[GPCA Updates] GP RELEASE Greens call Obama's nuclear power investment his 'worst idea yet'

[Green Party of California Updates]

GREEN PARTY OF THE UNITED STATES
http://www.gp.org

For Immediate Release:
Thursday, February 18, 2010


Greens call President Obama's resurrection of nuclear power and handout for
Georgia nuclear reactors his "worst idea yet"

• Green Party Speakers Bureau: Greens available to speak on energy policy,
climate change, and related issues: http://www.gp.org/speakers/speakers-energy.php


WASHINGTON, DC -- Green Party leaders and candidates are calling President
Obama's resurrection of nuclear power with a multi-billion-dollar
taxpayer-funded subsidy for a Georgia plant his "worst idea yet" and warned
about serious public health threats posed by mining, waste transportation, and
waste storage.  The Green Party disputes the myths that nuclear power is
'green energy' or a solution to the advance of climate change.

"The twin nuclear reactors in Burke County, Georgia, would be financed with
$5.4 billion in loans from the Federal Financing Bank with money of the US
Treasury.  According to the GAO, this investment has a 50/50 percent or worse
chance of failing.  President Obama wants taxpayers to assume 80% of the
financial risk to turn the southeast Atlantic states into a big open-pit
radioactive barbeque.  This investment is a terrible idea -- President Obama's
worst yet," said Lisa Green, Green candidate for California Assembly
Candidate, 53rd Assembly District (http://www.votelisagreen.net).

"If built, the plant will be a financial disaster because of high construction
expenses and likely cost overruns, compared with other sources of electrical
power.  As the first of a new generation of nuclear power plants, it'll carry
huge technical risks.  Even more ominous is the problem of mining, waste
storage, and waste transportation through populated areas, which carry huge
public health dangers," added Ms. Green.

Greens noted that, in the US, more people have died from contamination from
uranium mining, from causes such as water sources polluted by mine tailings,
and from uranium transportation than from all the causes after materials reach
the first processing plant
(http://www.hcn.org/blogs/grange/what-the-nuclear-boosters-dont-tell-you /
http://www.hcn.org/issues/371/17708).  Energy Secretary Steven Chu recently
told a Senate committee that, for the foreseeable future, the plants will
probably store spent fuel rods on site.  No long-term plan exists anywhere for
storing commercial radioactive waste.

"We are already seeing tritium in the wells in Girard Georgia, and the cooling
ponds at Plant Hatch are filled to overflowing," said Patricia Crayton,
co-chair of the Georgia Green Party (http://web.greens.org/georgia).  "The
fuel cycle which feeds the power plants in Hazlehurst and Waynesboro is
intricately linked to the one which feeds the bomb plant across the Savannah
River near Aiken.  $5 billion could better serve setting Georgia on a
sustainable energy path worthy of our children."

"In addition to a cornucopia of biochemically and radiologically hazardous
waste materials, the proposed powerplants will also manufacture plutonium-239,
raising the question of whether the Obama administration's underlying intent
is to provide electricity to Georgia citizens or to further escalate the
nuclear weapons race," said Douglas Campbell, Green Party activist and a
former nuclear engineer in Ferndale, Michigan.

"If Republicans and Democrats really believed in the free market, they would
strenuously oppose nuclear power, which is enormously expensive and carries
astronomically high liabilities.  But they don't believe in the market.  They
believe in targeted, special interest handouts and guaranteed profits for
favored corporations, despite flawed corporate agendas.  That's why they want
nuclear plants built with taxpayer dollars, with utility ratepayers in states
like Georgia and Florida assuming the financial risk and local residents
assuming the health risk," said Nicholas Ruiz III, Green Party candidate for
Congress in Florida's District 24
(http://intertheory.org/nriiiforcongress2010.html).

Greens are fighting dangerous nuclear projects across the US.  In Florida, the
Green Party praised a citizens' suit filed by members of the Citizens for
Ratepayers Rights against nuclear cost recovery charges, and urged Floridians
to sign a petition protesting unconstitutional rate hikes
(http://www.gp.org/press/pr-national.php?ID=296).

In Illinois, Greens strongly opposed a legislative move to repeal a moratorium
on nuclear energy
(http://www.ilgp.org/groups/media/ILGPpress-releasses/greens-blast-legislative-move-to-repeal-nuclear-moratorium-call).

"Building a nuclear plant is no substitute for enforcement of the Clean Air
Act in Georgia, where pollution from poor construction and dirty coal plants
has caused asthma in children and other health emergencies -- or in Maine or
in any other state," said Lynne Williams, Green candidate for Governor of
Maine (http://www.lynnewilliams2010.org).  "Nuclear power proponents are
gambling that Americans have forgotten the Three Mile Island Meltdown in 1979.
  We haven't forgotten it.  Nor are we ignorant about the risk of breast cancer
and other ailments that uranium poses."

Greens insist that clean energy, not nuclear power, must replace fossil fuels
in the effort to fight climate change.  The Green Party supports socially
equitable carbon taxes; incentives, legislation, and reforms to provide
renewable energy technologies; rejection of environmentally destructive
'alternative' fuels produced from unsustainable or toxic feedstocks; rejection
of 'clean coal'; comprehensive planning to protect and conserve water
resources; and an absolute limit on CO2 emissions through a dramatic reduction
of fossil fuel use.

"President Obama is calling for major investments in nuclear, coal, and
natural gas, when we should drastically reduce the use of such energy," said
Carl Romanelli, 2006 Pennsylvania Green candidate for the US Senate.  "Here in
Pennsylvania, we have cancer clusters in the eastern part of the state due to
too many nuclear plants
(http://www.sott.net/articles/show/201699-US-Report-finds-high-rate-of-thyroid-cancer-in-eastern-Pennsylvania-blames-nuclear-power-plants
/
http://carbonwaters.org/polycythemia-vera/p-vera-media-coverage/20090203-researcher-identifies-cancer-cluster-in-eastern-pennsylvania/).
  Considering advancements in renewable technologies, it would make more sense
for our energy resolve to be applied to these industries, not filthy and
destructive forms of energy production so touted by the President.  The
president continues to act as if fossil and nuclear is the only manner in
which energy is produced."


MORE INFORMATION

Green Party of the United States http://www.gp.org
202-319-7191, 866-41GREEN
• Green candidate database and campaign information:
http://www.gp.org/elections.shtml
• Green Party News Center http://www.gp.org/newscenter.shtml
• Green Party Speakers Bureau http://www.gp.org/speakers
• Green Party ballot access page http://www.gp.org/2008-elections
• Green Party Livestream Channel http://www.livestream.com/greenpartyus

Green Party Eco-Action Committee http://www.gp.org/committees/ecoaction/index.php

"Energy Sec Unaware That Nuclear Loans Have 50 Percent Risk of Default"
By Kate Sheppard, Mother Jones, February 16, 2010
http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2010/02/chu-not-aware-nuclear-default-rates

"Nuclear Loan Guarantees Aren't Just Guarantees: They Are Actual Taxpayer Loans"
Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS), February 17, 2010
http://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2010/02/17-2

"Fed loan guarantees may boost nuclear power return"
Associated Press, February 16, 2010
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hx5wB6YEaAyHIpeDxx6ML-TApHzQD9DTH55G3

"Obama's nuclear error: $54 billion in loan guarantees make little policy or
political sense"
Climate Progress, February 1, 2010
http://climateprogress.org/2010/02/01/obama-nuclear-error-nuclear-loan-guarantee/

"A quarter of US nuclear plants leaking"
AP: "27 of 104 plants leak radioactive tritium, a carcinogen, raising Concerns
about nation's aging plants"
Climate Progress, February 8, 2010
http://climateprogress.org/2010/02/08/a-quarter-of-u-s-nuclear-plants-leaking-radioactive-tritium/

Green Pages: The official publication of record of the Green Party of the
United States
Fall 2009 issue now online
http://gp.org/greenpages-blog


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