind as the movement from which they came. While Monbiot took to
his regular column in the Guardian newspaper to exhort greens to adopt the new
creed (Monbiot 2011a,b,d), Lynas embarked on a series of books in addition to an
anchor role in a new film documentary (Lynas 2011a, 2013; Pandoras Promise,
2013).

As it had been for the Labour Party, embracing nuclear power also represented a U-
turn for Monbiot and Lynas. While the former had at times vehemently opposed
nuclear power and the vested interests that lay behind it (Monbiot 2009), Lynas had
by his own admission been in denial (Lynas 2011a, Pandoras Promise 2013).
Setting out his roadmap for a low carbon Britain Monbiot had originally rejected
nuclear power because of the industrys record of corner-cutting, because of its
association with the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and because of the
unresolved questions about waste disposal and the energy balance (Monbiot 2009,
p99), while reflecting on his previous position Lynas said recently I had a sneaking
suspicion nuclear was going to have to be part of the solution simply because it
doesnt produce carbon dioxide, but I didnt want to go there, I was too scared. Its
pathetic really looking back but you dont want to make enemies of your allies in the
environmental movement by tackling something very difficult, controversial
(Pandoras Promise, 2013).

1.13 Characteristics of green reframing of nuclear

(i) Fukushima highlights reliance on nuclear for carbon mitigation
Rather than being a coincidence Fukushima was very much a catalyst for the nuclear
proselytizing of Monbiot and Lynas, underscoring the low-carbon nature of nuclear
power. This was the first of what could be discerned as a three-pronged justification
of nuclear, the other two being a reappraisal of the risks and the promise of what
might be termed alternative nuclear energy technologies.

For both, the Fukushima disaster and some of the international responses to it
served to highlight nuclear powers contribution to the mitigation of carbon
emissions and climate change, and the implications of removing large chunks of
nuclear from the energy mix.

In the weeks following the Japanese disaster Monbiot started to sketch out the
argument in two columns respectively titled Why Fukushima made me stop
worrying and love nuclear power and The double standards of green anti-nuclear
opponents (Monbiot 2011a,b). He argues that that if the response to Fukushima is
to phase out nuclear power, the likely result will be to burn more coal or gas and
that a greater burden will be put on renewables as well as being expected to
displace coal they will be required to fill the void left by nuclear. Quoting research by
Lynas (2011b), he says that phasing out planned nuclear programmes in a number
of countries could add another degree to global warming. He also cites research
estimating that if development of planned new nuclear power stations in the UK
stalls, the result will be an increase of 9m tonnes of carbon dioxide for every year of
delay (Monbiot 2011b).

Lynas points out that the UK produced 25 per cent of its electricity from nuclear
power at its peak (Lynas 2013) and that France still enjoys the lowest per capita
emissions in the world thanks to its near 80% use of nuclear power (Lynas 2011a).
By 2005 he says nuclear power provided 5 per cent of global primary energy and 15
per cent of global electricity (Lynas 2013). He says the contribution could have been
higher had it not been for anti-nuclear campaigners whose actions lead to planned
nuclear plants being replaced by coal from the mid-70s onwards. Such campaigners
had unwittingly helped release tens of billions of tonnes of carbon dioxide into the
atmosphere (Lynas 2011a). The immediate post-Fukushima response of some
countries has lead to many millions more tonnes of CO2 being pumped into the
atmosphere each year. In Japan itself he says some additional 50m tonnes of carbon
a year will be released into the atmosphere as the result of the closure of all but two
of its nuclear power stations and the consequent additional imports of coal and gas
(Lynas 2013) It is a process Lynas refers to as refossilization and he notes its
emergence and potential emergence elsewhere. Outside of Japan, Germany has been
the epicentre of the worlds rejection of nuclear reaction, Lynas says. Having
generated 18% of Germanys electricity before Fukushima nuclear power will be
eliminated in the country by 2022. Having immediately shut down eight of its
nuclear power stations after the accident, Germany lost 32TWh of capacity 5TWh
greater than Germanys entire production of solar energy in 2012. As a result,
Germanys carbon emissions grew by 1.2 per cent in 2012, according to Lynas, who
says Germany is now despite making great strides in wind and solar energy one
of the few countries in Europe still opening new coal-fired power stations (Lynas
2013). He also notes plans for a nuclear exit in Belgium, Switzerland and the
Netherlands and says that in France, the accidental green man of Europe, nuclears
contribution to electricity production is likely to fall to 50% as a result of a deal with
the greens (ibid).

(ii) Reappraising nuclear safety

Lynas (2013, Pandoras Promise 2013) focuses attention on a sober reassessment of
the health impacts of the nuclear power plant disasters at Fukushima in 2011 and
Chernobyl in 1986 as well as the issue of waste. With regards to Fukushima, he says
only six workers were exposed to a dose of radiation in excess of 250mSv, the
maximum dose permitted in the US and Japan in life-saving emergency operations.
Citing among other sources the Japanese parliaments independent commission of
inquiry into the disaster, Lynas says that in addition a further 161 workers received
a dose of between 100mSv and 250mSv, while the average exposure for the several
hundred other TEPCO workers was around 25mSv. Stating that all such doses are
well below the threshold level of around 2,000mSv for radiation sickness, he quotes
the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation
(UNSCEAR) in May 2012: To date there have been no health affects attributed to
radiation exposure observed among workers, the people with the highest radiation
exposure. (Lynas, 2013, p45). Contrary to some of the media coverage, he says, the
only documented deaths attributable to Fukushima resulted from panic-stricken
attempts to avoid the radiation (ibid). Lynas goes on to quote a 2013 World Health
Organisation (WHO) report: For the general population inside and outside Japan,
the predicted risks are low and no observable increases in cancer rates above the
baseline are anticipated (Lynas, 2013, p47). Attempting to put the figures in some
kind of context, Lynas examines the extent of and variability in natural background
radiation. Noting that a reading 20mSv a year can be enough to trigger an
evacuation under international guidelines following a nuclear accident, Lynas draws
attention to two locations one in Iran, the other in Brazil, where readings as high
as 1,250mSv and 342mSv a year respectively have been recorded, apparently
without abnormal levels of associated cancer being observed (Lynas 2013,
Pandoras Promise 2013). In a nearby town to Fukushima, where refugees restrict
the outdoors exposure of their children, Lynas (2013) notes similar background
radiation readings to those found in Oxford: 1.5mSv verses 1.05mSv per year.

On the worlds worst nuclear power plant accident 25 years earlier in Chernobyl,
Lynas and others contrast the million associated deaths claimed by life-long anti-
nuclear activists such as Helen Caldicott with the 50 or so deaths estimated by the
UN, including 28 emergency workers from acute radiation sickness and 15 fatal
thyroid cancers (Pandoras Promise 2013, Lynas 2013). Anti-nuclear campaigners

[have been]exaggerating the threats of radiation far beyond what is scientifically
credible, doing real harm to people by labelling them as victims and insisting they
are doomed to suffer and die early, says Lynas (2013 p55).

Monbiot (2011a,b) focuses on placing nuclear in the context of safety surrounding
coal-based energy. He cites official Chinese government estimates of 2,433 deaths
from coal mining accidents alone in the country in 2010. While cautioning that this
figure is likely to be underestimating the real number by a factor of four, Monbiot
equates this to at least six people being killed in Chinese coal mines every day. Even
if you accept the official figure, he says, Chinese coal mining alone kills as many
people every week as the worst nuclear power accident in history the Chernobyl
explosion has done in 25 years. (Monbiot 2011b, p3). Added to this picture of coal
mining should be hideous lung diseases contracted by so many miners. Turning his
attention to concerns around low-level radiation Monbiot (2011b) says Green anti-
nuclear campaigners abandon the scientific objectivity they usually apply to issues
such as climate change. If it was the issue, they say it is, he argues they should turn
their attention to coal plants, drawing attention to research showing fly ash from a
coal plant putting 100 times more radiation into the surrounding environment on
an equivalent energy basis. Despite the localized effects of this he says, regulation
for disposing of fly-ash is much weaker than that for nuclear waste. On every
measure (climate change, mining impact, local pollution, industrial injury and death,
even radioactive discharges) coal is 100 times worse than nuclear power, he
concludes (Monbiot 2011a, p3)

On the issue of the safety of waste, Lynas (2013) makes it clear he believes that all
waste generated by commercial nuclear plants in the US is properly safeguarded and
poses little danger to the environment. Similarly in nuclear-powered France he says
all the nations reprocessed high-level waste is currently stored in a single facility
the size of a basketball court. The author also takes issue with fears over waste with
a long half-life or rate of decay, arguing that by definition it is not very radioactive
and that it becomes safer over time unlike common carcinogens and neurotoxins
associated with many industrial processes such as arsenic and mercury, which stay
dangerous forever. Lynas (ibid) says that instead the focus should be on waste with
medium-scale half-lives which generate significant amounts of radiation over

human lifetimes. In Pandoras Promise (2013) he summarizes his thoughts on the
issue: Volumetrically nuclear produces tiny amounts of wastecompare that to the
billions of tonnes of waste produced by coal-fired power stations. It completely
blows away most of the anti-nuclear arguments. Nuclear waste is not an
environmental issue. Its not something as an environmentalist that Im concerned
about. Taking into the relative, combined risks of different energy sources Lynas
(2013) concludes that in terms of deaths per terawatt-hour, other conventional
sources are significantly more dangerous than nuclear.

(iii) The benefits of alternative nuclear technology
Despite attempting to allay some of the concerns surrounding nuclear power,
nuclear-friendly Greens such as Monbiot and Lynas have promoted alternative
nuclear power technologies in part as a means of addressing traditional Green
objections, most notably the use of thorium fuel as an alternative to uranium, and
fast-breeder reactors.

With regards to thorium, both have drawn attention to the white metals abundance
in nature thought to be three to four times greater than uranium and the fact that
at present it is an unwanted byproduct of mining for rare earth minerals. This
means, they say, that it is a cheap fuel, which doesnt suffer from the health concerns
surrounding mining for fresh supplies of uranium. Additionally and perhaps more
importantly the use of thorium they point out results in a fraction of the long-term
and highly radioactive waste associated with conventional uranium fuel.
Furthermore, the authors repeat assertions that its proliferation potential is much
lower than that of uranium, due to the difficulty of extracting useable weapons-
grade material from its waste products. (Monbiot, 2013, 2011b,c,d, Lynas 2013)
While thorium can theoretically be used in conventional reactors with a
redesigned fuel core both talk about the fuel in the context of experimental Liquid
Flouride Thorium Reactors in which the fuel is mixed with the coolant in this case
molten salt. Such a design is said to be passively safe, meaning that the reactor shuts
itself down in the event of a system failure without the need for human intervention
or an external power supply. Such assertions appear well supported by more
academically-focused literature, which highlights how LFTRs optimize benefits of
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thorium fuel (Martin 2012, Schaffer 2013). Martin (2013) points out that part of the
reason that significantly less waste is produced is that thorium has a much higher
burnup meaning that more of its energy is used in the reactor when compared to
uranium. Aside from the passive features of the LFTR, Martin (ibid) also says the
potential for meltdown is avoided because thorium is not capable of fission or a
chain reaction, relying as it does on a starter fuel. Critics (Rees 2011) have
questioned the time in would take to develop thorium use on a commercial scale,
but the UK government has sanctioned the National Nuclear Laboratory to engage in
international research (Harrabin, 2013). Meanwhile India and China the former
having identified some of the worlds biggest reserves have stated their intention
to build fourth generation thorium reactors (Martin, 2012). It is also worth noting
that thorium fuel has received backing from the likes of Hans Blix, the former UN
weapons inspector and NASA climate scientist James Hansen (Harrabin 2013,
Martin 2012).

Similar arguments are made in favour of developing so-called fast-breeder reactors,
capable of burning the UKs large stockpiles of nuclear waste in particular depleted
uranium and plutonium, from which nuclear weapons could be made if it fell into
the wrong hands. Such reactors are capable of recycling or breeding this waste as
fuel, over and over again, extracting most of the energy bound up in it , while
producing negligible waste. It has been estimated that worlds largest store of
civilian plutonium at Sellafield could power the UK for 500 years if used in this way,
not only providing cheap and plentiful low-carbon energy, but overcoming the cost
and logistics of building long-term deep geological storage. Again, discussions
around fast breeder reactors are made in the context of developing an experimental
design known as the Integral Fast Reactor, which is another form of passive
reactor, and therefore said to be incapable of the sort of meltdown events seen in
Chernobyl and Fukushima (Monbiot 2013, 2012, 2011b,c,d, Pearce 2012, Lynas
2011a, 2013). In the all-important UK context, the technology has received the
cautious backing of Professor David MacKay, DECCs chief scientific advisor, in
particular a plan by US-based GE Hitachi to build a fast reactor at Sellafield, based on
its experimental Prism design (Clark 2012). And that is not all GEH has offered to
underwrite the financial cost of failure in order to test the technology (Monbiot
2012). Its a very elegant idea that we should try and use [the waste] as efficiently
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as possible. I definitely find it an attractive idea, says MacKay, adding: My position

as chief scientific adviser at DECC is that I think Prism is an interesting design and
Id like to see [details about its credibility] worked out. (Clark 2012, p2/3).
Timescale arguments have also been raised against commercialising the integral fast
reactor (Pearce 2012, Porritt 2013) as have question marks over whether the
processing of plutonium fuel could actually enhance the near to medium term
proliferation risk (Pearce, ibid).

Lynas (2013) also makes the point that while alternative nuclear technology or
Fourth Generation reactors are the ideal, Third Generation Plus reactors currently
being built in Europe and beyond feature significant safety improvements. In
contrast, the Fukushima and Chernobyl disasters were, he says, the result of the very
worst in western and Soviet designs respectively, with the latter even lacking a
containment building. Such 3G+ reactors have as standard a minimum of 72 hours of
passive safety built in.

1.2 Research objectives

1.21 Why the focus on green attitudes?
The reframing of nuclear as a vital low-carbon source of energy by Lynas, Monbiot et
al has been largely aimed at greens. Beyond the three-point message already
outlined, the authors exhort greens to overcome what might be termed a broader
tribal or ideological opposition. Drawing on their own previous beliefs and
involvement in the environmental movement they berate greens for their dismissal
of nuclear power as a technofix. They argue that climate change is ultimately a
technical problem requiring a technical solution and that greens have mistakenly
shunned the technology by taking a moral stance on the problem of climate change.
As a result greens are attempting to steer opinion away from the easiest solution
and therefore the one most likely to succeed in favour of a position which combines
(limited) renewables with fundamental behaviour and systemic change,
characterised by an overall reduction in energy demand, an active curbing of
economic growth and an anti big business mindset (Lynas 2013, 2011, Monbiot
2012, 2011a,b,d). For Lynas (2011a) this approach was epitomised by an
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environmental alliance called Klimaforum that made its presence felt at the
Copenhagen climate summit in 2009, under the slogan system change, not climate
change. For greens to actively oppose nuclear power in the view of Lynas is just as
bad for the climate as the textbook villains like the big oil companies (ibid, p11).
Instead, he argues, it is time for a new and far more pragmatic approach that does
not hold climate change hostage to a rigid ideology. (Lynas 2011, p54). Lynas and
Monbiot also accuse greens of being inconsistent in applying the rationality of
climate change science to their appraisal of low-carbon technologies. For Monbiot
(2011a,c)this has manifested itself in a failure to appreciate the stymying of the
potential for onshore wind by local opposition, not only the windfarms themselves,
but also the associated infrastructure. Beyond that criticises greens for their
preference for decentralised renewables power, which he believes is ineffective and
incapable of powering an advanced industrialised country such as Britain (Monbiot
2011a). He also highlights the ability of greens to focus on the cost of nuclear while
overlooking the scale of subsidies to renewables (Monbiot 2011b).

1.22 Why do Green attitudes towards nuclear power matter?
In the international context Lynas (2013) charts green movements turning from
cautious support in the early days of nuclear power to outright opposition by the
early to mid-70s. Against the background of fierce green demonstrations against
nuclear power nuclear power plants and in some cases entire programmes were
cancelled in countries from the US to Austria, Ireland and Spain on the other side of
the Atlantic. But as Lynas (2013) and Ramana (2013) have noted perhaps the most
profound reversal has been in Germany, where Green MPs in government have been
credited with bringing about the decision to shut down eight reactors in the
immediate aftermath of the Fukushima disaster and to phase out nuclear power
entirely by 2022.

In the UK context, the Green Party has been gaining ground and since 2010 has had
its first MP in Caroline Lucas, who as Monbiot (2011b) noted in a column about
Green double-standards over nuclear, has become something of a focus for anti-
nuclear sentiment. However, the greens look to be some way from laying hands on
the levers of central government power in a country with a first past the post voting
system and no tradition of grand coalitions.
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However, as Monbiot (2011c) suggests, green thought can be prevalent within the
political mainstream and in 2010 the Liberal Democrats went into coalition
government having called for much tougher targets in the 2008 Climate Act: a 40%
cut in carbon emissions by 2020, with a carbon neutral economy by 2050.
Furthermore, the partys last general election manifesto was firmly anti-nuclear: not
only did it not want a like-for-like replacement for the Trident nuclear deterrent, it
also opposed the new building of any new nuclear power stations (Liberal
Democrats 2010). While the decision to go ahead with nuclear power was enshrined
in the Coalition Agreement, Liberal Democrats only accepted this on the proviso
there was no government subsidy and that the industry would be highly regulated
(Mason 2013a). While the green Lib Dems werent sufficiently powerful in
coalition to prevent the go-ahead for nuclear renewal, the fact that the party was
handed the energy and climate change brief (Murray 2010) can lead us to speculate
that it was able to limit the ambitions of the policy, and that with a majority
government formed entirely of pro-nuclear Conservatives, things might have turned
out differently.

Externally, green NGOs in the UK have been seen to wield significant influence with
Greenpeace having brought a successful High Court challenge over a flawed initial
public consultation over nuclear renewal as well taking part in the subsequent
public consultation before withdrawing (Doyle 2008). Lynas (2011) has also noted
the important role played by Friends of the Earth in lobbying for the 2008 Climate
Change Act. While Lynas (2013) notes that such NGOs may have softened their anti-
nuclear stances in so far as no longer deploying dedicated anti-nuclear staff, it is
clear that one way or another greens may hold significant sway over the direction of
future nuclear policy.

1.23 Research questions
This research sets out to investigate and gain some understanding of current green
attitudes towards nuclear power and the values that underpin them, particularly at a
grass-roots level. The last point is important, because it will allow us to reflect upon
the degree of divergence between the policy of mainstream UK-based green
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organisations (see Green Party 2011, Greenpeace UK 2010) all of which are
officially anti-nuclear power and their probable supporter base. Indeed, if the
consensus is shown to be shifting they may have to engage with and reflect it over
time. The research aims to capture a broad cross-section of people who self-identify
as greens, spread across a range of support for or affiliation with different
organizations and values. Initially aiming to describe the nature and diversity of
nuclear views, the research asks to what extent they reflect an awareness of the
reframing context and to the extent that it is understood, the responses to it.
Answers to a range of specific questions are sought. What sort of proportions
support and oppose nuclear power, in what intensities and in what ways? Of those
that oppose it, are concerns of operational safety, waste and proliferation the
dominant concerns suggested by the reframing discourse? Or are other concerns
such as cost more prevalent? To what extent are perceived limitations of renewables
in terms of energy generation and public acceptance linked to support for nuclear
power? Are there other distinct characteristics and values that are linked to support
and opposition? (For example, a belief in the need for behaviour change or for a
reduction in the standard of living) Just how important is climate change to the
debate around nuclear power? Do other green issues or values play an important
role? To this end, to what extent are more traditional green values involved (i.e.
those that pre-date the climate change debate)? Is there an awareness of the
sensitivity of the nuclear debate as characterized by Monbiot, Lynas et al? Finally, to
what extent could the adoption of alternative nuclear technologies address primary
concerns surrounding nuclear power? These questions are raised in the context of
recent developments such as the Fukushima disaster as well as the prospect of shale
gas exploration in the UK and contemporary domestic debates about energy security
and fuel poverty. Taking all of this into account the research considers the extent to
which the findings fit the characterisation of green thought on nuclear as put
forward by Lynas and Monbiot. The research concludes by considering what
implications there might be for ongoing and future attempts to reframe nuclear
power as a low-carbon energy source.

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2. Literature review

2.1 Current public opinion
In the UK nuclear power remains one of the least popular forms of energy
generation, alongside coal and oil. Nevertheless since the early 2000s it has
experienced a steady erosion in opposition, which peaked during the cold war in the
immediate aftermath of the Chernobyl disaster in 1986 (Poortinga et al 2013a,
Corner et al 2011, Pidgeon et al 2008). Similar proportions of people now support
and oppose nuclear power in the UK (Poortinga et al 2013a), with the Fukushima
nuclear accident failing to make a discernable impact on opinion in contrast to Japan
and Germany. This has gone against the predictions of some researchers, who
thought another big nuclear accident could reignite latent fears, leading to a collapse
in public confidence (Corner et al 2011, Pidgeon et al 2008). The decline in UK
opposition over the last decade or so has coincided with the emergence of a
government-led reframing of nuclear as an important climate change mitigating
source of low carbon energy, which has become according to the somewhat limited
literature the dominant nuclear discourse, operating alongside that of energy
security (Corner et al 2011, Bickerstaff et al 2008, Pidgeon et al 2008). Most of the
key indicators show an increasingly favourable view of nuclear power, according to
Poortinga et al (2013a) who compare three representative Ipsos-Mori surveys
conducted in 2005, 2010 and 2013, though they appear not to perfectly replicate
each other. In terms of unconditional/unframed views, support for nuclear power
rose from 26% in 2005 to 32% in 2013, while those opposed fell over the same
period from 37% to 29%. The biggest group however are now those holding views
somewhere in between, edging up slightly from 36% in 2005 to 39% in 2013. It is
however the conditional questions which provide a bit more real world insight. A
similar number of people want nuclear power to continue at current levels or be
extended: 43% in 2005 verses 44% in 2013, while those wanting to see nuclear
power phased out or shut down have fallen by 10 percentage points from 50% in
2005 (and 47% in 2010) to 40% in 2013. The number concerned about nuclear
safety waste storage and accidents is substantial, but has fallen by even more,
from 58% in 2005 to 54% in 2010 and 47% in 2013. It is interesting to note that the
figure is lower than before Fukushima. The greatest fall over the period is among
those who think the risks of nuclear power outweigh the benefits from 41% in 2005
16
to 37% in 2010 and 29% in 2013. The 8% drop since 2010 is particularly striking.
Conversely, the proportion of people who believe the benefits of nuclear power
outweigh risks has increased from 32% in 2005 to 37% in 2013. But to put this all in
context, nuclear was the joint second least favoured means of producing electricity
in 2013, alongside oil at 34%, just one percentage point ahead of coal, while natural
gas was easily the most popular fossil fuel, ranked favourably among 59% of people.
Renewables received by far the highest levels of favourability, lead by solar on 77%,
hydro-electric on 72% and wind power on 64%. Biomass was the least favoured of
the main renewables with 48% (all Poortinga 2013a).

Poortinga et al (2013a,b) speculate as to a number of possible causes for the
durability of nuclear power in the UK in the wake of Fukushima, notably a possible
lack of reporting in Britain compared to other countries as well as a perception
among the public that the natural conditions (i.e. earthquakes) dont exist to allow
for a direct replication of the accident. Citing Butler et al (2011), the authors also put
forward a learning by experience narrative for the UK in which a belief was
promoted that the authorities would draw on the safety lessons of Fukushima and
incorporate them into more robust technologies and practices in nuclear new build.
Such a stance may have been predicated on the UKs better safety record vis--vis
Japan. Certainly the lack of a recent major incident seems to be reflected in the
stable polling on trust in regulation. Confidence that the British Government
adequately nuclear power in 2013 was at exactly the same level as in 2005 at 33%,
having risen to 39% in 2010. Agreement that current rules and regulations are
sufficient to control nuclear power has increased slightly, from 32% in 2005 to 34%
in 2013 (Poortinga et al 2013a). A similarly framed question put to the Japanese
public in 2008, elicited only 19% of agreement, perhaps indicating the loss of trust
that had already been established through a number of safety breaches. In 2011 in
the immediate aftermath of Fukushima, this figure fell to 9% (Poortinga et al
2013b).

2.2 Response to reframing
A limited literature has sought to specifically assess the impact on UK public opinion
of the government-led reframing of nuclear power as carbon-mitigating low-carbon
energy source. While its findings provide the basis for further research, its
17
examination of the nature of the reframing and means by which it has been
communicated is particularly thin.

Bickerstaff et al (2008) provide one of the early studies of this reframing, utilising
survey data and focus groups. They characterise the reframing as a risk-risk trade-
off in which issues with nuclear power are acknowledged but at the same time
presented as being far outweighed by the potential impact of climate change. The
authors describe a narrative drawing in a range of actors from senior politicians and
advisors to industrial actors and scientists. Brian Wilson, a Labour energy minister
in 2004 is quoted responding to a somewhat cautious Energy White Paper: I think
the debate is moving in the direction of recognising nuclear power as an essential
part of a low carbon energy mix (Bickerstaff et al 2008, p148), while in the same
year Lord May, president of the Royal Society and a former Chief Scientific Advisor,
says it will be difficult for Britain to lead the way on climate change in the mid-term
future without building new nuclear power stations. (ibid, p149). At the same
prime minister Tony Blair is cited as being keen not to rule out the future use of
nuclear if we are to meet our carbon targets (Bickerstaff et al 2008, p149). The
Nuclear Industry Association, the trade alliance for British nuclear companies, is
described as highlighting the shortcomings of other energy alternatives without
completely dismissing them, thus enabling it to advocate a place for nuclear at the
heart of a diversified energy mix (ibid). While portraying the reframing of nuclear as
an acknowledgement of its historic unpopularity as well as the need to have public
opinion onside in enacting contemporary energy policy (especially on the scale
required to help meet carbon targets), Bickerstaff et al (2008) doubt its efficacy in
markedly bolstering support. Noting the lack of consistent support in their focus
groups, the authors describe a rejection of the basis for the risk-risk trade-off. While
issues such as waste create an immediate and palpable sense of dread, climate
change despite high levels of awareness and concern - is seen as a more remote,
less tangible issue. They also describe a generalised scepticism of governmental
institutions that serves to work against the credibility of science-based arguments.
Only two of 32 individuals in the focus groups were consistently prepared to
conditionally accept nuclear power expansion on the basis of climate change
mitigation. To grow that number the researchers had to allow participants to
renegotiate a position of reluctant acceptance, which was able to express deep
18
concerns surrounding nuclear power while accepting the logic of climate change
mitigation. Such positions also created counter-narratives focusing on economic
arguments and renewable energy technologies (Bickerstaff et al 2008). The authors
suggest other forms of reframing would be more productive, especially if they
focused on energy security and landscape concerns. They also say a better
understanding of the dynamics of trust in the debate is also required.

An analysis of the results of survey data from 2005 by Pidgeon et al (2008)
suggested that conditions for a risk-risk trade-off in the low carbon framing of
nuclear power might be favourable with 82% of the public expressing concern about
climate change verses 59% for nuclear, ranking 16 out of 17 in a league table of
environmental issues. While nuclear appeared to be less favoured than fossil fuels
overall without framing, presenting a low carbon risk-risk trade-off nevertheless
once again proved problematic, with the public wanting to express a preference for
renewables, lifestyle change and energy efficiency in tackling climate change.
Nuclear tended to be seen in a more favourable light when framed in terms of an
energy mix. Almost half of the sample (48%) believed we needed nuclear power
because renewable sources would not be sufficient on their own, while almost two-
thirds believed that reliability of electricity supply would need to be ensured
through a mix of energy options, including nuclear. The reference to issues of energy
security is clear. Pidgeon et al (2008) suggest that the relative newness of the
climate change issue presents problems for reframing nuclear in this context as well
as some strong pre-formed opinions about nuclear, which may limit the ability of
government actors to influence by providing contextual information. This appeared
to be born out in the lack of difference between statement and control groups in
the survey. Equally, the authors note the existence of those with only contingent,
part-formed views who do not give the issues consideration on a regular basis.
These have to actively construct their viewpoint. While such people may give
policymakers some reason for hope they also illustrate the authors point about
there being a lack of a single/stable public opinion on which policy operate. Despite
confirming the reluctant acceptance of nuclear power in the face of climate change
framing, Pidgeon et al (2008) note a distinct characteristic among the public that
might be termed fatalistic acceptance. In other words, when asked about energy
futures, people said they expected nuclear to be part of the mix (regardless of their
19
preferences). Almost half of respondents agreed that nuclear would make a

substantial contribution to supplies of electricity, with much lower agreement for
coal and oil. The authors say this is consistent with research conducted in the 90s
showing people are consistently more positive about nuclear power when asked
about its role in the future. Another finding of the survey deserves perhaps a little
more attention than the authors grant it, and that is what appears to be a concern
that the development of nuclear power could displace renewables: some 61% of
respondents said they would accept future nuclear power as long as renewable were
developed and used concurrently (Pidgeon et al 2008). On a separate point the
authors also note the findings of other research showing the discrepancy between
public opinion on energy and support for specific energy projects. Perhaps this is
why all but two of the governments shortlisted sites for nuclear renewal were the
locations for existing nuclear power stations (Corner et al, 2011). Bickerstaff et al
(2008) note that there is often surprisingly substantial support among populations
close to nuclear power facilities, who cite the contribution they make to the local
economy.

2.3 A glimpse of the green response?
Corner et al (2011) provide perhaps the closest examination to date of government-
led low carbon/climate change mitigation reframing of nuclear power in the UK,
giving some specific consideration to the effect that it might have on those with
strong climate change and environmental concerns. Using a sophisticated method of
ranking and categorising respondents in their 2010 representative survey according
to energy, climate change and broader environment-related questions, the authors
found that those with strong climate change values were negatively associated with
unconditional support for nuclear power. This negative association also applied to
those with broader environmental concern such as preserving nature and
preventing pollution- as well as those with strong energy security values. Despite
this, climate change and energy security framing appears to have galvanised support
for nuclear power for people in general. Thus unconditional support for nuclear in
2005 and in 2010 (the authors survey) of around 35% rose to beyond 50%
conditional support when given a climate change frame. And when nuclear was
framed in terms of an energy mix to ensure energy security, conditional support
rose beyond 60% in 2005 and 70% in 2010. But the framing didnt make those with
20
climate change and energy security concerns any more likely to conditionally
support nuclear. When framing was expressed in terms of reluctant acceptance,
those with climate change, environmental and energy security concerns were more
likely to conditionally accept nuclear power, but it was only when respondents were
allowed to express their unease about nuclear power that such values became a
positive predictor of conditional support. The authors therefore conclude that
attempts to reframe nuclear power, especially in terms of climate change, would not
readily mesh with those holding strong environmental values.
Jones et al (2012) found little evidence for the general efficacy of a climate change
reframing in their study, which set participants the task of creating of creating an
energy mix to meet energy demand. Participants set a low-moderate reliance on
nuclear power in both control and climate change framing groups, with a bias
heavily in favour of renewables. The authors suggest that the lack of difference
might be evidence for strong pre-formed opinions. However, they also note that the
levels chosen for nuclear power reflect those currently existing in the UK this
might be evidence for peoples preference for a degree of status quo. Nevertheless,
Jones et al (2012) found that there was a noticeable increase in the share given to
renewables in the climate change frame group, in addition to a reduced reliance on
coal.

Analysing the most recent polling data, Poortinga et al (2013a) confirm the findings
of Corner et al (2011) that climate change framing substantially increases
conditional support for nuclear power among the general public. However, they note
that the effect of this framing appears to be diminishing. Fewer people (47%) were
willing to accept the building of new nuclear power stations to tackle climate change
in 2013 than they were in 2010 (56%) and 2005 (55%). Still, the effect of framing is
seen to boost support for nuclear power by around 15% in 2013, given that the
unconditional figure was 32%. The authors note that the reduction in the
conditional acceptance of climate change framing for nuclear power has coincided
with an erosion of the high levels of belief in and concern surrounding climate
change in the last few years. The proportion of the British public who believe the
worlds climate is changing fell from 91% in 2005, according to the authors, to 72%
in 2013. Conversely, those who refute the existence of climate change rose from just
4% in 2005 to 19% in 2013. Concern about climate change fell from 71% to 60% in
21
the three years to 2013 (Poortinga et al 2013a). The authors suggest that the 2008
financial crisis as well as the influence of sceptical voices in the media may have had
a bearing on these figures. While not directly addressing the issue of framing on
those with strong climate change and other environmental beliefs, Poortinga et al
(2013b) note the desire of survey respondents to first explore non-nuclear options
in tackling climate change. In 2005 the percentage of those agreeing with the
statement We shouldnt think of nuclear power as a solution for climate change
before exploring all other energy options was in the mid 70s, though this had
moderated to the high 60s by 2010. However, in Poortinga et al (2013a) the gap
between a preference for nuclear power and renewables appears to be rapidly
closing. Here the authors express it as a ratio albeit one which has reduced from one
which favoured renewables by 10:1 in 2005 verses 4:1 in 2013.

2.4 Summary: a confusing picture
All of the above makes for something of a confusing picture, but the essential points
to summarise seem to be these: nuclear power remains highly contentious,
especially when compared to renewable forms of energy. Nevertheless public
opinion over the last decade had been moving in favour of nuclear power at a brisk
pace, perhaps aided at times by framing of nuclear power as a means of
mitigating climate change, depending on the context and means of communication.
However, this framing appears to have had a stronger effect on the general opinion
(perhaps those with weak to moderate views on climate change and wider
environmental issues) rather than those who might be considered greens. The latter
appear to reluctantly support nuclear power in a climate change mitigation frame
under very limited circumstances. Recent research by Truelove and Greenberg
(2013) in the US context may be relevant here: they found that 27% of people
thought that nuclear power itself was a significant contributor to climate, while 29%
thought it was a moderate cause. We can speculate about whether a large
proportion of greens believe this to be the case. It is not clear from the data
presented by the authors. Separately, there is some evidence that energy security
framing is having a beneficial effect on conditional support for nuclear power.
Indeed, Poortinga et al (2013b) cite the percentage of those backing nuclear under
this frame rising from the mid-50s to low 60s between 2010 and 2011.

22
Amid the focus on climate change and energy security frames, an interesting
footnote is provided by Teravainen et al (2011) who contrasts the state orientation
towards nuclear energy in Finland, France and the UK. In contrast to Finlands
technology and industry know best orientation and the French government
knows best, the UKs state orientation is described as being markets know best in
which free market mechanisms are presented as being the arbiter of the energy mix.
We can perhaps speculate that such an orientation has not gelled well with a more
command and control orientated climate change framing. Indeed, as the authors
point out, it was undermined when ministers felt impelled to raise the possibility of
state support for nuclear in the latter days of the Labour government in order to
keep the lights on in other words energy security framing.

3. Research methodology

3.1 Addressing the gaps in existing research
As we have seen from the literature review there is very little that considers green
views on nuclear power and the response to reframing and a complete absence of
research that specifically targets greens as a study group. Perhaps because of this
the tension between green concerns for climate change and the climate change
framing of nuclear power remain opaque. Furthermore none of the existing
literature sought to isolate the effect of such a framing being made by fellow greens,
not least their advocacy for alternative nuclear technologies. Nor did it consider
green views on nuclear power in relation to the aftermath of Fukushima and in the
context of the rapidly evolving debate around fracking in the UK (Vaughan 2013).
The impact of a faltering UK nuclear renewal process in which a number of
interested developers have recently withdrawn on cost grounds also remained to be
investigated (Monbiot 2013, Macalister 2011).

The current research sought to begin to address some of these gaps in our
understanding by identifying a cross section of greens willing to complete an online
survey and take part in a follow-up interview. Given the vagaries of defining who
constitutes a green and their proportion in the population the emphasis of the
research was qualitative rather than seeking anything that could be considered
23
statistically representative. The aim was to get an overview of the potential diversity
of views on nuclear power and build up thick descriptions of each type (contingent
upon the responses, drawing on Corner et al 2011): Nuclear Enthusiast (supporter),
Conditional Supporter, Nuclear Sceptic (reluctant supporter), Nuclear Refuser
(outright opponent).

3.2 Survey design (see Appendix 1 for survey in full)
The survey itself was designed in Google Docs, which combines ease of use with
strong analytics, and was divided into four broad sections: General Info,
Environmental Oulook & Values, Existing Nuclear Technology and Future Nuclear.
General Info covered variables such as gender, age group, support for organisations
and political parties, and relevant professional and educational background. The
three remaining sections surveyed attitudinal data, largely by means of a five-point
Likert scale, which was chosen for its clarity and familiarity, being regularly used in
public opinion polls and academic research. Such a forced choice method of
ascertaining opinion has been identified as having particular advantages over
check-all formats in encouraging a deeper processing of response options without
posing acquiescence or non-response issues (Smyth et al 2006). Assurances with
regards to the anonymous processing and presentation of the data were clearly
stated. Furthermore, respondents were invited to provide additional comments at
the end of each section. The second section, Environmental Outlook & Values, sought
to identify underlying green values in order to be able to attempt to correlate these
with views on nuclear power. Drawing on personal experience and values identified
by Lynas (2011, 2013), Monbiot (2009,2011b,d) and Porritt (1989, 2011, 2013) as
well as in the academic literature (Doyle 2007, 2011; Kaelberer 1993; Rudig and
Lowe 1986), the survey asked respondents to assess a range of statements covering
eco-centric, anthropocentric, pragmatic, markets-orientated, technology-focused
and behaviour-centred viewpoints. This section also assesses general attitudes
towards renewables and fossil fuels. The third section, Existing Nuclear Technology,
as the name suggests, assessed attitudes towards currently deployed conventional
nuclear power in the UK, addressing issues such as safety, waste, terrorism,
weapons proliferation, as well as cost and the aftermath of Fukushima. Positive as
well as negative statements were presented in order to assess the strength of
nuclear positive as well as anti-nuclear sentiment and to try to present the debate in
24
an even-handed manner. The final section, Future Nuclear, assessed opinion on the
claims made in favour of alternative nuclear technologies such as fast breeder
reactors and thorium fuel. It provided three short paragraphs of context, which
supplemented three paragraphs of introduction to the debate over the green climate
mitigation framing of nuclear power at the very beginning of the survey. Both
provide references to easily accessible, non-technical background information, from
a pro and anti perspective.

3.3 Survey distribution
The starting point was to disseminate the survey via local and regional networks of
the Green Party of England and Wales, specifically Lambeth Green Party and London
Green Party. I aimed to leverage my profile as a former activist, volunteer press
officer and local by-election candidate to gain attention for the research as well as
establish a degree of trust and reassurance as to my intentions, given the potentially
divisive nature of the research. While the research wasnt intended to specifically
focus on Green Party views on nuclear, this approach was intended to provide a
platform for the research. An email with a hyperlink to the survey as well as a
succinct outline of the research was initially sent to the 240-strong membership of
Lambeth Green Party at the end of April 2014. This was swiftly followed by the
inclusion of the same information in monthly emailed newsletter to around 3,000
members of the London Green Party from the party coordinator. The information
was also sent to several dozen people on an informal academic climate change email
group. In all instances recipients were encourage to share the survey with green-
minded people in their wider personal networks. In addition to these emails social
media was utilized to further distribute the survey. My personal Twitter account,
followed by some 1,400 people including many greens was used to post the link, and
it was also targeted or tweeted at certain green individuals and green groups. The
message was retweeted or relayed by three noteable accounts namely the
Campaign Against Climate Change (@campaigncc) with more than 4,000 followers
and Green Liberal Democrats (@GreenLibDems) with in excess of 2,500 followers,
and the local activist account Brixtonite (@Brixtonite) with more than 5,500
followers. Facebook was also utilised and the survey link and information was
posted on pages hosted by a range of green groups and individual including
Lambeth Green Party, Friends of the Earth (in England Wales and N Ireland),
25
Greenpeace (UK), WWF-UK, CPRE, Mark Lynas and Energy from Thorium.
Additionally a posting was made on the page of my local online newspaper, the
Brixton Blog, as well as my personal Facebook page. While pages belonging to the
likes of Greenpeace UK have hundreds of thousands of followers, it is not easy to
estimate reach given the rapid turnover of information. Nevertheless this additional
social media promotion was aimed at reaching people well beyond the confines of
the Green Party.

3.4 Timeframe & analysis
The survey was piloted over the February/March 2014 period with a small group of
selected people including a senior academic and a former pollster, both with
extensive experience of social surveys. The feedback primarily helped to streamline
the survey to ensure it remained both engaging but also possible to complete within
an aimed-for five-minute window. The latter was important as it was felt that if it
became too onerous, it could be biased towards those with strong pro or anti-
nuclear power views (i.e. those most interested and motivated by the subject
matter).

Responses to the survey were accepted over a three-week period between April 29
and May 19, 2014, with 128 individuals completing the survey. This was whittled
down to a valid 112. While there were no compulsory questions, one or two
responses were too incomplete to provide satisfactory analysis and so were
removed. Likewise, those failing to self-identify as greens or those residing abroad
were also discounted to avoid distorting the intended sample. One duplicate was
also removed.

The responses were loaded into a spreadsheet and analysed using Google analysis
and SPSS software. A statement in the third section Nuclear power is preferable to
fossil fuels was intended to be a key determinant of attitude, and was used to give
each participant a provisional categorisation of favourability towards nuclear power
as previously outlined: namely Nuclear Enthusiast, Conditional Nuclear Supporter,
Nuclear Sceptic and Nuclear Refuser. Those strongly agreeing with the statement
were marked enthusiast, while respondents agreeing with deemed conditional
26
supporters. Respondents giving a neutral answer were categorised as sceptics,

while participants who disagreed or strongly disagreed were marked as refusers.
The provisional categorisation was weighed against an aggregate score calculated
for each participant according to the response given to each of the 14 Likert
statements in the third section. For negative statements, strong agreement was
scored four, agreement three, a neutral response two, disagreement one and
strong disagreement zero. For positive statements the scores were reversed. The
exception to this system of scores was for the statement on the desirability of
nuclear over fossil fuels, which rose in increments of four from zero for strong
agreement to 16 for strong disagreement. This was in recognition of the importance
of the statement. Final aggregate scores of 0-16 were marked enthusiast, 17-34
conditional supporter, 35-51 sceptic and 52-68 refuser. Strong additional
comments were also considered. If there was found to be a serious discrepancy
between the provisional categorisation and the scored ranking and comments, the
final categorisation was reviewed and revised accordingly. Most revisions were
applied to the middle two categories.

One of the primary objectives in this exercise was to identify a range of people to
interview. While no prior assumptions were made about the proportions of each, the
research aimed to secure two interviews from each category from those
respondents who had agreed to provide contact details eight in total. In the event
10 people were interviewed between May 24 and June 16: three Nuclear
Enthusiasts, two Conditional Nuclear Supporters, three Nuclear Sceptics and two
Nuclear Refusers. Interviews were semi-structured, enabling nuclear power to be
flexibly discussed in the round or in the context of green values and attitudes
towards other energy sources. Interviews were scheduled to last for 30 minutes,
though some were extended by 30 minutes with the consent of the interviewee.
They were conducted over the phone and face to face. All interviews were digitally
recorded and notes taken concurrently. The interviews were then transcribed and
analysed and contrasted with initial survey responses and comments.

4. Overview of survey results (see Appendix 2 for statistical survey breakdown
and Appendix 3 for survey comments)

27
(i) Section 1: General info

In terms of the first general information section it is interesting to note the large
minorities of people with formal environmental knowledge: some 25% reported
they either were or had been employed in an environmental role, while 30% had
obtained or were studying for an environmental qualification. However, the level of
formal knowledge does not appear to correlate with a particular position on nuclear
power. In terms of support for environmental organisations, this is focused on
Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth, accounting for 45% of the total expressing an
affiliation. What might be characterised as more conservative, less protest-
orientated conservation-focused groups such as National Trust, English Heritage
and CPRE received substantially less reported support. The three together account
for 21%. Perhaps unsurprisingly given the survey methodology, political support is
heavily weighted toward the Green Party, recording 66%, with Labour scoring 17%
in second, and the Liberal Democrats 10% in third. Note, in both the environment
NGO and political support questions, respondents were allowed to express support
for more than one.

(ii) Section 2: Environmental outlook & values
In the second section of the survey on Environmental Outlook & Values, particular
items stand out. While there is high agreement on the technical potential of
renewables, with 60% agreeing or strongly agreeing that renewable energy could
meet all the UKs energy needs, 79% also agree or strongly agree that local
opposition could limit their scale. The conclusion many have reached that this may
leave the UK with an energy deficit seems to have pushed some towards at least
some nuclear, as the following comment suggests:
Because of its ambient nature, I do not understand how renewable energy sources
can meet all our needs, except in collaboration with other countries and their
renewable infrastructure over great distances e.g. using the Interconnector to access
surplus from Europe. It would still be necessary, however, to have backup sources,
such as natural gas plants with carbon capture and storage, or nuclear energy
(unless we can solve the vital problem of long term storage of great quantities of
energy i.e. get better batteries).

28
The quote neatly addresses the link between some of the key issues, including the
need for energy storage if renewables are to provide a high proportion of the UKs
energy a ready solution to which is still outstanding. In a similar vein, another
survey comment raises the issues of timescale in developing energy sources, giving
the pressing nature of climate change, and perhaps raises the possibility of nuclear
as a transitional energy source:

It's hard to answer 'Renewable energy can meet all the UK's energy needs' because
the answer depends on timescale. Today it's NO. By 2050 it might be yes The
politically critical question is medium term and I think the answer is still no.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Figure 1. Greens see local opposition limiting a perceived high potential for
renewables to meet the UKs energy needs. Is this pushing some towards
nuclear as it has for George Monbiot?

29

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It is clear that some have turned to a different solution, that of drastic energy
reduction, which 88% of people agree or strongly agree, is necessary.

There's not enough time to build green energy supplies in the short term, we must
use demand side reductions to buy us time, whilst building green energy as fast as
possible, says one respondent.

However, the fact that the majority of items in this section produce majority
agreement may well suggest that the majority of people want to see an all of the
above approach which includes R&D, a diverse energy mix from existing sources,
combined with a degree of energy efficiency and behaviour change. Such an
approach is well summed up in the following comment:

Climate change, I believe, can be seen as the culmination of many factors, over
consumption, poor education, growing global financial equality, lack of technological
development, poor government investment and leadership.

The most contentious measures in this section attracting less than a majority
concern broad philosophical approach to the environment and opinion on living
30
standards and world population growth. While there is a clear majority agreeing
that the welfare of people is the most important reason to tackle climate change
(69%), the alternative proposition, suggesting the natural world as the prime
motivation is substantially less, at 45%. While the two are not exclusive
propositions, it suggests that the sample has more of an anthropocentric view than
an ecocentric one. Linked to levels of energy consumption was the statement a
reduced standard of living may have to be the price we pay for tackling climate
change. This is a point of view expressed by greens such as Simms (2009).
Nevertheless, only 45% agreed or strongly agreed with this, with 39% disagreeing
or strongly disagreeing.

While clearly many people felt that we cant carry on in a business as usual fashion
in terms of the way the economy is currently structured and the present degree of
consumption, there was a reluctance to characterise the perceived need for change
in these terms. The following two comments express this point:

A reduced standard of living may have to be the price we pay for tackling climate
change is a strange question. Do we need to make some drastic changes? Yes. Does
this mean maybe driving less and flying less and having fewer products in the
supermarket? Yes. Does this mean maybe a different relationship to technology?
Maybe. But do I believe that all these changes of living equal a reduced standard of
living, no. I think this is just a different way of living.

Define 'standard of living' - lower material standard will most likely be required,
but that may lead to healthier and happier societies i.e. an improved standard of
living.

A final item, teeing up the third section of the survey asked respondents to choose
the energy source they would least like to see in the UKs energy list from a list of
fracked gas, natural gas, nuclear and wind (coal with twice the carbon emissions of
natural gas was deemed to be too easy an option for greens to target). Its clear from
this that fracking has replaced the traditional bte noir of greens, with 78 per cent of
respondents choosing it. However, a small number also made the additional
31
comment of nuclear as well suggesting it was a close call for some. A distant
second was nuclear with 13%, ahead of natural gas on 3% and wind on 2%.

(iii) Section 3: Existing nuclear technology
The third section of the survey deals with attitudes towards presently deployed
nuclear power technology and among statements of concern, there is little surprise
in waste coming out on top with 65% overall agreement. However, other traditional
concerns appear to have been supplanted. Of next greatest concern is the
involvement of big energy companies in developing nuclear power, with 62%
agreeing or strongly agreeing that this was problematic. An anti-big business stance
is a characteristic identified by Lynas (2013), and is perhaps resonant of the
reputational damage suffered by the big energy providers as a result of coverage of a
failure to pass on wholesale price falls onto customers (Macalister 2014). The
statement Additional nuclear nuclear capacity could displace renewables ranks
third with overall 57% agreement. Fourth-ranked is the statement The financial
cost of nuclear power is too great with 53% in total agreeing. This could be
indicative of anti-nuclear sentiment increasingly borrowing from the traditional
rational discourse of nuclear advocates as well as the influence of the markets-
orientated context given to nuclear in the UK both trends noted by Teravainen et
al (2011).
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Figure 2. While waste is the overriding green concern, many more
contemporary concerns have come to the fore

32
33

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The above issues are linked by many respondents in additional comments in this
section, particularly waste, business and cost:

It feels like another example of private profit and social costs. In Germany they had
to move a store of nuclear waste because it was leaking at a cost to the government
that was higher than the money made by the company from power.

The implicit subsidy it inevitably requires to insure it against accidents should not
be paid by the taxpayer while profits accrue to private owners.

Any nuclear infrastructure in the UK would have to bepublicly financed and
government run, much like we need to nationalise the railways and energy grid we
cannot afford to let big business cut corners on nuclear energy, as the risks are too
great.

Such remarks are accompanied by other comments emphasizing the opacity and
technical nature of the nuclear industry that make constructing an informed view
difficult.
34

In discussions of cost of nuclear power, we are seldom told if the cost of waste
disposal is included, and there is lack of clarity about the feasibility and cost of
disposing of low-level and highly radioactive waste. There should be cross-party
agreement about the best scientific estimates.

I find it hard to make my mind up on these issues because expert opinion is so
divided.

What might be characterised as the more traditional objections to nuclear power
attract considerably less agreement. The statement Nuclear power encourages
nuclear weapons proliferation attracts 38% agreement with almost the same
proportion disagreeing at 36%. Perhaps a more modern concern the assertion that
nuclear power stations are vulnerable to terrorist attack attracts greater overall
agreement at 47%. There is also a relatively benign appraisal of the statement
Nuclear power in the UK has a poor safety record with 37% agreeing or strongly
agreeing while 34% are in disagreement. Echoing the limited impact of Fukushima
on wider UK public opinion (Poortinga et al 2013), the statement suggesting the
disaster confirms nuclear power is inherently unsafe fails to secure majority
agreement: 42% agree or strongly agree while, 21% neither agree nor disagree and
37% either disagree or strongly disagree.

Those statements in favour of nuclear power seem to reveal the struggle many
greens have with the issue, despite accepting the logic of climate change mitigation
arguments. In other words the sort of reluctant acceptance identified by Corner et al
(2011). The statement Nuclear power is preferable to fossil fuels attracts 56%
overall agreement with only 15% disagreeing. Yet only 40% agree with the
statement Nuclear power represents a vital low carbon source of energy, with
44% disagreeing. Clearly overt statements of support are problematic. Nevertheless,
given the vaunting of Germanys renewables revolution (Lynas 2013) it is
interesting note that only 23% disagree with the statement The abandoning of
nuclear power in Germany will lead to more fossil fuels being burned.

35
Germany is a very sad case! is how one comment puts it. Fukushima has
motivated them to dump all their perfectly legit nuclear and move to coal (and more
renewables, but coal cannot be endured!)

However, some believe there is nothing inevitable about the situation in Germany:

Stating that the abandoning of nukes in Germany will lead to more fossil fuel is
unfortunately a political cockup and totally avoidable. Even so it's a short term
problem and even so Germany had reduced carbon emission by 25% since 1990.
Thats better than most industrialised nations.

Some comments address waste in the context of alternative nuclear technologies,
the topic of the final section of the survey:

Nuclear power is a truly realistic way to reduce our carbon footprint in a drastic
way and very quickly. Developments in technology and science are opening up
new possibilities for using nuclear waste as a fuel. This is an exciting prospect and
could provide bountiful, cheap and clean energy.

Waste and cost are the two issues that really matter. But new types of nuclear fuel
might lessen thisCost is tough - it will only fall if adopted en masse and that
requires large state backed commitment. The market will not (rationally) provide
it.

The latter quote indicates a view that only a state-backed policy on nuclear could
provide a large-scale expansion in the sector.

(iv) Section 4: Future nuclear
The fourth and final section of the survey shows that in theory, with support of a
high level of public debate, alternative technology could go some way towards
addressing waste and some of the other conventional concerns surrounding nuclear
power. The statement If alternative nuclear technology can address concerns over
36
safety, waste ad weapons proliferation, it should be considered finds favour with

75% of respondents. However, this is tempered by less than half agreeing that
technology such as thorium fuel and fast breeder reactors does overcome the major
obstacles, with 56% agreeing with the statement The claims made for alternative
nuclear technology should be treated with extreme caution. Some 51% question
whether alternative technology could be deployed within a helpful timescale.
Surprisingly, cost is relegated in this section with 49% neither agreeing nor
disagreeing.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Figure 3. Survey answers and interviews suggest alternative technology may
make nuclear far more appealing to greens, but there is scepticism about its
claims.

37

The latter response in particular could however be a function of respondents lack of
information and awareness of the alternative nuclear technologies, a comment that a
sizeable number recorded. However, it seems fair to say many remain open at this
early stage:

This is one for experts and correct info. But having read a little in this area, I have
seen convincing figures suggesting that renewables will not solve the energy crisis,
and that nuclear power is the only viable alternative source, not simply to solve the
climate change crisis, but to solve the issue that fossil fuels are running out.

Others however see nothing new in the claims presently being made for alternative
nuclear energy, and that the timescales that may be involved make it a remote
prospect:

The nuclear industry has a historic habit of trumping the 'next' technology. The
reality is any nuclear revival will be built with '3rd Generation' nuclear technology:
light water boiling or pressurised water reactorsEssentially the same reactors that
were available to utilities in the mid 1960sThe rest is just moondust for the next
20-30 years.
38

Further comments on this section echo previously made displacement concerns,
though more in relation to R&D investment:

I think if there are actually alternative nuclear materials that can potentially
produce safe and clean energy, then that's worth spending some research resources
on; but not at the expense of renewables research.

4.1 Attitude types
When analysed and coded the responses revealed a fairly even distribution among
the four broad categories of stance on nuclear: 29% Nuclear Enthusiast, 22%
Conditional Nuclear Supporter, 26% Nuclear Sceptic and 23% Nuclear Refuser. Each
stance is considered in more detail when examining the interviews in the next
section. However, they can be summarized as follows:

*Nuclear Enthusiast: keen to see an expansion of nuclear power without attaching
conditions in order to tackle climate change. This does not mean, however, that
some reservations are not expressed.

*Conditional Nuclear Supporter: more likely to sanction nuclear renewal at current
levels as part of a diverse energy mix. Attaches conditions to nuclear expansion.

*Nuclear Sceptic: Nuclear power may be a necessary evil in a limited form within a
diverse energy mix and with stringent conditions applying.

*Nuclear Refuser: Any perceived benefits of nuclear power are far outweighed by
disadvantages and it cannot be sanctioned. Broader environmental concerns than
just climate change are considered important.

5. Interviews/discussion (See Appendix 4 for full interview transcripts)

It is important to note that false names have been substituted for each interviewee
to ensure both anonymity and an easy means of identification. Broad observations
about personal characteristics such as career type are given where relevant and are
39
accurate. Analysis of the interviews are intended to set out the common
characteristics of each of the four stances on nuclear energy, though interesting
variations such as differences in emphasis are also noted.

5.11 Nuclear enthusiast
It is interesting to note the commonality in some of the survey answers among the
three nuclear enthusiasts interviewed. In terms of general environmental outlook all
disagree or strongly disagree with the idea that renewables can meet all the UKs
energy needs, while also disagreeing with the statement that behaviour change is
one of the most important aspects of energy policy. Additionally the three
demonstrate a clear preference for developing new energy technologies over
existing ones. On nuclear all disagree or strongly disagree with the notion that the
industry has a poor safety record in the UK as well as the idea that the Fukushima
disaster confirms inherent nuclear safety issues. All strongly agree that nuclear
power is preferable to fossil fuels while also agreeing or strongly agreeing that the
abandoning of nuclear power in Germany will lead to more fossil fuels being burned.
All agree or strongly agree that nuclear power is a vital low carbon source of
energy. The three differ on the biggest issue facing nuclear, with one stating waste,
another operational safety and a third cost. All are positive about the claims of
alternative nuclear technology and its deployment.

If there is an underlying theme among the first set of interviewees then it is that they
see the use of nuclear power as the easiest - and therefore best - way of significantly
reducing the UKs carbon emissions and hitting agreed targets. While favouring
renewables in the energy mix, all perceive a limitation in terms of a heavy reliance
on them in meeting energy demands, citing in particular the need for large areas of
available land. This they contrast with the concentrated nature of nuclear power.

I think the advantages of nuclear are land useyou only need a small amount of
area for a nuclear plant (per unit of energy), and really you dont need the same
amount of resources in terms of steel and concrete, especially when you compare it
to offshore windalso reliability and so-called base load power, says Rob, who
works for an energy think-tank.

40
Both he and Laura, who advises on sustainability, also reference the compatibility of
nuclear with the current grid system. Here Rob says: Obviously we dont quite
know whats going to happen to the grid but at the moment it requires a certain
amount of dependable power and renewables are problematic above a certain
degree of penetration. We know weve got to scale up low carbon energy and
therefore nuclear is looking very useful.

All three say individual behaviour change in order to bring about demand reduction
would be required if the UK was to be heavily reliant on renewables. However, they
doubt that the necessary scale of change is achievable.

My gut instinct is that even though theres often a financial case for reducing energy
consumption to cut costs, on an individual level the kinds of reductions you make
are never compelling enough, says Laura. And citing the rebound effect (see
Dowson et al 2009, Monbiot 2009) she adds: [even] if everything becomes more
efficient it doesnt necessarily mean that people will use less energy it can mean
people use more for the same price.

Another, Jeremy a journalist and writer, and the only Conservative-supporter to be
interviewed relates the issue of significant demand reduction to a potential
reduction in GDP and standards of living:

Whats not going to be acceptable to people is a reduction in their standard of living
and whats not really possible economically is a fall in GDP followed by no GDP
growthyoud create economic collapse.

Much as Lynas (2013, 2011) has reappraised the risks of nuclear energy, so too have
the nuclear enthusiasts in the current research. Jeremy does so in the context of
Fukushima, which has a particularly personal connection, having family in Japan.

Fukushima does show that clearly there are risks. [However] I looked into the risks
in statistical terms when it happened because I discussed with my wife if it was OK
for our daughter to go and stay in Japan. We looked at the levels of radiation outside
the immediate zone and they were really tiny. So I think the effect of Fukushima has
41
been exaggerated. Clearly nuclear accidents can happenI think maybe they always
will happen but theyre not as apocalyptic as people make out. Three-mile Island
wasnt apocalyptic and Fukushima wasnt apocalyptic.

All three recognise the importance of overcoming cost objections, suggesting that
these could be addressed by a combination of heavy investment, innovation and
deployment of nuclear at scale. The issue of timescales is also addressed by Laura
and Rob, with both suggesting that rapid deployment of preferred alternative
nuclear could be achieved through political will and innovation. The latter asserts
that the first light water reactors which were put in submarines went from
drawing board to deployment in a matter of six years. He also suggests that given
the UKs past pedigree in nuclear power development and current levels of
innovation and research, that the UK could position itself as nuclear power world
leader in much the same way as it is currently aiming to do with renewable energy.

The interviewees emphasise the need for any future expansion of nuclear to be
based on consultation, debate and consensus. However, they also cast doubt on
whether public opinion could be quickly or easily won over. My job is in marketing
and sustainability and from my knowledge that I get through doing that, if things get
a bad name its very sticky and people generally dont make decisions based on
information or rationalitythey often make very emotionally-driven decisions about
this sort of thing, says Laura, adding: I guess the question is, does it matter? Does it
need broad public support?

If the answer to those questions is yes, then perhaps nuclear power might not be the
clear easiest solution that it is sometimes presented as by its supporters. However,
Laura suggests it may come down to key opinion formers such as large
environmental NGOs and whether they decide to support it or at least not to
oppose it.

5.12 Conditional nuclear supporter
While there are key areas of agreement in the survey answers given by the two
conditional interviewees, they are more divergent than those given by the nuclear
enthusiasts, reflecting at times a very different emphasis. Both strongly disagree
42
with the statement that renewables alone can meet the UKs energy needs as well as
agree and strongly agree that nuclear power is preferable to fossil fuels. They also
agree and strongly disagree with the statement on the UK industry having a poor
safety record. And while the two agree that the costs of nuclear power are too great,
they diverge on the usefulness of pursuing energy demand and behaviour change.
These differences were maintained in the interviews.

It is perhaps unsurprising that Simon, an economist who has in the past worked on
energy policy, exhibits a markets know best position as characterised by
Teravainen et al (2011). Describing himself as a rational environmentalist he
argues that we should pursue the cheapest means of keeping within safe limits of
carbon and warming and stop making so many moral judgements. I like to believe
Im technology blindso Im an unreserved economist in some regardsif you can
put the right price on things and set the right policy parameters the answer should
present itself.

However, Simon asserts that because a proper or sensible price hasnt been put
on carbon there isnt even competition and therefore the market isnt currently
delivering. Insisting that waste and cost are the two issues that really matter when
it comes to nuclear, he says that waste needs to priced into the overall cost of
nuclear in much the same way as has been suggested for the externality of
carbon (Stern 2006):

At the moment we dont have a way of solving the nuclear waste problem as far as
Im aware other than burying it in the ground and waiting a very, very long time.
Because of that, setting the discount rate, the time over which you want to do your
cost benefit analysis is a vital part of how you end up with an answer as to whether
nuclear is cheap or not and its the easiest way of government to trick the equations
to say nuclear is a cost-effective option. Some governments just take the nuclear
waste issue out of the equation.

Because were currently unable to make direct cost comparisons, he remains
equivocal: The last time I looked nuclear wasnt very cheap and maybe shouldnt be
part of the mix (presently) but it really is sensitive to your carbon price.
43

Simon also suggests that renewables, beyond certain threshold levels, should price
in the cost of energy storage solutions.

Nevertheless he believes a level-playing field can be established in the future and
that it may be a mistake to base decisions on a snapshot of cost, putting out that no
one foresaw the drastic drop in the price of solar energy. He also supports
alternative nuclear energy such as thorium, arguing that if it was invested in and
deployed it could help reduce waste levels and therefore cost.

Yazmins views are influenced her post graduate studies in environment. She
appears to have no fundamental objections to nuclear but questions whether it can
affect climate mitigation efforts in a realistic timescale and how it can usefully work
alongside renewables.

I think nuclear is seen as a silver bullet. I don't think it should be ignored, but we
can't build at a scale to deal with climate change in the near term. The baseload
properties mean that we'll never switch completely to it either - any claims as such
are overhyped, and limit compatibility with renewables.

In other words, nuclear is not a power source which can be turned up and down in
response to demand if it was to be used to top-up renewables.

Should also says that we shouldnt necessarily connect the issue of an energy
shortfall with going all out for nuclear, suggesting the UK may need all means at its
disposal to hit carbon targets including the low hanging fruit of energy efficiency
and behaviour change as well as a more responsive, decentralised grid that is more
amenable to renewables.

Echoing Simons concern about cost she says: The money thing is very
interestingit (nuclear) started off being touted as very, very cheap, but when the
strike price was agreed it was a lot more than people were expecting. Its still not
outrageous but it is high and could feasibly go up and were completely locked into
that.
44

As with the nuclear enthusiasts, both interviewees are sanguine about the risks of
nuclear, describing their portrayal by opponents as overblown. Citing a classic risk-
risk trade-off (See Bickerstaff et al 2008) Yazmin says: I feel uncomfortable with
nuclear waste but I dont feel particularly scared by it. I dont think its a reason not
to build nuclear but I do think its an outstanding problemHowever, I would
prioritise the problems of climate change far above that and the more immediate
impact of what were about to leave to the next generation.

Nevertheless, she believes fast breeder reactors could assist in overcoming public
waste concerns: I think fast breeder reactors would make a difference, largely
because you can publicise it as dealing with the waste problem. And I think waste is
probably becoming salient in peoples minds with the proposal to bury waste in the
North West and its all in the news about why people dont want it there.

On nuclear disasters, Simon says: Theyre fairly isolated events and I suspect
modern nuclear power stations are far more safe than the public realise but its like
plane crasheswhen they go wrong they go wrong in a big way.

The invocation of plane crashes is interesting. Does this suggest that despite the
shock of disaster, people are becoming habituated to such occurrences over time?

Echoing Lynas (2013, 2011), Simon contrasts the few people likely to have died as
a direct result of nuclear power with the tens of thousands of people who have died
from coal mining. Because of theCold War people are terrified of nuclear in a very
understandable but paranoid way, he says. These are not bombs that are going to
blow up.

5.13 Nuclear sceptic
Of the three people who accorded with the sceptical categorisation during their
interview, two had moderated their positions as indicated in their survey answers
one away from conditional acceptance and the other from nuclear refusal. This
makes comparison of their survey results difficult. However, this deviation does
45
show that even many greens may not have a settled or stable view. Such as
characteristic, as discussed in the literature review (Pidgeon et al 2008), has been
speculated about in reference to the wider population. In this case an engagement
with the issue and the opportunity to discuss it appeared to trigger a review of
contingently held views on the subject. We can therefore speculate about the degree
to which a wider public debate may bring about shifts in opinion. Jane, a green
activist with an MSc in environmental technology, was the one interviewee whose
views accorded with the survey answers. She agrees that renewables can meet the
UKs energy needs but also that local opposition could limit their potential. Coupled
with this she strongly agrees with statements that the UK needs to reduce its energy
demand to meet climate targets and that behaviour change was a central plank of
energy policy. Jane strongly agrees that nuclear power produces huge amounts of
waste that cannot be safely stored but neither agrees nor disagrees on the statement
regarding the poor safety record of the UK industry. Additionally she strongly agrees
that the cost of nuclear is too great and that the involvement of big companies is
problematic, while agreeing that nuclear power is preferable to fossil fuels. She also
strongly disagrees with the statement that nuclear is a vital low-carbon source of
energy and disagreed with the pursuit of alternative nuclear technologies if their
chief claims are true.

All three interviewees exhibit a much stronger a-priori preference for renewables
and while acknowledging some potential limitations are generally much less focused
on these. Instead, their approach to climate change mitigation is to place renewables
within a holistic framework that also strongly emphasises the importance of
behaviour change. Nuclear power in general is treated with a high degree of
scepticism and characterised by a less benign assessment of nuclear risk than seen
in the previous two groups. And while offering reluctant statements of support it is
not always clear under what type of circumstance it would be countenanced. Where
statements of potential support are made they are in the context of a discussion
about alternative nuclear energy. While two interviewees in particular were initially
attracted to alternative nuclear technologies, their assessment has been tempered
by heated arguments with fellow greens on the subject and subsequent research.
The interviews certainly confirm a reasonably high exposure to information and
debate around alternative nuclear technologies both in the media and within the
46
wider green movement. Though the three deploy rational arguments they are
guided to a greater extent by ideology rather than the pragmatism displayed in the
supporter groups.

Jane asserts that arguments about the need for nuclear power were being sold on a
false prospectus. It isnt so much that renewables have a limited potential than a
failure to invest in and develop them.

I started my undergraduate degree [in environmental science] 10 years ago now
and [I remember] looking at all the graphs and the speed that youve got to put
[renewables] upto reach the climate change targets[it] requires huge amounts of
investment. So here we are 10 years later and the investment hasnt been made. I
havent looked into it recently but I assume were so far off the mark where
renewables may not meet that, so were looking to nuclear to fill that gap and my
personal opinion is that that puts the debate between a rock and a hard place.

She says that the most significant investments have instead been made into pushing
the boundaries of fossil fuels, such as in fracking and deep sea drilling technologies.

Arguing for an approach focused on renewables and behaviour change, Darren says
that a technofix mindset and the involvement of big energy companies are prime
reasons to steer away from relying on nuclear power.

My concern is that we just think we can fix the problem with technology. A lot of
people think that technology will save us and it might notI dont trust big
companies with anything. I think theyre mostly scumbags when theres profit its
always bad. Im all for the nationalisation of power in Britain and I think that when
you trust something as serious as that to a company its not like making consumer
electronics, its much more severe when something goes wrong.

Gareth makes what might be termed a deep green argument for radical behaviour
change:

47
Ideally we radically reduce our energy consumption and that means changing the
way we live and then we can meet our energy needs with renewablesIf we actually
want do something meaningful to benefit the environment and go some way
towards improving itas radical a change as the post-war period is probably the
only way of doing it. I dont know if we recycle more and set targets for 10 years
time and breathe in a bitI dont know whether these things are enough.

He also says that our attitude to burying nuclear waste is symptomatic of a wider
environmental malaise, which goes beyond climate change.

While conceding the issues relating to the Fukushima disaster might not be as
dangerous as has come across, he says: But that to me is not the big problem, which
is to do with spent nuclear fuelit means were avoiding the real issue about what
were doing to the environment. Were putting a massive sticking plaster over itwe
dont know what were leaving future generationsit seems like its lets not worry
about what we do with the waste, lets just find a big hole to put it somewhere.

For Jane the issue of waste boils down to an unfair and reckless subsidy for nuclear
power: Because weve got these long-term issues within nuclear waste then it
means these companies have no responsibilities for their waste and so it falls upon
public hands. It sounds like a great business model you reap all those profits and
then leave the main risk you have to someone else.

Gareth says that if thorium could overcome the waste issues and avoid a repetition
of Chernobyl and Fukushima type disasters then hed consider its use a bridging
fuel. If someone put forward a really good argumentbecause theres no way we
can reduce our energy consumption by the amount we need in the time that we need
in a way thats affordable and practical well OK, but Im not necessarily going to be
one of the people on the front line fighting against it I would certainly be
interested in alternative nuclear if its something we could use to fill that gap while
we changed our behaviour.

All three interviewees are clear about the need for a calmer, more rational and
science-based debate on nuclear power, saying that the at times febrile debate
48
hasnt been helpful. [The] Green Party has been a bit dodgy on nuclear on the
science front in the pastI think thats a real problem when it comes to arguing
against nuclear fuel. Its associated quite heavily with bad science, observes Gareth.
Meanwhile, Jane says we also need more science on the other side of the equation: I
think we need more scientists than politicians to be honesthow many people that
have studied science in the House of Commons? Climate science is fairly complicated
and if you dont have that science background it probably is really hard to appreciate
the impact. Mentioning a public debate on the economy he attended, Darren said:
There were lots of speakers like Natalie Bennett (Green Party leader) and there was
some discussion on energy and someone mentioned nuclear power and the room
when rooaaaaaaarrr...It was insane, Ive never seen anything like it. People feel
really strongly about it. I think it would be an important change in society if people
started to acknowledge their ignorance and uncertainty about it (nuclear). Getting
all the facts together is pretty challenging. The last comment seems particularly
interesting because it also seems to highlight the very technical nature of nuclear
it seems it is often not as easy to gather and evaluate key information about it in the
same way as renewables.

5.14 Nuclear refuser
The two interviewees under this heading give very stark answers on the issue of
nuclear: largely strongly agreeing with negative statements on the subject and
strongly disagreeing with those of a positive nature. On a more general
environmental outlook, both strongly believe that renewables can meet the UKs
energy needs, but also that local opposition could limit their development. Both
believe in the need for behaviour change and that a reduction in standards of living
may be a price we have to pay to tackle climate change.
For both renewables arent so much a pragmatic solution to climate change as a
necessary means of improving human wellbeing in a much broader sense. For Anika,
who grew up in Germany and is familiar with the countrys energy sector,
renewables stand out, because there is no downside of note:

The main point with renewables is that they dont cause any long-standing harm.
You have no waste, no pollution of our air, so you have no emissions. Its becoming
very obvious that we are reducing the life expectancy of humanity. In such a
49
dramatic scenario Im wondering why its not commonplace that people want to
protect themselves and the planet. So for me, Id like a very radical sentiment, its
about protecting life. Some people they complain about the noise of wind turbines
near their homes but I think that measured against the fact that we dont provide
any future to our children, its a minor issue.

Renewables in her view need to be implemented as part of a fundamental shift in
priorities and values; back to basics and the building up of communities. Up and
foremost we need to tackle the destructive spirit that now prevails in our societies.

At the heart of this is a critique of the current economic system: What is clear is that
we cant keep up our competitive economic system as we are used to running it, and
in my opinion Britain therefore plays a crucial role because the country set up the
competitive system with Adam Smith and so on.

For Ben too, a similar scale of upheaval is required: We need the kind of effort that
was mobilised after the Second World War to combat climate change including an
effort to retrofit every home in the UK to improve energy efficiency as well as
building all new homes to Pasivhaus standards. For him renewables in particular
solar energy are not just about combating climate change but about democratising
power by its ability to be set up on a community basis. But people first of all need to
be educated about what is possible, contrary to the vested interests of big energy
companies.

If you look at Germany, 26% of their energy needs are being met by clean
alternatives, mainly solar. I think its the vested interests of Edf and E.on that are
deliberately obfuscating - theyre creating confusion around the
alternativestheyre saying nuclear is the only (one)theyve got a far bigger
pullso we need to educate people from the grass roots up that these things are
available. A monopoly such as E.on and Edf are absolutely paranoid about
decentralised energy. Suddenly they cant control it, they cant control prices.

For Anika, the pursuit of renewable energy has the potential to go even further,
transforming a whole web of relationships: [Renewable energy] connects to a
50
deliberated society where citizens are no longer supressed by energy companies,

politicians and market entanglements but where costs and benefits can be
calculated in a precise and individualistic manner.

Despite their certainty about the desirability of renewables both interviewees
recognise the need to develop storage solutions to ensure their compatibility and
take-up. In this sense they are both pro technology and innovation. However, they
see nuclear, and in particular a focus on developing alternative nuclear energy
sources as a distraction from this task.

Were having entirely the wrong conversation, says Ben, who highlights progress
on developing hydrogen-based storage solutions for unused renewable energy. We
need to be talking about renewables first. Weve just got to get on with it and stop
mucking about and talking about nuclear. Its a massive distraction - a very
convenient distraction for the fossil fuel and nuclear industries.

As with previous interviewees, the two nuclear refusers highlight waste and cost as
the primary concerns. Anika contests the idea that nuclear power in western Europe
has failed to throw up the issues seen elsewhere, drawing attention to the issues of
waste in Germany. Im just worried about the waste and I know that even nuclear
agencies are worried about the waste even though its getting technically better to
avoid any accidentsI have to say that I was surprised myself that Germany acted so
hastily on Fukushima. People [in Germany] have been calling for the abandonment
of nuclear since the 1980s and its mainly to do with wastethis was confirmed
when one of our oldest storage facilities really broke down and had massive
problems with ground water, really polluted ground water [referring to Assee II in
Lower Saxony, an old research repository]. Now every day workers are trying to
shift ground water to the surface, litres and litres, trying to clean things.

She adds: Nuclear power cant work with an egalitarian society because you need to
hide your incidents. Noone is responsible if something happens.

Ben makes the connection between the issue of nuclear costs, a lack of transparency,
and waste, suggesting it is impossible to assess it in the same manner as other
51
energy sources. Does E.on or Edf ever give you figures for a return oninvestment
in a nuclear power plant? They cannotbecause youve got the costs to build the
infrastructure around it, youve got the costs of disposal, the costs of sealing the
stresses and cracks from storing the fuel rods. Whereas if youre looking to invest in
solar farmsyou know youre going to get an 8% return for example on your
moneyGovernments are complicit in that, theres a lot of secrecy around nuclear.

He also links transparency and a consequent lack of trust in the industry for his
inability to back R&D into alternative nuclear technologies. In relation to fast
breeder reactors he says: I think thats inherent with problems of its own. What the
hell do you do with this stuff [fuel] once youve created it? What risks are involved in
recycling this waste? Why should we trust the industry with this new technology?

Despite his aversion to nuclear, he says that the decline of nuclear and fossil fuels
should be managed.

5.2 Research critique
Given the methodology the overall results of the research inevitably have a Green
Party bias and clearly any claims to have provided an insight into generalised green
views must be tempered by this. However, the survey did reach beyond the Green
Party and the research ensured that a proportion of those selected for interview did
not give the Green Party as an affiliation or primary affiliation. A question that asked
how respondents had come across the survey might have helped smooth this
process. Furthermore understanding the distribution of the survey in this way may
have helped illuminate the degree of Green Party bias at the point of contact.

An initial question asking whether respondents self-identified as green was an
attempt to provide some objectivity to the sample. Clearly membership of the
Green Party given its broad contemporary remit would not necessarily identify
someone as a green. Likewise there may be greens who do not have an allegiance to
any particular environment-based campaigns. Nevertheless the question was not
made compulsory in order to complete the survey and with hindsight this was a
mistake as it was completed by some who answered no to the question and were
subsequently removed from the analysed results. Again, it may be possible to be
52
someone with demonstrable green values who does not self-identify as a green and
this could restrict the breadth of the research. However, it was thought that a
greater bias could be introduced by non-greens who wanted to record their strong
opinions on nuclear power.

In retrospect the survey could have been further simplified following the pilot which
may have encouraged greater participation and focus on the most important
questions. This was especially the case in the green attitudes section where many
respondents failed to differentiate between statements on promoting the
development of existing and new environmental technology. These statements along
with that on the need for curbing population growth did not prove necessary or
particularly relevant in terms of distinguishing different types of greens. This
section also seemed to suffer from a degree of an all of the above acquiescence, but
piloting showed that an alternative approach of forcing respondents to choose
between competing statements could have created a high degree of antagonism
through the perception of false oppositions. Some respondents had sought more
explanation and supplementary information in the final section on alternative
nuclear technologies. However, to do so would have lengthened to the survey and
the comments helped reveal the degree of awareness around this aspect of the
debate.

Interviews were conducted in an informal semi-structured style that put
interviewees at ease by allowing them to express their views in an individual,
flexible fashion. This format gave rise to a discussion of nuclear power within the
context of wider energy choices and environmental values. A more formal,
structured approach might have sought to make a greater link between survey
responses and sought more direct answers to questions, allowing for more
straightforward comparisons to be made between interview transcripts. However,
given the evident sensitivity of the subject matter among greens this may have
created antagonism and undermined trust.

53
6. Conclusions

The research shows that writers such as Mark Lynas and George Monbiot are not
lone voices among environmentalists, and in fact represent a growing constituency
of greens, who despite the historic antipathy of the movement towards nuclear
power have embraced it as an effective and necessary means of carbon emissions
mitigation in the UK as part of a broader energy mix. While this section of greens is
identified by the nuclear enthusiast categorisation, other categories of greens up to
and including sceptics draw on and to some extent accept aspects of the overall
green-inspired low carbon reframing. Certainly survey responses and interviews
indicated and high awareness of the debate and many of the issues involved. Indeed
it is interesting to note, as this conclusion is being written, news reports suggesting
environment NGO Friends of the Earth has shifted from its position of opposition in
principle to nuclear power (Vaughan, 2014).

As we move along the scale of support for nuclear power, from enthusiast through
to refuser, rational arguments are deployed and maintained, but initial
pragmatism gives way to more ideological underpinnings in increments. Therefore
by the refuser categorisation renewables are no longer simply tasked with
combating climate change but also what is also deemed as a necessary
democratisation of energy through its provision on a decentralised community
basis. Allied to this is an at times strong anti-big business sentiment, which sees it as
putting private interests and profit ahead of environmental principles such as action
on climate change. In this vision as these greens see it there is little room for
nuclear. As much as anything, nuclear represents an old and perhaps overly narrow
way of thinking about and relating to the environment. In this sense the challenge of
climate change has as Hulme (2009) suggests, presented itself as an opportunity.

The long-standing issue of waste seems to be the overriding concern of greens, and
even those who appear enthusiastic acknowledge a degree of unease about it. As
much as safety concerns, it is the intractability of waste as a policy issue that seems
to trouble people, given that no long-term solution has yet been found. For those on
the sceptical side of the argument this seems to be anathema to firmly held
environmental principles.
54

Waste aside, there does seem to have been a profound shift in the debate among
greens. There is little focus on the operational safety of nuclear power in the UK
amid a degree of acceptance even on the sceptical side of the argument that the
dangers of nuclear power may have been exaggerated by opponents. Historic
associations between nuclear power and weapons proliferation appear to have
largely receded, while fresh concerns, particularly on the economic costs of nuclear
power, have come to the fore.

There may be a number of reasons why the costs of nuclear have what seems like a
hitherto unseen prominence. Certainly there seems to be an awareness of the
accusations of pro-nuclear detractors, and this new-found cost focus seems to offer
greens a means of having a more rational debate. Certainly Monbiot (2014) has
found it increasingly difficult to justify nuclear on cost grounds and has had to reject
some forecasting on which he had previously relied. Of course to some extent the
focus on nuclear costs may simply reflect the current focus of the wider debate
around energy in general, not least soaring consumer energy bills and whether or
not the Big Six energy companies are being transparent in what costs and savings
are being passed on to the public (Macalister 2014). At the same time there are
arguments over the extent to which consumers are footing the bill for investments
in green energy (Mason 2013b). To some greens nuclear does not appear as cost-
effective as the cheapest renewables, and the promotion of nuclear seems perverse
when the cost of green infrastructure is being questioned on a value-for-money
basis. It is also worth noting that nuclear costs also seem related to the older issue of
the inscrutability of nuclear power and its associations with state secrecy.

Another concern that has come to prominence and one that is perhaps most
specific to greens is that developing nuclear power may effectively displace
renewables or the potential for renewable energy. This was a matter for conjecture
rather than being elaborated on or highlighted with explicit instances.

While it was initially raised as an objection in relation to currently deployed nuclear
power it was also deployed in relation to alternative nuclear energy another
subject on which the research has sought the views of greens. The potential of
55
alternative nuclear technologies such as thorium fuel and fast breeder reactors to
address at least to a large extent if not entirely concerns over waste certainly
seemed to make nuclear power more acceptable to those on the sceptical end of the
spectrum. Indeed it seemed to be a preferred means of power generation among
enthusiasts. However, the time it might take to develop and commercialise
alternative nuclear technology was raised as a concern across the board. And while
some saw the potential for accelerating this process given a post-war style political
push on climate change, it was clear that those with a strong renewables bias see a
competition for resources between alternative nuclear R&D and R&D for the storage
solutions they admit are needed to enable renewables to play a leading role in the
energy mix.

6.1 Policy implications
Contrary to the limited existing literature on the subject, the present research
suggests that the climate change framing of nuclear power has a deep resonance
with many greens. While the study did not use a general population control, it seems
likely that such a framing is at least as effective if not more so than with the public at
large. It is clear that those greens who do support nuclear power or who are open to
supporting nuclear power do so primarily because of their concern for climate
change and their belief that an energy mix which includes nuclear represents a
better prospect for climate change mitigation than renewables on their own. In
contrast to the previous literature, those in the enthusiast and conditional
supporter groups demonstrated little need to articulate unease about nuclear
energy. The important distinction to make is that the present research focused on
the latest iteration of low carbon reframing: that made by fellow greens - and this
may be a telling factor. Previous research had focused on government efforts.

It is interesting to however note that no one in the research appeared to be overtly
advocating a nuclear only option and indeed some seemed to see nuclear as a low-
carbon transition technology which would allow time and breathing space for
developments in renewables, energy storage, energy efficiency and behaviour
change. This seems to accord with research showing renewables as being the most
popular power-generating source among the population at large and seems unlikely
to change in the foreseeable future. In order to attract the widest possible green
56
support for nuclear power it seems policymakers should emphasise its climate
change mitigation potential alongside that of renewables, while trying to address
questions about transparency and how currently rising costs can be brought down
an issue highlighted by even the staunchest supporters of nuclear. Energy security
arguments seem likely to have a high degree of traction at the
enthusiast/conditional supporter end of the spectrum but those sceptical of nuclear
power may be left unmoved given their broader agenda including the need for
behaviour change and the acceptance of a lower standard of living.

Alternative technology appeared to advance the cause of nuclear power across a
swathe of green opinion and a demonstrator plant, perhaps along the lines GE
Hitachi have proposed with their PRISM concept (Lynas 2013, Monbiot 2012) may
help convince people that it can move beyond the drawing board. Deployment of fast
breeder and/or thorium reactors may be key to securing widespread green support
given the seeming ability of the technologies to address the issue of waste, though
their potential anti-proliferation qualities seem to add little to the appeal at this
stage. It may therefore prove crucial to the long-term prospects of these
technologies and therefore perhaps nuclear power in general in the UK that any
demonstrator is delivered at a reasonable cost and without major delays. If this can
be done then it might be extrapolated that a deployment at scale could bring costs
down.

Even those on the sceptical/refuser end of the spectrum have said they would
welcome a rational science-informed debate about the use of nuclear power in the
UK to mitigate climate change. Coupled with the observation that the views of some
may be fairly contingent, the evidence in the current research is that there could be
a green consensus on nuclear is possible if scientific advisors are pushed to the fore
of policymaking and that greater and more meaningful consultation is made with
green NGOs. The apparent pre-empting of the final public consultation on nuclear
renewal by Gordon Brown when prime minister (Doyle 2011) a consultation
which had involved Greenpeace likely undermined subsequent government
pronouncements on nuclear power.

57
Perhaps related to this trust issue is the subject of fracking, which was raised in the
context of the current research. In a very short space of time it seems to have
become the focus of campaigning zeal for many UK greens and inevitably drawn
attention away from nuclear. However, given the fairly low levels of trust in
government demonstrated by many on the more sceptical side of the nuclear debate
any long-term attempt to promote nuclear energy with a climate change framing
alongside fracking as seems to be happening at present may be met with
incredulity.

Trust in big business is even lower and no matter how much government directs
policy on nuclear power, it will be hard to enact in the current energy market
without the significant involvement of large power companies. This attitude to
businesses maybe prove a significant obstacle for greens, not least because nuclear
power doesnt readily lend itself to the sort of community operation and ownership
in the way that renewables can. It will be interesting to see whether a future debate
around the issue of small modular nuclear reactors could find tractions with those
greens who prize the idea of a more decentralised grid.
58
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64
Appendices

Appendix 1.

Below is a reproduction of the research survey as it appeared online. A copy
can currently also be viewed by following the link:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1ZlDnvJGuHN7rpHwKEADQkmdhZQAvn9K
7O65ROPtrQAY/viewform
Green Attitudes to
Nuclear Power
This survey is being undertaken as part of a dissertation that will count towards my
studies for an MSc in Climate Change Management in the Department of Geography,
Environment and Development Studies (GEDS) at Birkbeck College, University of
London.
While many green movements began with campaigns against nuclear energy, some
environmentalists have begun to abandon that stance, arguing that renewables on their
own cannot deliver the low carbon future needed to prevent catastrophic climate
change.[1][2][3][4]
The aim of this survey is two-fold: FIRST, to gain a greater understanding of
green/environmental attitudes towards nuclear power and SECOND, to ascertain
whether the deployment of alternative types of nuclear technology could overcome
some existing concerns.
Please try to answer as many questions as possible. The survey should take around 5
minutes to complete. Thank you for taking part.
For further information please contact me: andrewjchild@gmail.com
General Info
Do you consider yourself a green/environmentalist?
Yes
No
Male
Female
Gender
Age (years)
18-24
65
25-34
35-44
45-54
55-64
65 and over
Location (Place name & first 3 digits of postcode e.g.

London, SW2)
Are you a member of OR do you support/share the
values of one of the following organisations?
(You can tick more than one checkbox)
Greenpeace
Friends of the Earth
WWF
RSPB
National Trust
English Heritage
CPRE
Other:
Are you a member of OR do you support/share the

values of one of the following political parties?
(You can tick more than one checkbox)
Conservative
Labour
Liberal Democrat
Green
UKIP
SNP
Plaid Cymru
Other:
Are you OR have you been employed in an

environmental role
Yes
No
If you answered "Yes" to the above question please

describe your role in a few words
66
Are you studying for or do you hold an

environmental qualification?
o
Yes
No
If you answered "Yes" to the above question, please

state qualification
Additional comments
If you wish to comment on the "general info" section or provide more information please do so
here
Environmental outlook & values
Renewable energy can meet all the UK's energy

needs (e.g wind, solar, wave, tidal, hydro)
1. Strongly Agree 2. Agree 3. Neither Agree nor Disagree 4. Disagree 5. Strongly Disagree
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Current local opposition to onshore wind schemes in

the UK may severely limit the scale of renewable
energy
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
The UK needs to drastically reduce energy

consumption to achieve its climate change targets
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Energy efficiency is the best means of reducing

demand for power
1
Strongly Agree
5
Strongly Disagree
67
Behaviour change is one of the most important

aspects of energy and climate policy
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
A reduced standard of living may have to be the

price we pay for tackling climate change
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Developing existing renewable technology is one of

the most important aspects of energy and climate
policy
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
New technology and innovation should be given a

higher priority in energy and climate policy
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
The welfare of people is the most important reason

to tackle climate change
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Combating climate change is all about preserving

the natural world
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Curbing world population growth is necessary to

combat climate change
1
Strongly Agree
5
Strongly Disagree
Which energy source would you *least* like to see in

the UK's energy mix
Additional comments
If you wish to comment on the "environmental values" section or provide more information
please do so here
68
Existing nuclear technology
Nuclear power produces huge amounts of harmful

waste which cannot be safely stored
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Nuclear power in the UK has a poor safety record

1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
The Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan in 2011

confirms that nuclear power is inherently unsafe
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Nuclear power encourages nuclear weapons

proliferation
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Nuclear power stations are vulnerable to terrorist

attack
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
The financial cost of nuclear power is too great

1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
The involvement of big energy companies in

developing nuclear power is problematic
1
Strongly Agree
5
Strongly Disagree
69
Overseas investment in British nuclear power is

unacceptable
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Nuclear power stations are a blight on the landscape

1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Adding additional nuclear capacity in the UK could

displace renewables
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Nuclear power is preferable to fossil fuels

1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
The abandoning of nuclear power in Germany will

lead to more fossil fuels being burned
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Nuclear power can provide plentiful energy for

centuries to come
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Nuclear power represents a vital low-carbon source

of energy
1
Strongly Agree
5
Strongly Disagree
Which of the following do you consider the most

serious issue relating to nuclear power?
Additional comments
If you wish to comment on the "existing nuclear technology" section or provide more
information please do so here
70
Future nuclear
Momentum is building behind the use of an alternative nuclear fuel - Thorium rather than the traditional Uranium [5][6][7][8]. It is thought to be three times more
abundant. Proponents make a number of important claims: they say it produces a
similar energy yield while being safer to use in reactors, producing little or no longterm waste and being extremely difficult to use for nuclear weapons manufacture . It
has also been suggested that the UK should be investing in so-called Fast-Breeder
reactors (FBRs) which could use the country's stockpiles of nuclear waste as fuel,
reducing the need to find a long-term storage solution.[9][10][11] Furthermore, it is
claimed that by using plutonium as a fuel, FBRs could remove the threat of nuclear
weapons grade material falling into terrorist or foreign hands. However, both these
nuclear options have their critics, who argue that they would be costly and could take
many decades to deploy on a commercial scale.[9][12][13][14].
If alternative nuclear technology can address

concerns over safety, waste and weapons
proliferation it should be considered
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Alternative nuclear technology removes the major

obstacles to acceptance and should therefore be
included in the UK's energy mix
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
The claims made for alternative nuclear technology

should be treated with extreme caution
1
Strongly Agree
Strongly Disagree
Alternative nuclear technology could not be

introduced in a short enough time frame to prevent
damaging climate change
1
Strongly Agree
5
Strongly Disagree
71
The likely financial cost of introducing alternative

nuclear technology would be prohibitive
1
Strongly Agree
5
Strongly Disagree
Additional comments
If you wish to comment on the "future nuclear" section or provide more information please do
so here
Contact Info
I would like to follow up a selection of responses to this survey. Please provide a name
and email address below if you are willing to be contacted with further questions or
for a short interview. Your details will be treated as strictly confidential. A code will be
attached to your data so that it remains totally anonymous. You will not be
identifiable in any subsequent write-up or publication. Thanks again for taking part.
Full name (Surname, first name)

Email address
You've finished! Please press the

"submit" button at the bottom of the
page. Thank you!
References
[1] Monbiot, G. (March 31, 2011). The Guardian."The double standards of green antinuclear opponents".
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/georgemonbiot/2011/mar/31/doublestandards-nuclear
[2] Monbiot, G. (March 22, 2011). The Guardian. "Why Fukushima made me stop
worrying and love nuclear power".
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/mar/21/pro-nuclear-japanfukushima
[3] Lynas, M. (March 21, 2011). marklynas.org. "Nuclear: difference between two and
three degrees?" http://www.marklynas.org/2011/03/176/
[4] Earthcomms.org (November 14, 2013). "Pro-nuclear greens dare not speak out".
http://www.earthcomms.org/pro-nuclear-greens-dare-not-speak-out/
72
[5] Harrabin, R. (October 31, 2013). The Guardian. "Thorium backed as a 'future
fuel'". http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-24638816
[6] Chan, S. (August 21, 2013). The Telegraph. "Thorium put to the test as
policymakers rethink nuclear".
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/10255442/Thorium-putto-the-test-as-policymakers-rethink-nuclear.html
[7] World Nuclear Association. (March, 2014). Information Library: Current and
Future Generation - Thorium. http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/current-andfuture-generation/thorium/
[8] Energy from Thorium Foundation. Video primer on Thorium energy. (Retrieved
27/04/14). http://energyfromthorium.com/eftf-introductions/
[9] Pearce, F. (July 30, 2012). Yale, e360. "Are Fast-Breeder Reactors A Nuclear
Power Panacea?" http://e360.yale.edu/feature/are_fastbreeder_reactors_a_nuclear_power_panacea/2557/
[10] Clark, D. (February 2, 2012). The Guardian. "New generation of nuclear reactors
could consume radioactive waste as fuel"
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/feb/02/nuclear-reactors-consumeradioactive-waste
[11] Monbiot, G. (February 2, 2012). The Guardian. "We cannot wish Britain's nuclear
waste away".
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/georgemonbiot/2012/feb/02/nuclearwaste
[12] Abbess, J. (May 10, 2011). joabbess.com. "George Monbiot bites Thorium bait".
http://www.joabbess.com/2011/05/10/george-monbiot-bites-thorium-bait/
[13] Rees, E. (June 23, 2011). The Ecologist. "Don't believe the spin on thorium being
a greener nuclear option"
http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/952238/dont_believe_the_spin_
on_thorium_being_a_greener_nuclear_option.html
[14] Porritt, J. (March, 2013). jonathonporritt.com blog. "Nuclear: our new Letter to
the Prime Minister and Press Release".
http://www.jonathonporritt.com/Campaigns/nuclear
73
Appendix 2: Breakdown of survey data

Note: for a scales represented as 1 5, 1 = strong agree, 2 = agree, 3 = neither agree
nor disagree, 4 = disagree, 5 = strongly disagree

(Output from IBMs SPSS software except for *support for environmental NGOs &
**support for political parties, for which multiple responses were given by
respondents. These were processed by Google Docs analysis)

Section 1: General Info
Valid
Valid
Gender
Frequency
1
Female
38
Male
73
Total
112
Percent
.9
33.9
65.2
100.0
Age (years)
Frequency
1
18-24
16
25-34
27
35-44
30
45-54
20
55-64
11
65 and over
7
Total
112
Percent
.9
14.3
24.1
26.8
17.9
9.8
6.3
100.0
Are you a member of or do you

support/share the values of one of the
following organisations?*
74
Greenpeace
Valid
Friends of the
Earth
WWF-UK
RSPB
National Trust
English
Heritage
CPRE
Other
Frequency
71
Percent
24.1
61
20.7
42
37
33
14.3
12.6
11.2
17
5.8
13
1
4.4
6.8
Are you a member of or do you

support/share the values of one of the
following political parties?**
Frequency
Percent
Green Party
90
66.2
Labour
23
16.9
Liberal
14
10.3
Democrat
2
1.5
Valid Conservative
SNP
2
1.5
Plaid Cymru
2
1.5
UKIP
1
0.7
Other
2
1.5
Are you or have you been employed in
an environmental role?
Frequency
Percent
No
84
75.0
Valid Yes
28
25.0
Total
112
100.0
Are you studying for or do you hold

an environmental qualification?
Frequency
Percent
No
79
70.5
Valid Yes
33
29.5
Total
112
100.0

75

Section 2: Environmental outlook & values
Renewable energy can meet all the

UKs energy needs
Frequency
Percent
1.0
36
32.1
2.0
31
27.7
3.0
23
20.5
Valid
4.0
14
12.5
5.0
Total
8
112
7.1
100.0
Current local opposition to onshore

wind schemes in the UK may severely
limit the scale of renewable energy
Frequency
Percent
1.0
32
28.6
2.0
56
50.0
3.0
15
13.4
Valid
4.0
5
4.5
5.0
4
3.6
Total
112
100.0
The UK needs to drastically reduce
energy consumption to achieve its
climate change targets
Frequency
Percent
1.0
63
56.3
2.0
36
32.1
3.0
7
6.3
Valid
4.0
4
3.6
5.0
2
1.8
Total
112
100.0
76
Energy efficiency is the best means of

reducing demand for power
Frequency
Percent
1.0
47
42.0
2.0
39
34.8
3.0
12
10.7
Valid
4.0
11
9.8
5.0
3
2.7
Total
112
100.0
Behaviour change is one of the most
important aspects of energy and
climate policy
Frequency
Percent
1.0
50
44.6
2.0
35
31.3
3.0
14
12.5
Valid
4.0
11
9.8
5.0
2
1.8
Total
112
100.0
Developing existing renewable technology
is one of the most important aspects of
energy and climate policy
Frequency
Percent
1.0
61
54.5
2.0
42
37.5
Valid
3.0
6
5.4
5.0
2
1.8
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
77
New technology and innovation should be

given a higher priority in energy and
climate policy
Frequency
Percent
1.0
59
52.7
2.0
37
33.0
Valid
3.0
14
12.5
4.0
1
.9
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
The welfare of people is the most
important reason to tackle climate change
Frequency
Percent
1.0
43
38.4
2.0
34
30.4
3.0
22
19.6
Valid
4.0
9
8.0
5.0
3
2.7
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
Combating climate change is all about
preserving the natural world
Frequency
Percent
1.0
18
16.1
2.0
32
28.6
3.0
33
29.5
Valid
4.0
24
21.4
5.0
4
3.6
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0

78
Curbing world population growth is

necessary to combat climate change
Frequency
Percent
1.0
17
15.2
2.0
35
31.3
3.0
27
24.1
Valid
4.0
20
17.9
5.0
13
11.6
Total
112
100.0
Which energy source would you least like to
see in the UKs energy mix?
Frequency
Percent
6
5.4
Fracked gas
87
77.7
Natural gas
3
2.7
Valid
Nuclear
14
12.5
Wind
2
1.8
Total
112
100.0
Section 3: Existing Nuclear Technology
Nuclear power produces huge amounts of
harmful waste which cannot be safely
stored
Frequency
Percent
1.0
48
42.9
2.0
25
22.3
3.0
14
12.5
Valid
4.0
19
17.0
5.0
5
4.5
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
79
Nuclear power in the UK has a poor

safety record
Frequency
Percent
1.0
14
12.5
2.0
27
24.1
3.0
33
29.5
Valid
4.0
22
19.6
5.0
16
14.3
Total
112
100.0
The Fukushima nuclear disaster in

Japan in 2011 confirms that nuclear
power is inherently unsafe
Frequency
Percent
1.0
29
25.9
2.0
18
16.1
3.0
24
21.4
Valid
4.0
25
22.3
5.0
16
14.3
Total
112
100.0
Nuclear power encourages nuclear
weapons proliferation
Frequency
Percent
1.0
13
11.6
2.0
29
25.9
3.0
29
25.9
Valid
4.0
25
22.3
5.0
15
13.4
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
80
Nuclear power stations are vulnerable to

terrorist attack
Frequency
Percent
1.0
17
15.2
2.0
36
32.1
3.0
28
25.0
Valid
4.0
26
23.2
5.0
3
2.7
Total
110
98.2
Missing System
2
1.8
Total
112
100.0
The financial cost of nuclear power is
too great
Frequency
Percent
1.0
34
30.4
2.0
25
22.3
3.0
20
17.9
Valid
4.0
18
16.1
5.0
15
13.4
Total
112
100.0
The involvement of big energy companies
in developing nuclear power is
problematic
Frequency
Percent
1.0
44
39.3
2.0
25
22.3
3.0
26
23.2
Valid
4.0
8
7.1
5.0
8
7.1
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
81
Overseas investment in British nuclear

power is unacceptable
Frequency
Percent
1.0
23
20.5
2.0
16
14.3
3.0
33
29.5
Valid
4.0
26
23.2
5.0
10
8.9
Total
108
96.4
Missing System
4
3.6
Total
112
100.0
Nuclear power stations are a blight on the
landscape
Frequency
Percent
1.0
12
10.7
2.0
25
22.3
3.0
40
35.7
Valid
4.0
25
22.3
5.0
9
8.0
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
Adding nuclear capacity in the UK could
displace renewables
Frequency
Percent
1.0
30
26.8
2.0
34
30.4
3.0
23
20.5
Valid
4.0
20
17.9
5.0
3
2.7
Total
110
98.2
Missing System
2
1.8
Total
112
100.0
82
Nuclear power is preferable to fossil fuels

Frequency
Percent
1.0
41
36.6
2.0
22
19.6
3.0
31
27.7
Valid
4.0
10
8.9
5.0
7
6.3
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
The abandoning of nuclear power in
Germany will lead to more fossil fuels
being burned
Frequency
Percent
1.0
26
23.2
2.0
23
20.5
3.0
36
32.1
Valid
4.0
19
17.0
5.0
7
6.3
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
Nuclear power can provide plentiful
energy for centuries to come
Frequency
Percent
1.0
20
17.9
2.0
35
31.3
3.0
18
16.1
Valid
4.0
22
19.6
5.0
17
15.2
Total
112
100.0
83
Nuclear power represents a vital low

carbon source of energy
Frequency
Percent
1.0
22
19.6
2.0
23
20.5
3.0
17
15.2
Valid
4.0
21
18.8
5.0
28
25.0
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
Which of the following do you consider the most
serious issue relating to nuclear power?
Frequency
Percent
1
.9
Displaces
13
11.6
renewables
Financial cost
10
8.9
Involvement of big
6
5.4
business
Nuclear fuel is a
2
1.8
Valid
finite resource
Nuclear waste
65
58.0
Nuclear weapons
3
2.7
proliferation
Operational safety
8
7.1
Other
4
3.6
Total
112
100.0
84
Section 4: Future Nuclear

If alternative
Nuclear technology can address concerns
over safety, waste, and weapons
proliferation it should be considered
Frequency
Percent
1.0
57
50.9
2.0
27
24.1
3.0
12
10.7
Valid
4.0
7
6.3
5.0
8
7.1
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
Alternative nuclear technology removes
the major obstacles to acceptance and
should therefore be included in the UKs
energy mix
Frequency
Percent
1.0
27
24.1
2.0
25
22.3
3.0
30
26.8
Valid
4.0
17
15.2
5.0
11
9.8
Total
110
98.2
Missing System
2
1.8
Total
112
100.0
85
The claims made for alternative nuclear

technology should be treated with
extreme caution
Frequency
Percent
1.0
36
32.1
2.0
27
24.1
3.0
32
28.6
Valid
4.0
14
12.5
5.0
2
1.8
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
Alternative nuclear technology could not
be introduced in a short enough time
frame to prevent damaging climate
change
Frequency
Percent
1.0
23
20.5
2.0
34
30.4
3.0
38
33.9
Valid
4.0
8
7.1
5.0
8
7.1
Total
111
99.1
Missing System
1
.9
Total
112
100.0
86
The likely financial cost of introducing

alternative nuclear technology would be
prohibitive
Frequency
Percent
1.0
13
11.6
2.0
18
16.1
3.0
54
48.2
Valid
4.0
19
17.0
5.0
6
5.4
Total
110
98.2
Missing System
2
1.8
Total
112
100.0
Additional analysis
Support Category
Frequency
Nuclear
32
enthusiast
Conditional
nuclear
25
supporter
Nuclear
29
sceptic
Nuclear
26
refuser
Percent
28.6
22.3
25.9
23.2
87
Appendix 3: Survey Comments


1. "A reduced standard of living may have to be the price we pay for tackling
climate change" is a strange question. Do we need to make some drastic changes?
Yes. Does this mean maybe driving less and flying less and having fewer products in
the supermarket? Yes. Does this mean maybe a different relationship to technology?
Maybe. But do I believe that all these changes of living equal a reduced standard of
living, no. I think this is just a different way of living. I also feel equally strongly
about fracked gas and nuclear energy so hard to pick one. Also hard to say that one
reason is 'the most important' reason for combating climate change when there are
several.

2. Again I find the questions v polarising and dont reflect what I think is a
complicated issue. Yes it is about the natural world and human welfare (not either
or)...there are existing technologies that have not been properly developed and of
course we need continued innovation (not either or) and I believe there is a role for
all 4 energy sources listed above.

3. With political will and a factual debate anything is possible!! Between 2002
and2012 enough capacity from renewables were installed in Germany to generate
more than 3 times as much energy than Britain produced with 16 nuclear reactors
costing every year 2.5billions.

4. Because of its ambient nature, I do not understand how renewable energy sources
can meet all our needs, except in collaboration with other countries and their
renewable infrastructure over great distances e.g. using the Interconnector to access
surplus from Europe. It would still be necessary, however, to have backup sources,
such as natural gas plants with carbon capture and storage, or nuclear energy
(unless we can solve the vital problem of long term storage of great quantities of
energy i.e. get better batteries).

5. Define 'standard of living' - lower material standard will most likely be required,
but that may lead to healthier and happier societies i.e. an improved standard of
living. Preserving the natural world is a pre-requisite for secure human welfare, not
a binary either or. Work of Anderson and Bows from the Tyndall center shows us
that our 2 degree C carbon budgets require immediate large scale cuts to developed
worlds emissions. There's no enough time to build green energy supplies in the
short term, we must use demand side reductions to buy us time, whilst building
green energy as fast as possible. Curbing human population growth may help reduce
the impacts of climate change and help adaptation programs, not so crucial for
mitigation, need to focus on top 5% of income earners globally who are responsible
for 40-60% of all emissions.

6. Fracked gas seems like a line in the sand. It's putting money and research into a
new technology/energy source that is not renewable - it just seems backwards. I
accept that gas is likely to remain a necessary part of the energy mix for a while to
come.

7. I am aware of a difference of opinion regarding whether we can meet all energy
88
needs with renewables. Certainly we will struggle in the short term (certainly
without massive change in government outlook). I haven't been able to form my
own view. I am hopeful but not certain on this answer.

8. I do define nuclear as renewable, per your first question, if it were to be used in a
breeder type reactor. So long as Jeremy Clarkson and those who are of a similar
mind walk this Earth, whether or not you like my answers to these questions, they
are the ones most representative of the way to go forward. Efficiency and reduced
consumption will only spur use of dirtier, cheaper fuels in developing areas.

9. In trying to assess what I feel is most important with regards to the reason to
address climate change I have put forward a neutral position on all of the above as I
believe that none of these issues can be viewed in isolation. It is not people, it is not
the natural world and we can not just single out population growth. Climate
change, I believe, can be seen as the culmination of many factors, over consumption,
poor education, growing global financial equality, lack of technological development,
poor government investment and leadership. My motivation begins with the need
for development, we have come so far in the last 100 years but I feel that we have
been stuck on fossil fuel economy and happy to allow social equality to grow. Now
the 21st century and our knowledge of the environmental, social and financial issues
we face means that we need to develop in such a way as to be sympathetic to all
issues locally, nationally and internationally.

10. It's hard to answer 'Renewable energy can meet all the UK's energy needs'
because the answer depends on timescale. Today it's NO. By 2050 it might be yes
(though renewable aviation spirit still seems a stretch). The politically critical
question is medium term and I think the answer is still no - but 80% is probably
possible. And the fuel I least want to see used is COAL - much the worst for climate
and health. You should have included that option.

11. We are at a 'crisis' crossroads in history where energy use and development are
concerned. The fracking mania we see all around us is the growth culture's last
stand. As long as those in power (political and business) remain in denial, no
sensible progress can be made in terms of transitioning from our current power
requirements to a lower profile energy use altogether.

12. We need more locally produced energy e.g. domestic solar panels & small wind
turbines. We need attractive feed-in tariffs to incentivise local renewable energy .

13. Welfare of people & planet is intertwined and interdependent. Population
growth rate will decline due to economic development that empowers women to
have fewer kids, but significant population growth will still come from an ageing
population - which we can't (ethically!) do anything about...so not really a relevant
question to me. There is an excellent tool on the DECC website where you can try out
different scenarios to determine optimum UK energy mix - it shows the land use
cover you'd need for renewables to significantly contribute to our energy mix which
is a useful piece of information.

89

1. It feels like another example of private profit and social costs. In Germany they
had to move a store of nuclear waste because it was leaking at a cost to the
government that was higher than the money made by the company from power -

2. Although waste is the biggest issue, I do think nuclear power should be
nationalised. The implicit subsidy it inevitably requires to insure it against accidents
should not be paid by the taxpayer while profits accrue to private owners.
3. Don't trust government to regulate properly or generating companies enough to
want new nuclear. Cost is the next factor: history shows the costs are more than
expected, and born by taxpayers.

4. Don't trust government to regulate properly or generating companies enough to
want new nuclear. Cost is the next factor: history shows the costs are more than
expected, and born by taxpayers

5. For me the financial cost includes the waste disposal issue as well as the
operational safety issue (need for insurance etc). The question about Germany is
hard to answer, yes it may lead to more coal being burned, but that's a choice by the
Germans it's not a necessity. I do worry that a focus on nuclear will displace
investment in renewable energy.

6. I do not think we can supply sufficient energy by renewables alone. We must have
a small nuclear capacity as part of a diverse energy generation portfolio

7. I don't see any evidence anywhere that the problem of nuclear waste has been
solved to a degree where it is no longer an issue. Until such time, I do not believe
that nuclear energy should be part of any energy strategy. Nuclear energy is non-
renewable and therefore has no place in a green energy policy.

8. I find it hard to make my mind up on these issues because 'expert' opinion is so
divided.

9. In all energy related questions it is not enough just to look for safety and
standards of one technology: it is also about the amount that will never be restricted.
Hence, allowing for fracking or nuclear power stations in one site which might work
for a time will attract countless other facilities which as a whole impose
accumulated dangers of pollution and devastation.

10. In discussions of cost of nuclear power, we are seldom told if the cost of waste
disposal is included, and there is lack of clarity about the feasibility and cost of
disposing of low-level and highly radioactive waste. There should be cross-party
agreement about the best scientific estimates.

11. Nuclear is potentially extremely dangerous, but it's the only way to reduce
carbon emissions - renewables will never play more than a marginal role, but it
doesn't produce enough power, and the power it does produces varies too much
from hour to hour.

12. Nuclear power is a truly realistic way to reduce our carbon footprint in a drastic
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way and very quickly. Developments in technology and science are opening up
new possibilities for using nuclear waste as a fuel. This is an exciting prospect and
could provide bountiful, cheap and clean energy.

13. phhhhhh, nuclear power, where to start? Nuclear power needs to be considered
with the same criteria. Energy return on energy invested helps us to consider how
we spend energy (and emissions) to generate energy. Data is hard to get hold of but
my main concerns relating to nuclear power are: * Energy and emissions required
to generate energy from nuclear power across its whole life cycle * The cost of
generating electricity from nuclear energy is not stable with limited expertise high
resource demands meaning that it will continue to increase. Wind power has been
shown by DECC to be the cheapest per MWh. * The UK Government's inability to
entice corporate investment, even with questionable subsidies gives an indication to
the economics of the energy source - if it is such a marginal investment then perhaps
we should not let it be developed and ran by the lowest bidders * Waste and
disposal will be left with the government * Fukushima, hadn't the Japanese had a bit
of a telling off from the energy authorities for the state of repair of their nuclear
reactors? It is too expensive and companies will look to cut corners.

14. Regarding that final question, I'd like to point out that operational safety (or lack
thereof) and big business running the show go hand in hand. Any nuclear
infrastructure in the UK would have to be: a) reliant on newer, more inherently safe
fission models b) publicly financed and government run, much like we need to
nationalise the railways and energy grid, but less because of cost and more because
we cannot afford to let big business cut corners on nuclear energy, as the risks are
too great. The money could come from e.g. the scrapping of Trident. c) have more
stringent regulation and safety measures Germany is a very sad case! Fukushima
has motivated them to dump all their perfectly legit nuclear and move to coal (and
more renewables, but coal cannot be endured!).

15. The industry requires perfection in execution to be safe and economic. And
humans, and human society, are not perfect. Therefore it is something of a baroque
solution, an artefact of the mid 20th century Cold War State (see Charlie Stross's
blogpost 'Nothing like this will ever be built again' about the AGR at Torness).
Because nuclear power is a manifestation of centralized states and organizations
controlled by technological elites (almost the perfect definition of EDF and the
French state!) that limits both its scope and increases the risks. Likely we will
simply find it is not economic.

16. Stating that the abandoning of nukes in Germany will lead to more fossil fuel is
unfortunately a political cockup and totally avoidable. It would not happen if the
greens would still b in power in Germany. Even so it's a short term problem and
even so Germany had reduced carbon emission by 25% since 1990. That better than
most industrialised nations.

17. This country needs the effort afforded to fighting a world war to get out own
house in order. If we target our efforts and resources into retrofitting every home
in the UK, ensuring all new homes are as carbon neutral as possible, add solar panels
into the mix of all new builds, remove VAT from all energy efficient products, only
use energy efficient light bulbs and stop the manufacture of other types, help
publicise successful community owned energy producers so that others can take up
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the idea throughout the country. Tax the oil and carbon industries for the real costs
of their operations. Government adverts in TV which communicate clearly the
recent IPCCs findings and what we need to do NOW to reduce demand for energy
and soften attitudes to renewables.

18. Waste and cost are the two issues that really matter. But new types of nuclear
fuel might lessen this (can't remember its name). Cost is tough - it will only fall if
adopted en masse and that requires large state backed commitment. The market will
not (rationally) provide it. I've just scrolled down and seen the answer - Thorium.

3.3 Edited selected comments from Section 4: Future nuclear

1. I need to know the cost curves and future projections. For example, no one saw
the collapse in the cost of solar - this is welcome and we should be putting it on
every possible roof and filling up some deserts. It's almost competitive now.

2. Any investment and obsession with alternative nuclear energies distracts us from
investment into renewable energy. The latter, however has achieved a high
technological standard and releases humanity from any harm and side effects
regarding energy consumption. It connects to a deliberated society where citizens
are no longer suppressed by energy companies, politicians and market
entanglements but where costs and benefits can be calculated in a precise and
individualistic manner. We will have to study carefully whether scientific pleasure
overrides reason and whether the scientific ambitions of some few reduce life
expectations of many.

3. Fusion power is the elephant in the room here. It continues to be a very difficult
engineering challenge, but then so was sending a man to the moon until it was
decided that had to happen at all cost. If this can be achieved, it's a better alternative
than Thorium in my view. As for costs, they will be massive for any alternative to
nuclear, but then so are existing and committed future costs for regular nuclear.

4. Given how much money we waste on arms and subsidising fossil fuels, I cannot
imagine that cost could be reasonably considered prohibitive. The argument that
this infrastructure would never be online soon enough to contribute to our climate
solution is valid though - it's more a post climate crisis world (if we're still alive)
that it stands to benefit. Perhaps it will be the source we transition to from gas with
CCS in the long term (while our foundation must remain in renewables). P.S. Don't
tell anyone my opinions, never have I seen such a tremendously divisive issue
among like minded people! ;)

6. Humankind is not responsible enough to work with any Nuclear technology, add
to that terrorism, earthquakes and war, and it all adds up to a lot of trouble, lets get
rid of it and work harder with renewables.

5. I don't know enough about this to comment accurately but it should be looked
into if only for short term benefit while renewables are being ramped up.

6. I need to know more info on the costs / time frames. I cannot be treated as an
authority. This is based on information which I have read. I in no way am an expert,
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so simply gaining my view is great, but this is one for experts and correct info. But
having read a little in this area, I have seen convincing figures suggesting that
renewables will not solve the energy crisis, and that nuclear power is the only viable
alternative source, not simply to solve the climate change crisis, but to solve the
issue that fossil fuels are running out.

7. Just because thorium is 3 times more abundant than uranium does not mean that
it won't run out. It is not a true renewable.

8. The nuclear industry has a historic habit of trumping the 'next' technology. The
reality is any nuclear revival will be built with '3rd Generation' nuclear technology:
light water boiling or pressurised water reactors (LWBWR or PWR). Essentially the
same reactors that were available to utilities in the mid 1960s (AGR and CANDU
dropping by the wayside). The rest is just moondust for the next 20-30 years.

9. The nuke lobby has been making amazing claims since the first reactor went on
the grid and nothing ever materialised. In contrast renewables have a fantastic track
record in a hostile environment. Check out Bloomberg, Reuters and other financial
news. Nukes are for dreamer. The references you added are from self centred idiots
proofed again and again wrong! You have to check out facts not opinions

10. This is the first i've heard of thorium, and didn't know fbr would use up waste!
who says what's prohibitive cost, and shouldn't we be trying everything?
11. Totally think alternative nuclear technology is a massive opportunity that should
be receiving far more investment.

12. We most likely need a nuclear reactor or two, the problem is that the
government has left the decision too late. We should have started developing them
10 years ago. Now that capital funding is difficult to get hold of, resource costs
have increased, available technological expertise is limited, a new reactor is likely to
take longer to build (and cost more) than is hoped and the long term financial
burden of the power stations - including the cost of generation and disposal - means
that if we are going to have one it should be the Government that owns and operates
it, at least we will be paying ourselves and not the French government or other
companies for the pleasure.

13. Where I have chosen 3 this is because I don't have enough knowledge to have an
opinion. I think if there are actually alternative nuclear materials that can potentially
produce safe and clean energy, then that's worth spending some research resources
on; but not at the expense of renewables research.

14. You don't mention the most promising avenue of future nuclear power - that of
next-generation reactor technology, that are not necessarily fast breeders. The
molten salt reactor in particular has many advantages. It needs a lot of development
work, but a cheaper, safer reactor would yield huge benefit to a world in dire need of
low carbon energy. See http://www.the-weinberg-foundation.org/learn/molten-
salt-reactors/

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Appendix 4: Interview transcripts

4.1 Nuclear enthusiasts

Rob [Nuclear Enthusiast] Edited interview transcript

[Notes: age 25-34, Green Party supporter, employed in energy policy research]

[Q: advantages of nuclear over renewables?]

Because of the nature of the debate I generally avoid saying one or the
othertheyre not mutually exclusive but in answer to the question I think the
advantages of nuclear are land useyou only need a small amount of area for a
nuclear plant (per unit of energy), and really you dont need the same amount of
resources in terms of steel and concrete, especially when you compare it to offshore
windalso reliability and so-called base load power. Obviously we dont quite know
whats going to happen to the grid but at the moment it requires a certain amount of
dependable power and renewables are problematic above a certain degree of
penetration. We know weve got to scale up low carbon energy and therefore
nuclear is looking very useful.

Renewables could provide most of our energy but we would need a transformation
of the systemwed need a decentralised grid, active demand management and
more storage, and those things arent impossible but its a different direction and
given that we already have nuclear that just seems like the easiest option and
certainly the option thats best for scaling up on a global levelcertainly for
developing countriesthey want to build their industries and manufacturing and
they will therefore want big power stations to start pumping out energy. It just
seems more viable to me.

[What about the proliferation issue, especially with regard to developing
countriesrole for alternative nuclear technology?]

Yes and no (re alternative nuclear tech). I think its important to note that we have a
civilian nuclear power regime in something like 31 countries and there are only 7 or
8 nuclear states, so were already in a situation where access to nuclear technologies
isnt correlated with nuclear weapons. And we also know that the routes countries
take if they want to develop nuclear weapons have a distinct look and feelthey
build heavy water reactors and lots of reprocessing facilities. They dont just build
power plants. Sure yes, if you can do one you can do the other and that is a security
concern but it can happen anywhere and I dont think that having civilian nuclear
power makes it more dangerous for the world and I think the benefits outweigh the
risks. Thats it for me.

[Is part of the nuclear attraction, a business as usual economy?]

Ive spent a lot of time talking to friends and other environmentalists about this and
its just about feasibility. Were going to get behaviour change and were going to get
usage change and people are going to use whats presented to them. Companies are
going to do what makes sense. Companies are going to use less energy and people
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are going to use services and if theyre going to use less energy then thats good, but
theyre not going to really seek it out. I just dont think were going to see large-scale
behaviour change on an individual basisI think all the energy efficiency things can
and will happen but not necessarily from people choosing that much efficient
technologies, they come from companies saying look use this product and weve
made it efficient for you.

[Q: in a nuclear-based energy system whats the role for the private sector and
government?]

In the current paradigm we know that with the current reactor designs cant really
be built without a high level of state support because of the safety and insurance
premiums and because of the long time frames for decommissioning and waste
disposal. But with the next generation of nuclear stuff with much reduced waste and
better safety, private companies will be able [indistinctbut in effect make a proper
business case without the need for subsidies]. At the moment the nuclear industry
wouldnt be able to scale up in the appropriate way without a lot of state support but
that hopefully the private sector will be able to come in and deliver innovation with
some sort of state low-level R&D as well.

I think if you look at space flight which has really kicked of recently with the X Prize
thats the same sort of level in my opinion. Theres a huge amount of innovation,
its tightly licenced and regulated by private companies have been able to generate
huge amounts of investment to do lots of things so I dont see why that couldnt be
repeated with nuclear.

[Q: Is this how you bring down cost? One of the biggest issues raised in the survey]

The new build in the UK does seem to have been completely mad (in terms of cost).
In the rest of Europe nuclear seems to have completely run away as well.
Thats to do with both having these older designs that just have safety systems
bolted to themwith these evolution costs and licencing problems youre just
adding on costs year after yearinstead of saying, lets start from the beginningthe
other thing as with renewables is learning by doing. The Chinese do it cheaper and
faster with windfarms every year and I think once the nuclear industry gets its act
together and gets something that everyone is happy with then we will see the costs
come down in that same way.

[Q: Does a successful nuclear industry therefore require a degree of international
coordination and cooperation]

It definitely needs to happen to get that volumea one company offering or a one
state offering that then gets picked up and repeated and opened up. Certainly
something thats simpler and safer by design that doesnt need all of these
systemsand thats possibly a hope with the small modular reactors that suddenly
youre building hundreds of them and all of that process gets quicker and better and
more optimised and then you see the costs coming down.

[Discussion: Appeals to some wanting a more decentralised energy systemwould
this appeal to greens? Possibly, but not sure whysmaller generation may not be the
most efficient way of producing energyneed to exploit economies of scalethough
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different ways of achieving scalealso argument to be made for modular reactors in

terms of encouraging an indigenous industry that doesnt rely so much on foreign
parts, expertise etc]

The UK used to be a top tier nuclear player, it was an industry that we were
exporting and weve let it fall apart basically. But we still have this very high-level
research base and some strong manufacturing and it would make sense for us to be
one of the players selling to the rest of the world. Weve still just about retained the
expertise and if we act now we can return to the top tier.

[Q: Are risks of existing nuclear exaggerated? And if they are, why do we need the
alternatives?]

The alternatives we dont need them, but theyre just better. The safety case for
nuclear is already pretty strong and weve learnt lots of lessons from past
experience. There was Windscale but that was right at the beginning. If we take
hydroa damn broke in China and killed 300,000 people and if we take nuclear, the
worst thing weve got is Chernobyl. Of course we should make things as safe as
possible but in general in terms of KWh generated nuclear is very safe and we know
that we need low carbon industries. And in terms of Fukushima [indistinct, but gist
is that UN reported that no cancer risk from the radiationand that the fear of it
was much more damaging]. Im not saying it wasnt really bad and we shouldnt
build better, safer reactors, but given the global situation in terms of the need to act
on climate change its an acceptable danger.

[Q: How do you address historic mistrust of industry and in particular a lack of
transparency?]

The industry misbehaving and the stereotypical dumping of nuclear waste, thats
very difficult and clearly the industry needs to be very strongly regulated. I guess
you have to demand accountability and transparency and getting the industry to
follow protocol, but I think were in a better position than ever to do thatwere
better able to share informationand a new build programme with a strong
educational element that says exactly what is proposed and this is how we regulate
them, and this is why theyre going to be safe

To me the nuclear industry now seems fairly brow beaten and generally meek and
mildIve heard people say that you dont realise but 20 or 30 years ago the
industry was pretty badly misbehaved and generally unaccountable and reading up
a bit about that has given it some context.

[Q:Aware of how contentious the nuclear debate is within the green movement?]

[Yestalks about involvement in civil society round table on nuclear power
involving green groups, NGOs etc]

The debate has softened and I think part of that is to do with the recognition of the
need for low carbon energy. A lot of people seem not to want to discuss it but I think
it has softened since the 70s when people were calling for all nuclear power stations
to be shut down. A lot of greens now are more moderate they might still oppose it
but the arguments have changed. It isnt that there are these are unfeasible dangers,
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its there is a problem with the waste fine and its too expensive, but the expense
is not a fundamental argument. The answer to that is well if the costs come down
then will you support it?

[Q: Can the argument be won without green consent? ]

Probably not reallywe live in a democracywere trying to make these choices
together in some kind of consensus. We need to satisfy everyone somewhatwe can
make a business case for this, we can make an environmental case for this, and we
can make a jobs and UK-centric case. We might not convince greens in every case
but I think that they can be convinced that this is a necessary evilobviously I dont
think it is an evil though.

[Q: what do you think about the way the argument is being made by people like
Mark Lynas?]

I respect the way that he thinks its important to challenge and confront people. I
think different positions can co-exist if you say lets have a reasoned energy mix and
do what makes sense, its when people say nuclear must be shut down and I think
Germanys a great example of thatthem saying well phase out nuclear and just go
100% renewables and all the capacity of increasing renewables is just replacing
their closed nuclear so they havent cut their coal emissions, their greenhouse
emissions have gone up. That doesnt fit with the aim of decarbonising as fast as
possible. Thats where you can say if you kept nuclear and expanded renewables
emissions would be much less, and thats dangerous and needs to be shouted about.
I dont want to have that kind of argument with friends and turn it into a make or
break issue. I would have thought most people in the UK would say dont shut down
the low carbon nuclear power plants.

[Q: If nuclear can be so effective, wheres the need for renewables?]

I do see that. The fact is weve got some already anyway and theres no reason not to
continue with those. If its cost effective then its cost effective [makes the argument
for renewables providing a need for community-based power with nuclear
providing the bulk. Wind and solar fit that model very well.] But why pretend this
can be scaled up massively. Why not be happy with a small amount of generation
from it?

[Q: What about the aesthetic arguments against wind? Is this at heart of some pro-
nuclear stances?]

Personally I think wind turbines are fine, Im quite happy with them. I can see the
argument about preserving landscape views but I dont share it. It can be a bit of a
thin cover for climate denial and anti-green sentiment. On the other hand weve
already covered the countryside in lots of pylons and things. We shouldnt build
everywhere but where it makes sense we should do it.

[Q: Role of molten salt reactors?]

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It has the greatest potential and makes the most sense in terms of the best safety
case, the best waste caseused in conjunction with Thorium fuel. Communicating all
these different new bits is one of the main challenges.

[Q: can this nuclear technology be commercialised quickly enough to tackle the
urgency of climate change?]

Why not? It requires political will, but the first light water reactors were built in six
years from nothing to the first nuclear-powered submarines. With a big push and
collaboration I dont see why it couldnt happen. We already have this huge research
base and knowledge base and theres a lot of international work going on. There are
a lot of individuals and companies that share that vision. It can be turned around
very quickly if you take the best available stuff off the shelf and do it in a simplified
way. China says it will develop its first reactors (of this type?) by 2030OK thats
still a long way off but its not throwing money at it, thats a $350m programmeits
not a lot of money when compared to the amount spent on other large scale
projectsthe SERN atom smasher is something like 15bn

Jeremy [Nuclear Enthusiast] Edited interview transcript

[Notes: age 35-44, Conservative supporter]

Technology can be used by industry to reduce Co2 emissionsgreener cars are
being builttechnology to make boilers more efficient etc. Behaviour change by
manufacturers is possiblebut I dont think behaviour change by individuals will
really workit might be that 10% of the population will put an extra jumper on
rather than turn on a radiator purely for green reasons. The vast bulk of people
arent going to do that. Even in Germany, perhaps the greenest of countries, Im not
sure there are huge numbers doing that. You can to an extent reduce energy usage
but not radically.

Even if you reduce it per head in the west, the Chinese middle class is growing, the
Indian middle class is growingtheyll use more energy. Therefore I dont see any
solutions apart from nuclear at the moment.

Whats not going to be acceptable to people is a reduction in their standard of living
and whats not really possible economically is a fall in GDP followed by no GDP
growthyoud create economic collapse. Modern economies are set up for
productivity growth. If Britain pursued a green agenda (with renewables), it could
become uncompetitive with other countries.

I dont even think we have the option of pursuing renewables for our energy needs.
Conventional green power is variable, not reliableIm not sure how it could be
done even if you had windmills in most available space.

The risks of nuclear are overstated by anti-nuclear campaigners. There are some
risks. I dont really see that we have an option though. 20 or 30 years ago there was
talk that if you had a war in a country with nuclear power plants that opposing sides
would use them as an instrument of wara sort of scorched earth policy, but I think
Yugoslavia had nuclear power plants. There still are risks.

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I think in the UK safety standards are pretty strict. Fukushima does show that clearly
there are risks. I looked into the risks in statistical terms when it happened because I
discussed with my wife if it was OK for our daughter to go and stay in Japan. We
looked at the levels of radiation outside the immediate zone and they were really
tiny. So I think the effect of Fukushima has been exaggerated. Clearly nuclear
accidents can happenI think maybe they always will happen but theyre not as
apocalyptic as people make out. Three-mile Island wasnt apocalyptic and
Fukushima wasnt apocalyptic.

There are specific problems in Japan to do with the way that hierarchy works. In the
west to a certain extent you have questioning of superiors. Look at safety records of
airlinesthose with the best safety records are those in less hierarchical cultures.
Korea has a very bad record. I think that Japanese culture might increase the
possibility of negligence. Cultural attitudes to risk and disasters are quite
importantattitudes to constant questioning to make sure that safety procedures
are being carefully applied.

I think that actually an open society is good for nuclear safety because if any
mistakes are made people can then learn from them and improve safety.

[Q: How to deal with perceived risk? Alt nuclear or education or both?]

Technological knowledge is constantly increasing and the way we can maximise the
chances of surviving global warming and the way we maximise power compatible
with thatthe primary way of doing it is through new technology.

[Q: wildlife or aesthetic issue with wind]

As long as wind not going to eradicate wildlife I have no problem with wind. A lot of
British wildlife doing very well at the moment. On the aesthetic thing, no. There
might be specific iconic sights but to be honest I dont find them ugly. Im happy to
have them as part of the energy mix, as long as they dont receive high subsidies.

[Q; cost of nuclear?]

Its not ruinously expensive and its possible it will get less expensive as efficiency of
the technology improves. Ultimately, if we had a primarily nuclear energy industry I
dont think the costs would be so prohibitively high that it would stop the economy
from growing. Its possible it wouldnt grow as fast as before but maybe thats a
price we have to pay, but even then

The oil price has gone up an enormous amount. Most people wouldnt have
predicted it would have gone up so much without hampering global growth. I would
say the same would hold true for nuclear energy.

Costs should clearly be one factor.

[Rejects idea that lack of green motives among big business should be a reason to
reject].

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Laura [Nuclear Enthusiast] Edited interview transcript

[Notes: age 25-34, cross-party support, employed in marketing and sustainability,
post-grad qualification in sustainability]

[Q: Attitude to renewables not being able to deliver all energy needslarge amount
of land use involved. Has this shaped favourable attitude towards nuclear power?]

Thats what I think at the moment. Its always really hard with these things because
its obviously dependent in part over what further innovation there is within
renewables [mentions the solar roadways]that provides an opportunity for
renewable energy to use land thats also being used for something else, and
suddenly changes the equation of the land use argument. [Was ability around farm
use taken into account in DECC carbon calculator? Like anything it depends how
you model it and the assumptions you use]. From what I know my gut sense is that
renewables could never be a total energy solution unless we reduce energy demand.

[Q: Can you bring about the level of demand reduction that you would need in order
to make renewables an option? Does nuclear allow us to avert need for big demand
side change?]

It comes down to some fundamental assumptions about human nature and what
motivates peopleits interesting that energy efficiency should be the most sensible
thing to invest in first, before you decarbonise your energy supply you should
reduce your overall energy consumptionbut I dont think that excites peoples
entrepreneurial spirit to the same extent that creating a new source of power
doesmy gut instinct is that even though theres often a financial case for reducing
energy consumption to cut costs, on an individual level the kinds of reductions you
make are never compelling enough. If youre a huge company that owns large
numbers of buildings and factories the numbers get big enough for it to be
worthwhile to do energy efficiency on a really serious scale, but individual people in
their homes? Im not sure whetherbuildings are responsible for a huge amount of
carbon emissions in the UK but Im not sure individual consumers are ever going to
do enough.

If everything becomes more efficient it doesnt necessarily mean that people will use
less energy it can mean people use more for the same price.

[Q: alt nuclear technology, the best way to tackle risk?]

My job is in marketing and sustainability and from my knowledge that I get through
doing that, if things get a bad name its very sticky and people generally dont make
decisions based on information or rationalitythey often make very emotionally-
driven decisions about this sort of thing.

Once nuclear power has gained this image in many, many peoples minds as
fundamentally evil or environmentally destructive type of fuel that would take a
long time to shake, even if you had very compelling, rational information that it did
override some of those concerns. I guess the question is, does that matter? Does it
need broad public support? Could you convince a very powerful NGO like
Greenpeace to be supportive of it and then it could act as a kind of shortcut for
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people in terms of how they frame that technology and what they think about it. My
view would be its one of those things youd solve by finding an emotional shortcut
that tackles peoples concerns, which would be to get the support of NGOs that are
respected by people in the environmental movement rather than just present a
really good case in terms of facts and figures.

Peoples reaction will be that thorium is in the same category as nuclear weapons,
its something I dont really understand, it sounds very technical. I might have a
general mistrust of scientists or new technologies just on principle.

[Q: timescale of commercialising new technology an issue?]

The Chinese government is I think seriously investing in itthey hope to have a
reactor in 10 years or something, but at the end of the day I dont know how long it
takes to innovate in this stuff but it basically depends on how much money is going
to be put into it. I dont know if thats a good argument. I would have thought that if
theres political will from the government to invest in that kind of technology then
its possible (as a solution).

[Q; How optimistic/pessimistic about meeting the climate change through low
carbon energy?]

Its an unknowable thing and theres no point in being pessimistic about it because
people who are pessimistic tend not to do anything. Thats the thing I find most
irritating. I dont think its practical to be pessimistic about that sort of thing. I think
its sensible to be pragmatic in how you approach it and basically I dont think
anyone knows at this stage whats going to be the most useful approachso its best
to try all the different things you can and hope that something ends up being
scaleable and just works and maybe Thorium could be that thing. I have no idea. It
depends on so many factors that are impossible to model and predict but I think its
a fundamentally good thing to drive innovation in new technologies that will be
cleaner.

I think this whole discussion depends on what your assumptions are about the
evolution of the grid as wellif you think energy is going to be very decentralised
and off grid that effects your view on whether you want massive power stations but
then if you think the fastest way of solving things is going to be to create a
technology thats instantly hugely scaleable and can plug into existing power
networks then maybe something like a Thorium reactor although it could take
longer to develop could be a faster way. Im pessimistic about the general publics
ability to have a rational or informed view on things. I dont think thats necessarily a
barrier though.

(Q: is that answer for the government to be more command and control?)

I think you do have to consult (over energy planning) because we have to have an
accountable form of government. I dont know how important public opposition
would be to the development of Thorium. There are bigger evils that people are irate
about at the moment like fracking and coal power. I guess it boils down to the
question, would key NGO influences care enough about Thorium to launch a
campaign against it.
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[Lot of discussion follows about the role business has to play and whether it can
drive innovationcreating services that are more appealing to consumers precisely
because theyre environmentally friendly. Quite positive about the role of business.]

The more companies communicate about what theyre doing (in terms of being
green) the more you can shift public opinionbut in Europe you have this segment
of consumers who are really environmentally aware but also hugely cynical about
any communication from big companies about what its doing even if that
communication is very credible and backed up and they are actually doing
something quite good. Thats really frustrating because you get a situation where
companies dont want to talk about the good stuff that theyre doing because theyre
afraid of this basically vocal minority.

4.2 Conditional nuclear supporters

Yazmin [Conditional Nuclear Supporter] Edited interview transcript

[Notes: age 25-34, cross-party support, MSc environmental technology]

[Survey comments: I think nuclear is seen as a silver bullet. I don't think it should be
ignored, but we can't build at a scale to deal with climate change (IEA had some
good stuff on this) in the near term. The baseload properties mean that we'll never
switch completely to it either - any claims as such are overhyped, and limit
compatibility with renewables. On balance I think it's short sighted and expensive. It
may have a place, but it really isn't a key battleground.]

[Q: does your attitude to renewables not being able to meet our energy needs push
you towards accepting nuclear power?]

I think for me its not really connected. I think renewable energy has a really big part
to play and can meet most of our needsbut because of the nature of it
(intermittency) and the lack of (energy) storage facilitiesI think in the future we
can work out a really sophisticated way of aggregating and controlling demand and
supply and responding much better to what energy is available, but definitely in the
medium term I think well need fossil fuel plants as well (as nuclear?) just for the
nature of how we use energy. For nuclear I think it would be a useful addition, but I
dont see it as a particularly large chunk of the energy mix. I dont think it should
really supply that muchor should supply that muchobviously it could but the way
plans and developments are going at the moment, its a tiny proportion of the energy
mix that were going to get from nuclear. I just dont think its worth fussing about.

[Agrees that current timescale for building nuclear means its difficult to bring large
amounts of energy on tap any time soon]. I would prefer not to have any oil or gas or
coal. The way that we use energy means that well need coal and gas just to top up
when we have high demand and not enough generation. The nature of nuclear which
is to supply this constant baseload wont help with that.

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(Fracking) Its going in the wrong direction. We still need some gas but if youre
going to invest a lot of money in research and new projects then it needs to be
renewables. Its the only real future, I think.

A lot of renewable technology has already been developed and we just need to
overcome public opposition to it and go down that route quite strongly.

[Q: Do you see an attraction in nuclear in terms of minimising the need for demand-
side change/behaviour change?]

I think well need behaviour change any way. My feeling about nuclear is that its
massively over-hyped on both sides of the argument. The pro-nuclear people tend to
say that it can meet all our needsand the reality suggests its going to take decades
to build anything. Chinas doing it a lot cheaper and using slightly different
technology which is going a lot fasterbut it is going to take a long time, its looking
like its going to be extremely expensivea lot more expensive than onshore wind
and possibly offshore wind. And its not going to offer that much. And in terms of
useful energy it provides a nice baseload, which is nice to have but it doesnt solve
everything. I would naturally be opposed to nuclear because it creates a lot of
problems that we dont know how to fixstoring a load of radioactive waste that we
dont know what to do with, so its just sitting in barrels. That seems like an
incredibly stupid thing to do short sighted and it seems like a bad idea to create a
problem youve no idea how to fix. However, I think the risks that people talk about
and I think the actual radioactive risk is a lot smaller than opponents give it credit
forprobably it will be fine. It seems quite stupid but I dont think it would be a risk
I wouldnt be worried about nuclear accidents in the UK you compare it to the
impacts of coal mining or you could look at rare earth metal mining that youre going
to use in making magnets in wind turbinesthose are probably worse than anything
youre going to get from nuclear.

Nuclear seems like its not really solving a problem. It seems like we might be able to
operate as we are without really making a change, but were going to need energy
efficiencywere not going to be able to build nuclear at a rate where we dont need
that and using energy in a smarter way is just smarter. [Agrees that about changing
our mindset rather than just energy per se].

[Q: perception of nuclear risk, how do you respond?]

I think some people welcome nuclear as more familiar and less intrusive than wind
turbinesbut I suspect theres even stronger Nimbyism about the waste
certainlyless so about nuclear plants because theres a lot of jobs associated with
it, certainly. (Unclear whats being said here)You can extend that to wind turbines
as well. It triggers a lot of reaction that isnt to do with particularly the visual impact
or the sound impactI think its more to do with party political groupings and
identity of self as valuing the landscape. I think community benefits struggle to
overcome that because its so rooted in personal identity and where people have
rooted themselves and Im not really sure how to change that and whether top-
down government support would make that better or whether a stronger
community model than the one were seeing at the moment would make a
difference. Those views seem quite entrenched and theyre not going to go away.

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[Q: can alternative nuclear technologies be used to address nuclear concerns?]

I dont think Thorium will make a huge difference here I dont think the perception
of risk would be much affected. Its still a bit scary. Possibly there could be an
education programme that went along with that, that would change peoples minds.
I think fast breeder reactors would make a difference, largely because you can
publicise it as dealing with the waste problem. And I think waste is probably
becoming salient in peoples minds with the proposal to bury waste in the north-
west and its all in the news about why people dont want it there. I think it you
offered something that dealt with the waste problem that could change peoples
perceptions.

[Q; Timescale issues with this?]

[Q: waste as a generational issue rather than the immediacy of placing it in
proximity to communities?]

(Agrees that possibly generations is a bit of an abstract issue) I feel uncomfortable
with nuclear waste but I dont feel particularly scared by it. I dont think its a reason
not to build nuclear but I do think its an outstanding problem, and I think the legacy
aspect is a really strong (objection) for me, and dealing with problems that we dont
know what to do with. However, I would prioritise the problems of climate change
far above that and the more immediate impact of what were about to leave to the
next generation.

[Is it possible to reframe nuclear as a carbon mitigation technology, given past
associations with nuclear weapons etc?]

Its baggage thats been around for a long timethere are issues that are more
recent and relevantthe UK governments response to the Fukushima emissions
was very measured and the UKs chief scientist reassuring expats on international
TV about safe dosagestelling people in Tokyo they could stay there and that it was
equivalent to eating a few bananas. Theres been the risk of nuclear accidents for a
long time nowweve also had Chernobyl, Three Mile Island(so normalised?)yet
theres quite a strong nuclear lobby and quite an evident identity of people who feel
that its progression and that being anti-nuclear is kind ofillogical. Its survived all
that fairly well. And obviously theres a big negative that people will pick up on but
its the same for coal plants and wind turbinestheyve all got their demons, I think.

The money thing is very interestingit (nuclear) started off being touted as very,
very cheap, but when the strike price was agreed it was a lot more than people were
expecting. Its still not outrageous but it is high and could feasibly go up and were
completely locked into that. My perception is that you then have to pay whatever
they (the energy generators) ask and it seems a bit risky to lock yourself into that
from a national strategic point of view. In terms of a willingness to pay, I dont know
how much it would change their opinions if they thought it would be more
expensive. It links to me with onshore/offshore wind because offshore wind is a lot
more expensive and the only benefit is that you dont have to look at it.

104
Efficiency and behaviour change are the low hanging fruit that we should be going
for and if you put all the money thats going in to building a new nuclear industry
into training people and getting skills and developing a better demand control
system and really getting people to reduce how much they use and how they use it,
that would make a much bigger difference. But you need a nationwide concerted
effort to do that, which may mean that people engage which would be a good thing
but it may meet with a lot of resistance because you require a lot more activity
from people.

Nuclear is really attractive its a big industrial project, its linked to research, its
new jobs, and its a lot easier to sell than turn your thermostat down (indistinct) and
windfarms, which arent particularly exciting.

[Agree with idea that UK nuclear ambitions hit by a downturn in interest elsewhere
in world, especially partner nations in Germany and elsewhere].

I think theres an attitude that were due a nuclear renaissance and that it would fit
in well with the climate stuff and that companies would like it and its a
demonstration of what they can do.

Theres a nuclear plant which has being built in Finland that has over run by many,
many years and went massively over-budgetand I dont think theres an example
of a western nuclear plant being built on time and to budget, so I think that this is
seen as a real opportunity to do that. And the company that can do that in the UK
and can how that theyve managed to deliver that will have a shoe-in to the rest of
the market. But at the moment it feels like a test ground for something that we
havent got the skills to producehavent got the mix of delivery record, safety and
skills and finance that we need.

[Suggest development of modular systems as a way of addressing some of this, but
can we produce enough power from this. Might not be worth it if its just 500MW
(per station)]. For the time being it just seems a bit of an uphill battle to justify
nuclear and make sure all the safeguards are in place. I think people would feel
uneasy about increasing the likely number of plants.

[Q: Awareness of how debate perceived among greens?]

I myself identify it as being very green, pragmatically green. I studied science at
university and then went on and did a masters in environmental technology and
energy policy and like to feel that Im quite rational about it, butIm still quite
involved in the green community and its like a dog whistle to some people. I cant
quite disentangle whether thats harking back to the early development of the
movement, with CND and the wider world peace motivationhow much its that and
how much people think its rationally shortsighted. I think that people who think we
can just have renewables are misguided and naively optimistic. You have to make a
compromise somewhere and maybe thats nuclear or maybe thats gas. I think it
polarises people massively and its a really tricky conversation to have. You always
end up the bad guy. Youre with pro-nuclear people and you say its fine but its not
going to do that much and I dont particularly like itthey think youre an idiot, and
if youre with a load of environmentalists and you say its not as bad as all that then
105
they think youre the devil. I dont think it needs to be like this. I dont think nuclear
power justifies being quite so contentious.

I dont think its a big enough part of our mix, I dont think the problems are big
enough and I dont think the savings are big enough.

[Anti big business findings of survey chime with what shes come across in terms of
greens question corporate motivations and whether these can provide guarantee of
good standards etc.]

Its old environmentalism vs new environmentalism. The idea of Old
Environmentalism is that you have a whole package of stuff thats more socialist,
less big business and more caring about the environment, and New
Environmentalism is much more fitting in with current models and you take
whoever can help you, so if its big business doing something more sustainable,
great

That (Old Environmentalism) does seem to relate to nuclear. How can you support
something when the motivation isnt being low carbon at all its being something
completely different. Does that matter?

[Discussion of another anti-windfarm form of environmentalismNTpreserving
historic viewslifespan of windfarms can be quite short20/30 yearsopportunity
for a breakpoint thereland can go back to what it wasbut if you build a nuclear
plant it leaves a presence for hundreds of years, even if it doesnt have a radioactive
impact on the landscape.]

The climate change argument needs to overcome a lot of this opposition (to
windfarms). The landscape isnt going to look the same if we have 4 degrees of
temperature increase either.

Simon [Conditional Nuclear Supporter] Edited interview transcript

[Notes: age 35-44, Labour supporter, Economist ]

[Survey comments: I'm a rational environmentalist in the sense I apply a healthy
discount rate on the future and care about the generations to come, but also don't
freak out when we chop a forest or two down nor do I wear sandals.

Energy Mix least want to see fracked gas. BUT. This is a very complex argument. I
would like the market to decide the mix, but the government to incentivise via
supply (prices).]

Under Tony Blairnuclear was the underlying political ambition. Quite
savvydidnt want to do in one big step but wanted to bring it back in a big way. But
he had made this decision. Very objective, very analytical review.

I like to believe Im technology blindso Im an unreserved economist in some
regardsif you can put the right price on things and set the right policy parameters
the answer should present itself.

106
Now of course there is some feedback because what government does and where
government invests in research in particular can ultimately affect those prices.
Because if you throw a huge amount of money into nuclear research I believe youre
going to end up with better nuclear power stations and that should end up with
cheaper nuclear power.

Given where we are today lets say prices are fixed should nuclear be part of the
answer? Well only if nuclear is the cheapest option. It will only be the cheapest
option if we can find a sensible price to put on carbon. Now the market price of
carbon is a nonsense. Its not a true market its been flooded. And therefore that
price is pointless. But this means government has to interfere and set a carbon price
and thats really tricky and controversial. However, lets assume it does choose a
carbon price and lets pretend theres even competition across different types of
electricity productionnuclear has one particular problem, nuclears shadow if you
like, its presence lasts vastly longer than other technologies because of nuclear
waste, and at the moment we dont have a way of solving the nuclear waste problem
as far as Im aware other than burying it in the ground and waiting a very, very long
time. Because of that, setting the discount rate, the time over which you want to do
your cost benefit analysis is a vital part of how you end up with an answer as to
whether nuclear is cheap or not and its the easiest way of government to trick the
equations to say nuclear is a cost-effective option. Some governments just take the
nuclear waste issue out of the equation, which is immoral. You cant take that
enormous cost, that this generation isnt going to have to face [says costs depends on
extended economic growth].

The green lobby tends to say nuclear waste is bad and therefore we shouldnt have
it, which is really unhelpful to the debate. What they should be saying is it costs this
much to put in the ground and when you put that into the equation its not a cheap
enough option. That said, how far into the future should you look? One generation,
two, three, four, five, sixtheres a set discount rate you apply. Thats one way of
sidestepping problem. Thats not to say that this problem isnt present in other fuel
generation because carbon takes a hundred years to get out of the atmosphereand
that should be part of the carbon priceMy personal opinion is that you somehow
need to put that into the cost to try and compare them fairly. The last time I looked
nuclear wasnt very cheap and maybe shouldnt be part of the mix, but it really is
sensitive to your carbon price.

Price of nuclear fuel today should take account of its scarcity (so market solution to
issue of finite fuelsolving problems for future generations). The same with oil oil
will never run outthe price will just rise and rise and rise. I suspect theres a lot of
nuclear fuel and a lot we dont know about as well. Another thing is that the amount
of shale gas and other frackable substances is massiveenough for a generation,
which is why the US is so excited. Their reliance on Middle Eastern oil doesnt
become an issue really.

[Q: is business as usual an attraction of nuclear power?]

There is a green lobby moral point on this sometimes [talks about green offsets and
buying the right to polluteREDD+ etcgreen argument that lets western
governments off the hook. Argues that we should pursue the cheapest means of
keeping within safe limits of carbon and warming and stop making so many moral
107
judgementstalks a lot about establishing global carbon market and the point at
which this could start to work. Faith that this market will be established and will
work in time to point where theres a pinch point for carbon emitters.]

The government should only care about what the public felt (about nuclear power)
if it was holding back decisions to do things. In that case you might want to try to
educate the public but thats time consuming and it adds to the cost. If I can just do it
anyway, because the green lobby is small, I dont really care. Theres always going to
people who are anti-nuclear because they associate it with weaponry and the cold
war. There are some groups who deliberately mislead on nuclear I think.

Playing the economist are we pricing the risk of nuclear properly? Look at the
incentives, the people who present the costs of nuclear are nuclear power station
builders. If you look at Fukushima, thats human error that led to a massive high
impact, low probability event that in that particular part of Japan. It costs a fortune.
It didnt effect anyone else in other parts of the world thank God, and the other ones
Chernobyl and Three Mile Island. Chernobyl was a rare case where you had a
crumbling regime that shouldnt have been operating this clapped out nuclear
power station. Theyre fairly isolated events and I suspect modern nuclear power
stations are far more safe than the public realise but its like plane crasheswhen
they go wrong they go wrong in a big way [talks about Fukushimashouldnt have
been sited where it was near fault line but also human errors in response to what
happened]. There are hundreds and hundreds of nuclear power stations in the
world that are perfectly fine. The opposition to nuclear as a decision maker would
not bother me unless it stopped me making my decision (how influential is the
wider green lobby?).

[However) theres loads of evidence that the green lobby matters or that politicians
think it matters. Tony Blair thought he needed 2 energy reviews to move to a
position of were pro nuclear and we need more nuclear power stationsif hed
just come out in 2005 and said were going to build more nuclear power stations
there would have been massive uproar. He knew that he needed years of debate and
edging it forward was in his mind a no-brainer. If you look at what Germanys done
recently in saying no more nuclear, this is a political manipulation based on
Fukushima I think to pick up more votes because the public thinks f******hell man,
nuclear power stations explode and they kill people. Thats political manipulation
of public fear for votesand the Lib Dems were picking up on this for votes. They
werent doing this because they had searched their souls and said nuclear is bad,
we must be anti-nuclear. This was a political decision to pick up the anti-nuclear
vote.

If everyone knew the reality there wouldnt be an anti-nuclear vote to get. Its a no-
brainer. Yes there are risks but we need to manage those risks. We should treat
technologies based on their costs. Cost is what matters. Do you want to pay twice as
much on your energy bill? No. Then lets not have offshore wind running the country
because that would be bonkers. So people do care about price but they would
benefit from being better informed.

(Re alternative nuclear technology vs education). You have to try to decide which is
more likely to pay off. The thing thats really surprised me over the last 10 years is
108
how much solar has fallen in price. Noone saw that coming. Huge amounts of
subsidy have gone in (to kick start) and that has driven cost reductions.

Onshore wind is quite expensive now if you consider the cost of overcoming
opposition. Theres no votes in windmills right now it seems very toxic.

[Also talks about the need to modify and upgrade the grid to accommodate large
amounts of wind power.] If, however, you can get storage right, decentralised
renewable power becomes vastly more attractive [mentions promising investment
in chemical storage in the USalso decentralised grids overcoming lots of demand
and supply problems].

Post-privatisation boom in energy market has been a disaster for the consumer
[describes as oligopoly]. Big business wants to build nuclear but theres a lack of
subsidy. The fact that nuclear power requires subsidy perhaps suggests we
shouldnt be building them but you could say thats because we havent got a carbon
price.

I bet you more people die by mining coal alone but a multiple of 100 than have
died from nuclear power ever. The number of people who have died in the Welsh
valleys, the number of people who die in China every year because of mines, people
trapped in mines, people who have been blown up in Turkey. Must be 10s of
thousands of dead people. How many people died in nuclear power station
problems? Theres been 3 big ones. Chernobyl did kill a few peoplebut
incomparable to the deaths and misery caused by coal. But this is the fear people
stoke because of nuclear war and the cold war. People are terrified on nuclear in a
very understandable but paranoid way. These are not bombs that are going to blow
up.

4.3 Nuclear sceptics

Jane [Nuclear Sceptic] Edited interview transcript

[Notes: age 25-34, Green Party activist/organiser, MSc Environmental Technology]

[Survey comments: In terms of behavioural change, energy efficiency and reduction
- I feel we need a holistic approach that includes all three. Behaviour change also
needs to be driven by system changes e.g. it being cheaper to do you laundry at night
than during the day to ensure that we're using up our evening energy production.

As I understood it, alternatives were a bit like "shooting yourself in the foot rather
than in the head".]

[Q: How overcome local opposition to wind and other renewables? How does this
tally with scepticism about nuclear?]

[Talks about the role of media in shaping peoples opinionsidea that wind more of
a backyard technologyI personally wouldnt want to have a nuclear power plant
anywhere nearlinks nuclear to cancer risk]

109
You realise how risky being around these kinds of technologies can be (from
personal experience of family cancer)theres a real danger of what they can do.
Who really knows whats happening?were constantly learning new things about
science (so suggestion we dont fully understand the risks) and there are obviously
all of these different factors affecting us (says in effect science could eventually tell
us nuclear more, not less dangerous).

(Returns to original point) I think the media have defined our relationship with
nuclear powerI heard this quote on Costing the Earth on the BBC that in
Germany they say wind power is more part of the community. People feel that their
wind turbines are almost a part of their villageand they get energy back and the
relationship they have is a symbiotic relationship whereas I think the media have set
up a conflicting relationship with wind power in the UK its driven this Nimbyism
far above and beyond what weve seen in the past because even with motorways
and things like that that would completely destroy the landscape behind you it was
still considered the hippies going out and stopping the bypasses. My parents are
proper Nimbys and stopped the bypass behind our house which obviously Im very
gratefultheres something very middle class about Nimbyism in relation to wind
turbines and I think its really interesting the way its being possibly driven by things
like the Daily Mail.

What I think is quite interesting is how did we get our electricity pylons up without
all this Nimbyism because theyre the same kind of eyesore on the landscape.
Obviously many went up before my lifetime but you dont hear about the conflict
that those created was that because it was in the name of progress or because
people wanted electricity? I guess its a market drive
[Q: Could nuclear be more attractive to people because it may require much less
land use and therefore address peoples landscape concerns?]

I really struggle with nuclear because of my background in environmental
scienceyou look at all the graphs, its really the investment that has to be made
without nuclearI started my undergraduate degree 10 years ago nowand looking
at all the graphs and the speed that youve got to put up, youve got to create that
holistic wind, wave, solar power investment the speed at which you have to do it to
reach the climate change targetsrequires huge amounts of investmentso here we
are 10 years later and the investment hasnt been made. I havent looked into it
recently but I assume were so far off the mark where renewables may not meet
that, so were looking to nuclear to fill that gap and my personal opinion is that that
puts the debate between a rock and a hard place

Nuclear is one of those things where its private profit vs public riskI talked to an
MEP who brought up the example of a nuclear power plant in Germany where
basically they (the operator) had made however much money out of it, the plant was
decaying and a tiny leak was detected were not talking Fukushima levels but
enough that if it got into the water system it would be really dangerous. Who then
paid? The company was long gone and it was the German government that had to
pay for that clean-up operation. As far as I understand itthe clean-up cost was
more than the company ever made.

110
Because weve got these long-term issues within nuclear waste then it means these
companies have no responsibilities for their waste and so it falls upon public hands.
It sounds like a great business model you reap all those profits and then leave the
main risk you have to someone else.

[Q: What about the attractiveness of nuclear is allowing society and the economy to
continue business as usual]

I think its a chicken or egg situation. Obviously behaviour change is a part of that
but a lot of these things are so habitual that youre not going to get the changes you
need. Its got to be on both sides because one of the things that concerns me most is
that if you look at the history of nuclear power, the only reason we know about
nuclear power is because we were doing research into nuclear weapons and then it
was like suddenly look, we can make energy from this. As a result of investing in
something negative, in my opinion weve created something quite negative. Now
what were seeing is as a result of BP investment into deep sea drillingthe
engineering investment in something like Deep Water Horizon has been
tremendous. Its been a real feat of technology, but how much money has gone into
that? And if that same amount of money had gone into investments in renewables,
what could we have discovered? I think that although we do need behavioural
change its actually the people in business who need to think in a more pragmatic
way of where theyre putting their investments. Ive been thinking a lot about whose
a leader and whose a follower? Ive been thinking of it in terms of the media
(consideration of local/Euro elections follows20.30)

What weve got now is a few people leading in terms of carbon-emitting
technologies and this addiction that we have to carbon-emitting fuels and then other
businesses following and if BP or Shell took a proper leadership role in terms of
renewables, think what that could achieve. Thats maybe the decision of one person
maybe on a board of 12 people and it could actually change the world.

[Q: are there circumstances in which you would countenance a degree of nuclear
power?]

I dont think you can understand the situation with the climate and not consider
nuclear but I think my biggest question is 10 years ago when I was looking at those
graphs and if wed made those investments into renewables where would we be
now? And what youre seeing is investments going into neither of these
technologies. Its going into things like fracking and Deep Water Horizon. But we
havent even tried and tested what we can do with renewables. Thats what
frustrates me most. As Ive said I dont think you can understand whats going on
without considering nuclear but I think we need to get on a do something

I think that we need more scientists than politics to be honesthow many people
that have studied science are in the House of Commons? Id say its very few and
probably impacts the countrys understanding of the reality of the situation. Climate
science is fairly complicated and if you dont have that science background it
probably is really hard to appreciate the impact. Its a whole ecological issue what
does two degrees of warming mean for the bees

111
[Q: Are alternative nuclear technologies a worthy pursuit in dealing with the risks
and perceived risks of nuclear energy?]

The way that I understand that is shooting yourself in the foot rather than the head.
(says doesnt fully understand science but was drawn to possible merits of Thorium
by a balanced BBC Costing the Earth feature on BBC R4) I was speaking at a
Peoples Assembly and I mentioned thorium and Kate Hudson from CND
immediately started an argument with me. I dont know the full science behind it,
but I came back and looked it up afterwards and obviously there are additional
issues with it but anti-nuclear groups like CND are like, no its all bad.

[Q: How much of a contentious issue do you think nuclear power is among greens?
Whats your experience?]

Within the Green Party itself, we currently say no to nuclear power and what I think
is that in the next couple of years this policy is obviously going to come up for debate
again and I dont know where the Green Party will stand because of the fact that
when you look at the charts its becoming more difficult to address the issue of
renewables. Weve got people who are joining the Green Party as a result of that
policy and people who arent joining as a result of that policy scientists and people
who have studied politics alike and I just think its really interesting that this one
topic can really divide a group of environmentalists and I think its hard to talk about
in the environmental movement but it does need to be debated. Weve got some
huge issues that we need to deal with and those issues are going to require tough
decisions, and as I keep saying I wish those tough decisions had been taken 10 years
ago because here we are 10 years later still having the same debate (and those
decisions are now getting tougher).

I think Id have moved my position on it if it hadnt been for Fukushima. Its been one
of the biggest humanitarian disasters of recent years and I think it just highlights the
impact of the risk and its the dedicated workers who go in and risk their lives to
save the lives of the many and its the people in the surrounding areas and its the
residents of that country that have taken the brunt of the disaster and I dont think
we realise the full effects of it yet. Its the same thing with Chernobylwe were
bringing children to Wales so they would have a few weeks out of the nuclear zone.
Is that really the kind of world we want to live in where we have to move people
around the world to extend their lives? When something like that happens its a
global impact it terms of the fallout zonethere was fallout on the hilltops of Wales
(Cumbria?) when Chernobyl happened

Darren [Nuclear Sceptic] Edited interview transcript

[Notes: age 18-24, Labour/Green supporter]

Generic green position is that nuclear is bad[talks about the anti-nuclear roots of
the green movement and his mum attending Greenham Common protests. NOTE:
position has shifted from surveyillustrates provisional nature of positions]

[Q: attitude to renewables?]

112
Im a big supporter it must be the only long-term solution. I know that some people
say its ambient and that we might need some back-up sources though

[talk about resistance to wind being an impediment to development, though high
technical potential]

That always confuses me, because it always seems to be people in Conservative
heartlands who dont want to see how their energy is produced, but what if they live
near a coal-fired power station? They have a much worse time. Someone has to live
near energy production. I dont think thats legitimate but I think its a problem. I
think thought that renewable energy is fantastic and windmills are beautiful,
because of what they represent more than anything else.

I havent really considered that we might not be able to push renewables through, it
was more that when I filled the survey in I still wasnt sure whether we could have a
100% renewables energy mixI think its eminently possible I just dont know
whether its possible in the timetable that we have (to avoid 2C of warming).

I think its possible if we have a more decentralised electricity network (grid). [Says
that an international grid, sharing power with France and other countries might
help address the ambience problem.]

Certainly in Britain (100% renewables possible) because we have wind everywhere.
Scotland will definitely be 100% renewables at some point.

Having done some more research my understanding is that nuclear is not a solution
to that particular problem (filling in a potential renewable energy shortfall). Any
nuclear solution would take so long to erect and take a long time to regulate
effectively. It might really not be an option in a way that I thought it was.

I think my understanding has become better and more thorough the more Ive
engaged with the subject. I definitely (initially) thought nuclear had to be part of the
solution. I was sort of on the fence and didnt have enough information.

[Would you now oppose/protest against new nuclear power?]

I think nuclear power could be great but only under particular conditions, and the
fact that we have to underwrite any accidents as a government so that if theres an
accident taxpayers have to fund the clean-up, I think thats a big problem. For
example, if corporations are profiting from the situation, they should have to pay if
they mess up. I would have to take it on a case by case basis as to whether Id oppose
a new nuclear power station. I wouldnt oppose it just because its nuclear power, it
would be more on the basis that there wasnt a good plan to deal with wasteits
shaky regulation things like that. If I thought it was 100% safe Id be like great,
energy thats clean and safe.

[Q: Accepts coal is far more dangerous and kills more people]

Coal is horrendous isnt it? It kills people everywherejust a couple of weeks ago
300 people died in a mine in Turkeynot to mention all the carcinogenic
particulates or whatever. Definitely coal kills a lot more people (than nuclear).
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The thing with nuclear is that its a legacy issue. If it goes wrong, it goes very wrong
and it goes wrong for a long time. Not that many people die, but especially in Britain,
how much land can we afford to lose?

[Q: Standard of living/economic sacrifice if go down renewables route?]
I think this is a terrible argument, its like a get of out jail free card! [If we seek a
nuclear fix to avoid this] My concern is that we just think we can fix the problem
with technology. A lot of people think that technology will save us and it might not.
Also, I despise the current economic model so I dont want to make any kind of
argument that will favour the preservation of it. I think that we have to change our
behaviour and I think Id be willing to accept standards of living decreasing for me if
they would increase for people in the global south because thats only fair but I dont
think its necessarily the case that my standard of living will have to decrease. I think
we might be required to use less energy but I think that might be quite a good thing
in the long run.

Theres huge energy efficiency savings to be made but I think changing attitudes will
be more powerfulthey inform every aspect of what we do. I dont think people
understand a) the gravity of the problem and b) that they can do something about it.

[Q: attitude re involvement of big energy companies in developing nuclear?]

I dont trust big companies with anything. I think theyre mostly scumbags. Not the
individuals involved, but when theres profit its always bad. Im all for the
nationalisation of power in Britain and I think that when you trust something as
serious as that to a company its not like making consumer electronics, its much
more severe when something goes wrong. I think we should a) be regulating it much
more seriously and b) probably handling it ourselves.

We need a more equitable power solution and clearly the Big Six as they are so
called are not providing that. I get my power from Ecotricity and they seem to put
the most money back into green infrastructure. Id love to be a part owner in a
nearby wind turbine and get my energy from that.

[Some talk about whether DESERTEC could be a good thing and whether host
countries would benefit sufficientlythen on traditional forms of conservation,
National Trust and keeping Britain green. This was when green thought was
predominantly conservativeand now its predominantly left or radically left]

[Q: attitude towards alternative nuclear technology? Can it address traditional
nuclear concerns?]

If the technology can make it 100% safe then Im pretty much all for it. I think at
Sellafield we have half of the civilian plutonium waste on the planet soand we
could get rid of that I guess if we had fast breeder reactors to churn through it. So it
could solve a lot of problems but it just requires us to test it a lot and educate people.
I think you could find a lot of allies for this technology on both sides of the fence, but
within a lot of circles that I move in a lot of people are like agghh God, No!

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I went to a talk about the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership an

EU/US trade deal thats being discussed, mostly behind closed doors at the
moment There was talk about harmonising regulations with the US on things like
food and the environmentThere were lots of speakers like Natalie Bennett (Green
Party leader) and there was some discussion on energy and someone mentioned
nuclear power and the room when rooaaaaaaarrr. The question was something
like do you think nuclear power is a necessary part of our energy mix if you want to
decarbonise quickly and effectively and maintain our standard of living or
whateverand people just shouted. It was insane, Ive never seen anything like it.
People feel really strongly about it. They feel a gut distaste when the hear nuclear
power. I was the youngest there and I think maybe it was a previous generation kind
of thing. I guess its a relic of how the green movement started out.

I think it would be an important change in society if people started to acknowledge
their ignorance and uncertainty about it (nuclear). Getting all the facts together is
pretty challenging.

Cost and big business and the timescale issues are I think the best arguments against
nuclear power. I dont think a lot of people articulate it very well though. I think we
should be encouraging open thought and debate about this. Unfortunately greens
can be as dogmatic and the people they disagree with.

Gareth [Nuclear Sceptic] Edited interview transcript

[Notes: age 35-44, Lib Dem/Green supporter]

Renewables cant meet energy needsI was thinking about current energy needs
and growth in energy needs. I dont know whether they can themselves meet those
needs without impacting on the environment. Every action we have has an impact
on the environment to a greater or lesser extent.

Taking something like windfarms, theres only so many you can haveeven if you
covered the country with themwould that be enough?...I mean you wouldnt want
to do that anyway. I think the attitude weve got lots of space is part of the problem
in terms of our attitude towards the environment. We think theres no human
activity there therefore its a space we can use, rather than leaving it to be.

I dont know what the answer is. Always difficult to know whether to give the ideal
answer or what is likely to happen. Ideally we radically reduce our energy
consumption and that means changing the way we live and then we can meet our
energy needs with renewables.

I have no problem with public money going towards major projects making our
buildings fit for purpose (in terms of energy efficiency). Individual home owners
may be reluctant to do everything thats necessary because its costly. Whereas if
you say the states going to do it and well have a 50 year programme making every
building in the country fit for purpose (and as energy efficient as they can be) then
maybe its much more likely to happen.

On top of double-glazing and insulation and so onIf every roof in the country had
solar panels on it that would contribute hugely to meeting our energy needs without
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needing to blight the landscape with power stations and windfarms. Surely thats a
lot less controversial. As time goes on get more and more efficient and cheaper to
produce.

If we actually want do something meaningful to benefit the environment and go
some way towards improving itas radical a change as the post-war period is
probably the only way of doing it. I dont know if we recycle more and set targets for
10 years time and breathe in a bitI dont know whether these things are enough.
Will be too little, too late.

Were not very good at grasping our obligations to future generations. As rational as
we are, like any other animal were still very focused on the now[talks about how
little we spend on the lived environmentpavements etc]. Symptomatic...we like to
spend on the things that are fun and enjoyable and we dont really want to do the
stuff that is long-term and thats human nature. People wouldnt pay money into
there pensions unless they were made to do so.

From a purely practical point of view in terms of what we do now to meet our
energy needs nuclear is an attractive proposition. It will meet our energy needs for
some time to come or it will meet a big part of our energy needs for some time to
come. A relatively clean, relatively safe, relatively effective means of meeting our
energy needs, but

[Talks about the need to be critical of nuclear from a scientific perspectiveGreen
Party has been a bit dodgy on nuclear on the science front in the past]

GP has been very quick to say were against nuclear fuel without necessarily
objecting to it from a scientific point of view. Object to it on the basis of pollution or
object to it because it doesnt produce very much energy for the amount you put in.
Object to it because its a plot by big business to dominate world energy supply or
some suchbut just saying I dont like the ideaisnt it quite dangerous?...youre not
going to win any arguments with that. I think thats a real problem when it comes to
arguing against nuclear fuel. Its associated quite heavily with very bad science.

From my knowledge, the biggest problem with nuclear fuel apart from the safety
thing which depending on who you listen to might be exaggerated [Fukushima,
radiation might actually be quite low. Might not be a real problem. Might not be
as dangerous as has come across]. I dont know quite who to believe on thatbut
that to me is not the big problem, which is to do with spent nuclear fuel. Theres two
thingsfirst of all it means we avoid the real issue about what were doing to the
environment. Were putting a massive sticking plaster over it. Nuclear will keep us
going for some time without having to address the issues. The second problem is
what we do with the spent waste. The French constructed this deep underground
storage facility for spent nuclear fuel which is going to have to be there for
thousands of years. We dont know what were leaving future generations. It takes a
long time for your waste to become safe. You have to hope that there is no water
contamination, that there is no fault in the rock which might collapse in a few
thousand years time, exposing people to radiation. All of this might be quite
minimalI might be worrying unnecessarily, but it seems like its lets not worry
about what we do with the waste, lets just find a big hole to put it somewhere. I
heard someone say well why dont you just drop it into the deepest trench in the sea,
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because it will be fine there, too far away from anyone to do any harm. But that
doesnt stop our attitude of lets not worry about what we do with things when
weve finished with them. (agrees that goes to heart of general malaise about
environment).

If someone put forward a really good argument about why we need nuclear fuel...or
well have to build a few nuclear power stationsbecause theres no way we can
reduce our energy consumption by the amount we need in the time that we need in
a way thats affordable and practical well OK, but Im not necessarily going to be one
of the people on the front line fighting against it. If thats the right way to go then
thats what we have to do. One of the reasons (some) people are sceptical about the
anti-nuclear side is that apart from the bad science in the radically anti-nuclear
types who make it hard for you to want to associate with them. [Agrees that tribal].
But certainly wouldnt want to be like the French who supply most of their energy
from nuclear

Havent had huge experience of nuclear being contentious among my green circle,
but what I do come across, especially in the wider world is people, who are not at
the extremes of the argument but who are not necessarily climate change deniers
but think that everything will be OK if they just cut back a little bit and drive electric
rather than petrol cars. But we have to change the way we live which means not
taking several flights a year, which probably means not driving every day, which
probably means reinventing the idea of quality local shops and servicescutting out
all the energy that we waste. Theres lots of direct energy consumption which is easy
to see, but theres also the less direct stuff. Manufacturingenergy that goes into a
plastic drinks bottle or an aluminium drinks can that often gets thrown away. The
mining of the raw materials through to transportation. Designed to be disposable.
Even if recycled it uses a lot of energy. Cant separate our addiction to fossil fuels
from our addiction to resources in general.

Global warming is seen as the big thing and everyone is going to be affected by it. So
theres a big drive to reduce fossil fuels but thats only one of the many things that
were doing to our planet which is making life less pleasant for ourselves, our
children, our grandchildrenthe planet we live onbut were also make it a much
pleasant place to live for all the other creatures on the planet. Its not that theyre
nice fluffy things that I want to look after but having that diversity of creatures and
plants is what makes it a liveable planet. Our survival relies on the planets health
and vigour.

Theres a lot of people in politics who are quite rightly focused on very immediate
issues, but my argument is that there is no welfare state, society or anything else
without the environment that supports it.

[Long monologue comparing HS2 to nuclear technical solution to climate change.
Need to go beyond practical, pragmatic. Some of these solutions are all too
appealing, but debate shouldnt be short-circuited. How do you persuade people to
change in mindset. Why the nuclear option likely to happen].

How much longer can Germany keep burning more coal? May force a change of heart
over nuclear.

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Im slightly aware over the debate about developing alternative nuclear

technologies. Thorium has been talked about for many, many years. If there is a
clean form of nuclear fuel in the sense that it doesnt give us the great stockpiles of
contaminated material and which wont cause the same kind of fallout if theres an
accident like those involving Fukushima and Chernobyl then thats fantastic at
solving our energy requirements, and I would not be against it for any particular
ideological reasons per se. But, the thing that worries me as with conventional
nuclear fuel is how much we ignore other issuesdistracts usfinite fuelbut if it
lasts us a few centuries its not going to worry us. People have been talking about oil
running out for years and so far it hasnt and so people have become blaze. I would
certainly be interested in alternative nuclear if its something we could use to fill
that gap while we changed our behaviour. [agrees, could be like a bridging/interim
energy source]. Strong short-term arguments for fracking. Again, a way of putting off
addressing the way we treat the environment. Ultimately there may be no problem
with contaminating water supplies or seismic events but well still be burning a
fossil fuel (so a distinction with nuclear). Also might displace renewables. How much
money are we investing in fracking as opposed to renewables? Why not invest the
billions spent on fossil fuels in making us more environmentally friendly?

Problem is that we dont like the state spending money and it may be invasive (re
say a programme to put energy efficiency measures into every home). Some in
Labour and Lib Dems think theres a dictatorial streak in environmental movement
and we should be wary of that but if we know what the problem is and we can do
something about it why dont we just do something about it rather than offering an
incentive here and there and trying to encourage people and companies to do the
right thing.

Strange that people dont think that approach to fracking is dictatorial, but people
like their fossil fuels and the lifestyle they provide.

[Discussion of Passivhaus as an example of radical effective environmental policy]

4.4 Nuclear refusers

Anika [Nuclear Refuser] Edited interview transcript

[Notes: age 45-54, Green Party supporter, employed in environmental research, has
qualification in environmental law and policy]

[Survey comments: I'm following up the discussion around nuclear power and waste
since the early 80's and was very pleased with the recent developments in Germany
to abandon nuclear energy altogether. I am also very concerned about the recent
backdrop. There is enough evidence that the German's were right to distance
themselves from nuclear (major incidences with waste storage facilities etc);
however, further progress will only work in an international context. Another issue
in Germany (which might also be true for other countries from Europe to japan) is
support for nuclear energy on behalf of pensioners: this generation has got money in
their pockets to invest and doesn't see the point in the long-term prevention of
harm.

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In my opinion mitigation and avoidance of the climate disaster including

sensitiveness towards the environment relates to a fundamental shift in priorities
and values; back to basics and the building up of communities. up and foremost we
need to tackle the destructive spirit that now prevails in our societies: frustration,
hate, jealousy, apathy and sarcasm. We also need to re-establish political
consciousness and start thinking in a positive way. Much of these values and
strategies are applied on a daily basis in nurseries, primary schools, families,
(church) communities, clubs and associations. We need to learn from these groups
and transfer their communication style to formal bodies that determine our societal
organisation].

[Q: How will we overcome local opposition to wind and other renewables? Does
extent of this not make nuclear attractive a la Monbiot?]

The main point with renewables is that they dont cause any long-standing harm.
You have no waste, no pollution of our air, so you have no emissions. Its becoming
very obvious that we are reducing the life expectancy of humanity. In such a
dramatic scenario Im wondering why its not commonplace that people want to
protect themselves and the planet. So for me, Id like a very radical sentiment, its
about protecting life. So renewables are just very clear about that. I know for
example some people they complain about the noise of wind turbines near their
homes but I think that measured against the fact that we are really dying out and
that we dont provide any future to our children, its a minor issue.

[Q: What about the landscape issue?]

You need to measure all perspectives with interviews and questionnaireswho is
taking these views? Is it the older generation who of course like this view of the
countryside and doesnt bother with the future perspective or are they young
people? And from my German experience we set up a lot of wind turbines in rural
areas where there are old monuments like castles and churches and so onpeople
would just bear them. While not finding them attractive they feel so much better
knowing they are not causing any harm and overlook it to some extent.

[Q: is there more of a dialogue about renewables in Germany?]

I think we have a time advantage (in Germany). We had the same discussion in
Germany but it was 30 years earlier, in the 80s and 90s. You also found very
conservative people all of a sudden coming up with feelings for mice and little
animals just to get rid of these wind turbines. So we had the same profound
discussions and was very generational-led - the young against the old. Thats an
important point I would say.

[Q: Could a community-based approach to renewables overcome opposition in the
UK?]

I would say that is absolutely true. In Germany, many of these wind parks are run by
communities. People then become very proud of their projects, they really
appreciate their own efforts, they stick together. Its also a question of funding they
create common funds and theyre very creative. Theres a lot of research on this, but
I have to say that people in Britain dont want to learn about this. they just dont
119
want to hear about it. But hopefully it will come. Although I have many objections
about the Germany mentality, in some ways there is more democracy in these
issues. Our federal system allows for more freedom of communities.

[Q: How do you feel about the involvement of big companies in energy provision? Is
it an impediment?]

We need to be very honest about it. Turning to renewables is a complete change of
our societal values. For now people make a lot of money out of things that dont
really belong to them. Its a complete shift and people are really struggling with that.
Its a shift of mind, a shift of expectations and for the younger generations, and really
for my children and grandchildren. This kind of perspective is really difficultI see
my parents still investing in oil for example.

[Q: How do you take future generations into account? How important is this?]

What I really fear is that were all becoming exhausted because things are not
getting easier. And for the time being now anyone is happy if he gets any jobI dont
see any organised switch to renewables. Its not very bright to extract minerals from
the soil and its very clever thinking how to set up the networks for renewables. Im
really sorry that we dont improve our mental skills in this direction.

[Q: could it be easier to achieve our climate targets pursuing a more business as
usual approach with nuclear energy?]

Im just worried about the waste and I know that even nuclear agencies are worried
about the waste even though technically its getting better to avoid any accidents, its
just about the waste. Where can you store waste? Its underground and we have
already polluted ground water, we have problems with the oceans.

Theres no question that it would be very reasonable to go for renewables and the
rest is just to provide the technology and the mechanisms which enable it this is
financial restructuring

[Q: How do you deal with the issue of energy storage?]

Its about development, California has done fantastic research, Germany is about to
do soand the Germans are complaining that no one is really investing into this. So
if we were clear that renewables are the only solution for the future we would
slowly move our capital into this area. What is clear is that we cant keep up our
competitive economic system as we are used to running it, and in my opinion Britain
therefore plays a crucial role because the country set up the competitive system
with Adam Smith and so on. Since then we are running this liberal economic system.
Nothing against liberalism but if you have an imperative which comes from nature
and is really superior then you need to change, its very easyit has nothing to do
with any politicsits really cross-partyits how freely you can move mentally and
think through different scenarios in my opinion.

[Q: How does energy deal with timescale of climate change? How bring about change
in a short space of time?]

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What were missing is a kind of aspirational will to change, because were still
blaming each other for not being rational. Its definitely something for global
governance. Look at for example Obama, hes trying to get leadership in reducing
emissions and so on, but if you think of the US they came up with the shale gas
revolution which set us really back because before every country wanted to be a big
leader in renewables and the next year shale gas came onto the market and from
this point its done because we have no responsibilitiesif you can trade with shale
gas, why not trade with shale gas? So we restore our financial industry it has been
before and so on. What I think is getting lost is this consciousness for
interconnectivity. In some industries this is very natural and in others not at all.

[Q: Tell me about your knowledge of the nuclear industry in Germany and some of
the problems that have arisen? Doesnt industry in Western Europe prove nuclear
relatively safe?]

I have to say I was surprised myself that Germany acted so hastily on Fukushima. I
was used to things going backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards
depending on the political party of the day. People have been calling for the
abandonment of nuclear since the 80s and its mainly to do with waste again and
this was confirmed when one of our oldest storage facilities really broke down and
had massive problems with ground water, really polluted ground water (this refers
to Asse II in Lower Saxony, an old research repositorymentions proposed facility,
Schacht Konrad, former deep mine nearby which is said to lie in ground water
conveying strata). Now every day workers are trying to shift ground water to the
surface, litres and litres, trying to clean things, and I think this scared the Germans.
This is again is not addressed, nobody wants to know about it. Then I was
astonished that purely German companies gave up nuclear power, like Siemens for
example, stopped doing it, but they still continue to deliver nuclear power stations
to Brazil and other countries. This was very annoying for the Greensso I think
there was really a move back towards renewables but then international legislation
then came into the game and now we have international tribunals where investors
can bring a claim against the state when they have invested in something and the
state doesnt want to keep it up. And this is the case with Vattenfall, a Swedish
company which is now bringing a claim about 300,000 (correct?) against the
German state because the Germans dont want to run its nuclear power stations any
more, but they are long-term contracts. I think the world trade system is just like
that. The Germans are deeply dependent on exports, they want to deliver their cars
and their machines and therefore somehow they are also obliged to take other
peoples productsso we have this kind of dependency.

[Q: Can Germany pursue a renewables-only policy and still maintain a strong
economy?]

I think the renewables energy industry is part of Germanys economic growth. Im
pretty sure about this because the Germans are really inventive and especially East
German companies, small companies that have found their market niche so Im sure
that part of the strength comes from this sector. Otherwise Germany is struggling, it
is feeling under pressurebut we have a strong opposition and the citizen
movement is pretty present. We have the Greens who are well represented in the
Bundestagg but also other kinds of movements and organisations which are
protesting against falling back to nuclear and so on.
121

[Is nuclear associated with the right in Germany as it often is elsewhere in the
world?]

I think what people really underestimate is the movement that the Germans have
experienced since the Second World War. So for us the whole movement is
becoming good in some way. We were to blame for Nazi Germany, we were to blame
for the holocaust, and people went deeply into themselves and asked how can we
avoid harm? This also provoked the green movementwhen you look at the
development of nuclear power it comes from the war. It was used for bombs and not
for power firstly and after the war we turned the whole research into power. But
that is also kind of a military thing. The Germans have a deep issue with pacifism
somehowits profound after the war experience.

Nuclear power cant work with an egalitarian society because you need to hide
your incidents, no one is responsible if something happensfrom the point of
legislation we have no protection. If something goes wrong theres nobody
responsible not the countries or the neighbourhoodsits so kind of dodgy and
diffuse.

[Q: If you had to would you support nuclear over fracking?]

I think it is a shame to invest in these kinds of activities instead of looking at
renewables. [Talks about Germans having to pay tax on solar energy they generate
and that this is going down the wrong path]. Around a third of Germans I think now
have solar panels on their roofs and this is now being fought by the
governmentthey have to put something in the way. As long as the discussion
doesnt move to a reasonable degree to protect and to promote renewables I cant
really take other complaints seriously.

In all countries there is state involvementif you look at other countries Britain has
invested very strongly into its oil and gas industry. So the problem is how to turn
this aroundits very difficult.

[Q: What is the role of the state in the energy sector?]

Without the state and the policies directed by the state you cant do anything.
Nobody really wants to destroy the planet. Politicians are all too often involved in
decision-making which relies on the oil and gas industries. Thats the way they came
to power up until now and the way that they want to proceed. Perhaps the Germans
are also more successful with their renewable energy industry because they are
pretty wealthy. Germany is the most prosperous country in Europe and people are
committed to do something, to give something with their money. Theyve reached an
average level of prosperity that allows this to happen. Thats also very important.

[Q: What do you think about the motives of big energy companies?]

England is very clearly at the point to bring shale gas onto the market, to make the
case for shale gas and therefore not promoting wind farmsyou could always read
this in cases of animals and birds slaughtered with wind farmsI think theres really
competition between different forms of energy. On the market it is the samethere
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are different forms of energy, which is the cheapest one? [Discussion about how
societies becoming more connected, transparent, self-organising, not least through
social media etcbut not manifesting itself in energywe have no say as
citizensand hard to get data and make sense of it]

Now we are going through a phase where politicians are blaming energy
companies. I find this not really appropriate because they think markets are
orientated in such a way. It is really ideology, though nothing about green ideology

[Says it might be better if we nationalised energy companiesWe have very clear
signals from the IPCC that we need to leave 80% of fossil fuels in the groundso this
is a benchmark and in my opinion each state should be obliged to go for that
benchmarkthen it requires a completely new form of accounting. Its no longer
about states its all about multinational companies and its a big entanglement. But
were still having discussions we were having 30 years ago[also applies to nuclear
and issues of responsibility].

How do I make this clear to my student or my children that if we carry on with the
way we are behaving then we have no future? Its about values and ethicswe have
no targets any more, no goals. We are the first generation that really know what the
future is because we have these reports (from the IPCC) where it is evidenced very
clearlybut what about the next generation, in 20 years, 30 years? What will be the
feeling if we dont improve, if we dont make progress in some ways in mitigation of
climate change. I really feel for me it is a black hole

Ben [Nuclear Refuser] Edited interview transcript

[Notes: age 45-54, Green Party supporter]

[Q: how do you deal with local opposition to onshore wind etc? Why is nuclear not
an appropriate response?]

Fossil fuels have been around for hundreds of years, while alternative energy is still
very much in its infancy and not a lot of people know about its full potential yet.
Theres not enough exploitation of solarif you look at Germany, 26% of their
energy needs are being met by clean alternatives, mainly solarcommunity energy
companies. I think its the vested interests of Edf and E.on that are deliberately
obfuscating - theyre creating confusion around the alternativestheyre saying
nuclear is the only (one)theyve got a far bigger pullso we need to educate people
from the grass roots up that these things are available. A monopoly such as E.on and
Edf are absolutely paranoid about decentralised energy. Suddenly they cant control
it, they cant control prices. If we get it out there, if we get the debate out there that
actually community energywere looking at an infinite resource the sun and if
we can harness that then we can decentralise energy, we can maximise the potential
of the sunand these prices will always come down, theres only one direction for
them to go in. Now this is contrary to all our set up right now, so we need to re-
educate people.

[Q: do you question the motives of big energy companies? Esp re nuclear energy?]

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I would say theyre all about the profit motive. Does E.on or Edf ever give you figures
for a return on your investment in a nuclear power plant? They cannot give figures
for a return on investment because youve got the costs to build the infrastructure
around it, youve got the costs of disposal, the costs of sealing the stresses and cracks
from storing the fuel rodsthey dont give you these figures. Whereas if youre
looking to invest in solar farmsyou know youre going to get an 8% return for
example on your money [Gen discussion around nuclear not having cost
transparency that a lot of other energy or indeed other infrastructure projects
have]governments are complicit in that, theres a lot of secrecy around nuclear.
Whether theres something going on with backstreet deals with weapons
development or something like that, or spin offs, I dont knowbut I dont think we
should be spending any more of our time on that (nuclear) technologyweve got to
concentrate on storage, because in Germany a lot of the problem is that theres not
enough energy at times of peak demand. In Belgium theres a company called
Hydrogenics and what theyre trying to do is take the energy thats currently wasted
and turning it into hydrogen gas.

[Says nuclear very wasteful because energy yield low10 to 20%?]

[Q: Biggest reason for opposing nuclear displacing renewables? Explain?]

Absolutely, were having entirely the wrong conversation. We need to be talking
about renewables first. And then if that doesnt provide our needsand it should
theres no impediment. Weve just got to get on with it and stop mucking about and
talking about nuclear. Its a massive distraction. A very convenient distraction for
the fossil fuel and nuclear industries. Another day they get to produce energy is
another day theyre producing millions in profits. Ultimately nuclear is still a finite
energy source.

[Q: how much are you taking account of future generations? How does that shape
your thinking?]

Ive got two children and when people ask me why Ive become an
environmentalistI mean I always have been, but it just brings it into sharper focus.
I believe that every child growing up now is going to be far more concerned about
the environment than my parents every were and many people in my generation
are. Weve bloody got to do this, were running out of time already.

[Q: what do you say to those people who say investing in renewables is leading to
higher energy bills and hitting poorest hardest?]

Its a tricky one because people are struggling. As far as the elite are concerned were
out of recession but I know for a lot of people on the ground it doesnt feel as if we
are and people are still struggling to make ends meet and I get that. Anything that
can be done to reduce fuel poverty should be supported. Its very convenient that
the Tories and even Labour to some extent are able to dominate the debate in saying
that theres these green taxes that are adding to your fuel bills. Its a really tough one
for greens to combat. Ed Miliband has talked about a windfall tax on the energy
companies but Obama promised that and nothing happened. I think its time to stop
just talking about those with the deepest pockets funding these things. What I would
say is as a government looking to spend however many millions or billions on a new
124
nuclear plant and instead they invest that in alternative technologies to stop those
costs being passed onto consumers then thats the debate we need to move on to.
We need to shift away from how convenient it is for the Tories to talk about these
green taxes. We need to keep shifting the debate like for example the majority of the
debate in the media is about the 1.2bn in benefit fraud. OK, thats a problem but
were talking about 120bn in tax evasion. Its about flipping some of these
arguments on their heads and getting to the real profits are and where the real
crime is, and where the real crime and where the real profits are is with the energy
companies and governments that are willing to put their money into nuclear but not
into renewables. What happened to the greenest government ever?
[Q: How contentious do you think the debate is among greens around nuclear? Is it
taboo?]

I dont think thats true at all. Im very happy to talk about it. Britain is the nuclear
dustbin of the world. Were taking everyone elses spent fuel rods, and where are
they going? Whats Britain doing with them? I want some openness and
transparency. Were on the bottom rung of the ladder.

[Could fast breeder reactors or similar technologies be the answer to the waste
problem?]

I think thats inherent with problems of its own. What the hell do you do with this
stuff once youve created it, you know? Where does the waste ultimately end up and
what are we doing with it? [Partially addresses question now] What risks are
involved in recycling this waste?

The life of a nuclear power plant is what? 20, 25, 30, 40 years? Its very
expensiveits all funded by the government

Why should we trust the industry with these new technologies? But lets shift the
argument away from nuclear altogetherRaw materials for solar coming down in
pricestop being short term Britainstop thinking short term. With nuclear
youre not talking short term so why talk short term about solar?

[Q; Exploring remarks from survey about the need for a post-war effort]

We need the kind of effort that was mobilised after the Second World War to combat
climate change. Again, the meal ticket thats got everyone into power in America and
in Britain about the greenest government ever, about investment in green jobs,
about how the future is thiswhere is the bloody future? Im fed up of words, I want
to see action. How many years of Obama? How many years of Cameron?

[Q: why should Britain jump first?]

Weve got to stop coming up with excuses. Were already behind Germany, by miles.
We cant wait for everyone else to do it. Sure, OK with China there might be an
excuse (to catch up economically] but China is developing and accelerating with the
use of alternative technology but unfortunately its being offset by the amount of
new coal power.

125
[Q: what will the effect be of countries like Japan and Germany ending their nuclear
programmes?]

I think it has to be managed. We should be getting a shift on right now in terms of
insulating our homes, retrofittingweve got terrible housing stock. I dont know
what its like in Germany and Japan, but weve got to make as many Passivhauses as
possible so that the demand just isnt thereso whack down the demand for energy
and maximise the potential for renewablesand manage the decline of burning
fossil fuels and nuclear. We need something like a 20-year plan. I still stick to the
maxim there is no financial, legal, resource impediment to us becoming carbon
neutral by 2030. Weve just got to shut up and get on with it.

[Another interviewee to mention solar roadsusing recycled glassnever need to
paint the roads againyou have these hexagonal panels of solar panels. The surface
is the solar panels]

[Discussionthe costs of technologieswhat does it ultimately matter?]

ENDS

126

Understanding "Green" Attitudes Towards Nuclear Power in The UK

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Dissertation: Understanding green attitudes to

1. Introduction, aims and objectives

1.1 Research background

1.11 Government reframing of nuclear power

1.12 Prominent greens break ranks

1.13 Characteristics of green reframing of nuclear

(i) Fukushima highlights reliance on nuclear for carbon mitigation

(ii) Reappraising nuclear safety

(iii) The benefits of alternative nuclear technology

1.2 Research objectives

1.21 Why the focus on green attitudes?

1.22 Why do Green attitudes towards nuclear power matter?

1.23 Research questions

2.1 Current public opinion

2.2 Response to reframing

2.3 A glimpse of the green response?

2.4 Summary: a confusing picture

3.1 Addressing the gaps in existing research

3.2 Survey design

3.3 Survey distribution

3.4 Timeframe & analysis

4. Overview of survey results

(i) Section 1: General info

(ii) Section 2: Environmental outlook & values

(iii) Section 3: Existing nuclear technology

(iv) Section 4: Future nuclear

4.1 Attitude types

5.11 Nuclear enthusiast

5.12 Conditional nuclear supporter

5.13 Nuclear sceptic

5.14 Nuclear refuser

5.2 Research critique

6.1 Policy implications

Appendix 1: Copy of online survey

Appendix 2: Breakdown of survey data

Appendix 3: Survey Comments

3.3 Edited selected comments from Section 4: Future nuclear

Appendix 4: Interview transcripts

4.1 Nuclear enthusiasts

4.2 Conditional nuclear supporters

4.3 Nuclear sceptics

4.4 Nuclear refusers

Figures & tables

(ii) Reappraising nuclear safety

thyroid cancers (Pandoras Promise 2013, Lynas 2013). Anti-nuclear campaigners

medium-scale half-lives which generate significant amounts of radiation over

as possible. I definitely find it an attractive idea, says MacKay, adding: My position

preferences). Almost half of respondents agreed that nuclear would make a

supporters. Respondents giving a neutral answer were categorised as sceptics,

(i) Section 1: General info

safety, waste ad weapons proliferation, it should be considered finds favour with

deliberated society where citizens are no longer supressed by energy companies,

Ramana, M. V. (2013) 'Nuclear policy responses to Fukushima: Exit, voice, and

Do you consider yourself a green/environmentalist?

Location (Place name & first 3 digits of postcode e.g.

Friends of the Earth

Are you a member of OR do you support/share the

Are you OR have you been employed in an

If you answered "Yes" to the above question please

Are you studying for or do you hold an

If you answered "Yes" to the above question, please

Environmental outlook & values

Which energy source would you least like to see in