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Japan – natural and unnatural disasters.
Japan has been hit by the worst earthquake in it’s history. It’s the 6th most powerful quake in the entire world since records began in 1900. Just looking at the scenes coming from the disaster – particularly the before and after shots – and it’s clear that despite being a first-world country the deathtoll will be immense, in the thousands if not tens of thousands. It’s already been declared the worst disaster Japan has faced since WW2.
As SSY has already posted natural disasters are often exacerbated by the man-made actions (or inaction) that occurs around them. Whether it’s the botched response in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina or the comparative defences against Hurricanes by Socialist Cuba and Capitalist Haiti the way your society is organised has a direct effect on how it copes with massive natural catastrophes.
Had the tsunami hit some of the poorer countries in the Pacific like Indonesia or the Phillipines – who do not enjoy the same defences to natural disasters Japan does – the death toll would have been even higher. As a developed country Japan probably could not have done much more to stop it’s citizens being swept away by the tsunami, but it’s modernity has also made another very unnatural disaster possible – one that would not simply stop at the beaches of Japan, but has the potential to affect the entire region.
The earthquake and tsunami has destabilised Japan’s nuclear power stations at Fukushima, and thousands of people have already been evacuated, with residents being told to stay indoors, close their windows and not to drink tap water. Within the past few hours Japanese officials have declared that the fuel rods in all 3 reactors appear to be melting. France’s Nuclear safety agency has also increased the severity of the accident at Fukushima from level 4 to “at least level 5, or even at level 6″. This is significant and extremely worrying. The International Nuclear Event Scale runs from 1 to 7, with 7 being the most serious. There has only ever been one level 7 nuclear disaster – Chernobyl, and the events at Fukushima are (currently) only one scale behind that.
What has happened at Fukushima underlines the inherent dangers of Nuclear energy. Nuclear power operates by using the immense heat given off by nuclear fission to boil water and produce steam which in turn is used to power generators. The problem (and the danger) lies with the fuel itself, which is so hot it needs to be constantly submerged in cool water (this is why many nuclear facilities are near the sea). What’s happened at Fukushima is that the earthquake and tsunami has disrupted the cooling systems, meaning the fuel rods are no longer kept cool. The danger is now that the fuel will become so hot it will meltdown, break out of containment and release nuclear material into the atmosphere.
If this happens it does not matter how far people are evacuated, the material will go as Michio Kazuo puts it, wherever the wind blows. This means not only Japan but the Pacific and potentially the West coast of the USA could be affected. When Chernobyl underwent a meltdown nuclear material was found in Scotland, with restricted zones being set up to stop sheep carrying the radioactive material. If Fukushima does undergo a catastrophic, Chernobyl style meltdown it does not just pose a threat to people near the reactor in the here and now, it also threatens thousands more for the rest of their lives. After Chernobyl melted down, there were thousands of excess cancer deaths that claimed peoples lives years after the event despite the attempts of some to downplay the death toll.
The events at Fukushima may be this generations wake up call to the dangers of Nuclear power, just as Chernobyl was to the past. There’s already been a demo of 40,000 in Germany against the nuclear power plant at Neckarwestheim, whose operational length is undergoing extension despite popular opposition. The UK already announced a new generation of Nuclear Power plants over 3 years ago. The defenders of Nuclear power claim these new plants are much safer than their previous counterparts. Unfortunately, report the Guardian,
The analysis is limited, however. Computed risks for new reactors are lower than for current designs “when only internal events are considered,” according to a 2009 report that the Nuclear Energy Institute wrote for the NRC. (That includes fires or pipe breaks, for example.) But when risks of damage caused by external events — earthquakes, for example — are factored in, the new reactors are no safer than older reactors. In addition, because utilities have no operating experience with the new reactors, the probable risk assessments are purely theoretical and not as reliable as years of actual operating data from existing plants.
The German Government's response to anti-Nuclear protests
The article also quotes Russ Bell, head of new Nuclear Plant licensing in the USA, who is reticent about saying the new generation of Nuclear Power plants are safer because “We think all our plants are safe”. The reality is that everything that has the potential to fail and cause loss of life and limb – whether it’s a boat, aircraft, car or Nuclear Power Plant – is described by the builder as “safe”. The people who describe the new generation of Nuclear Power Plants as foolproof would have said the same thing about plants like 3 mile island in the past.
Accidents happen in the world all the time. Sometimes they are avoidable, and the cause of malicious neglect by the unscrupulous, like the Bhopal disaster or Chernobyl itself. Others are simply tragic accidents that could not have been foreseen or stopped. We cannot stop all technology due to the risk of injury and death – people will always need to use trains, despite the railtrack disasters. But we don’t need to use Nuclear Power in human society, the potential disasters that can occur in Nuclear energy are much more severe than the worst disasters that can undergo in other aspects of man made technology. Put simply when a plane or car crashes, it does not render the surrounding environment uninhabitable and increase the cancer risks of thousands of people for hundreds of miles.
Nuclear Power is a technology that is being promoted and constructed in defiance of public safety (to the point of building reactors near fault lines) in the interests of modern, non-stop growth Capitalism. What energy a society has available to it regulates what kind of technology, industry and civilisation it can build. Access to crops (the product of solar energy from the sun) allowed primitive civilisation to develop in the middle east, and allowed people to become scientists, doctors and teachers and survive off of maize, rice, corn etc instead of constantly having to hunt animals for food. The development of Capitalism 100 years ago was dependent on the use of coal fossil fuels to undergo the Industrial Revolution and transform the UK from a feudal peasant society to a modern Capitalist one – a society able to build ships, trains, use steel and construct cities.
Capitalism today is similar – it needs to constantly be producing consumer goods for people to buy. Capitalist companies which do not keep growing and producing greater profits for their shareholders will be overtaken and destroyed by those that do. This demand for non-stop growth has already led to a world wide economic crisis, ignited by the sub-prime mortgage scandal in the USA, with families being sold homes they could not afford. As well as an obvious economic crisis however, it also threatens to start a much larger environmental crisis – global warming.
The non-stop growth of Capitalism requires the use of the same fossil fuels it did 100 years ago, despite what we now know about the effects of increased CO2 on the environment. Some companies and Government’s have accepted the massive scientific consensus regarding man made (in reality, Capitalist carbon driven) climate change, and are trying to find alternate sources of energy that will allow them to continue non-stop growth. Others are looking for alternate energy for more cynical reasons – avoiding a dependence on middle eastern oil for example. The alternative that many of these companies and Governments are now promoting is Nuclear Power.
The reason they are backing Nuclear is because while it may not give off CO2, Nuclear Power is similar to fossil fuel in many other respects. The advantages of fossil fuels (you can hold on to coal/oil, then use it at levels and times of your choosing in power stations) are present in Nuclear fuel – you can decide when and how you use Uranium for example. Of course there is the Nuclear waste, which continues to be radioactive for thousands of years. Unfortunately capitalism does not think in the long term – if it did there would never be any revolutions or economic crisis – let alone think on a timescale which is many, many, many times longer the establishment not only of Capitalism but any kind of human civilisation itself.
There are alternative sources to both Nuclear and Fossil fuel – renewable energy, like tidal, wind, and solar. The reason these are not encouraged on the same level as Nuclear power is simple, they do not have the same advantages for capitalism as the fossil/nuclear fuel has above. You cannot decide when, where, and to what extent the wind blows, waves move or the sun shines in the same way you can decide what level of fossil/nuclear fuel to use. This kind of renewable energy is not compatible with a society and economic system that is dependent on constant, never ending economic growth.
That’s why as well as changing our energy systems from those that damage the environment we have to change our society to one that isn’t dependent on constant growth, and the neverending production of consumer goods which results not only in the economic crisis Marx predicted a hundred years ago, but now new environmental catastrophes that he could not have foreseen in his worst nightmares. The disaster at Fukushima is connected to the economic crisis throughout the world, and the continuing climate change – the constant non-stop growth demands of Capitalism, in defiance of the needs and safety of the majority of the world’s population.
Great article.
I believe nuclear energy to be correct and a viable option for energy consumption of course that energy supply runs out in thirty years. The after effects are terrible but also the enrgy if not runned by capilist organisations that would inevitably try to push up the price would be almost free especially if the ITEr project is succesful in France. Fusion will make much more energy, the world needs to find new fuel sources renewables may be viable in Scotland and other nations which have good wind or solar power or thermal energy but not all places are so rich in natural power. Nuclear is a cheap way to make lots of power and is on record the most safest power source.
I’d also like to point out that the city of Glasgow is currently posioned with radiation and other things through the industrial works of the industrial revolution and the reason for Scandinavia receiving a healthy dose of acid rain is also due to Britains industrial revolution.
Thank you Don Juan, I thought I was the only person left who saw the possibility of other fuels apart from renewables. Even within Scotland there are issues with solar and wind since they are unreliable and huge sections of our coast would have to be given over to tidal power or there be huge increases in the energy produced by renewables and our energy storage abilities unless we wanted to start rationing what electricity people can use (note: I am not saying we should not invest in renewables). I’ve long been interested in fusion power (completely different from current fission power stations) for its potential to multiply the amount of energy put into it – also I remain optimistic in there being other energy options which could be developed. Also call me old fashioned but I am still one for wanting to see economic growth and material development of society even under socialism. This does not mean constant never-ending growth as it does under capitalism but the improvement of people’s lives from new scientific and technological advances. I’ll agree it would have to be done in a manner where we made our energy usage more efficient and cut down waste but I think its hugely pessimistic to think it would not be possible to find solutions to these issues in the future. Even the initial stages of socialism where we would have to sort out housing, transport and manufacturing issues would surely contribute to economic growth?
Talking about the possibility of power from nuclear fusion is essentially ‘technological optimism’ of the highest order – yes, it does sound great, but it’s sounded great for decades and still hasn’t gotten anywhere near a stage it could be a useful energy source.
On growth, capitalism and ecology:
http://www.monthlyreview.org/110101foster.php
Neil
I know its unknown how long it will take to get fusion viable – last I looked into it there was plans for a functioning plant by 2020? My main point, however, is I think zero growth or as discussed, and criticised, in the article you linked degrowth is unnecessary and ignores possible future energy sources which are not as unreliable as current renewables are (though I would not rule out the possibility of future advances in them too). Even looking at some of the things in which a socialist and ecological society would aim to develop – such as adequate housing for all, improving the energy efficiency of housing; factories and offices, a proper integrated public transport system, and improving structures for manufacturing and farming so less needs to be imported would all technically entail economic growth. Also surely as energy efficiency, recycling, and energy production capacities of renewable / non-CO2 emitting fuels increase it allows for further economic growth rather than committing ourselves to zero-growth for the sake of zero-growth?! This is why I am saying I am not for a constant unending growth as economic growth exists under capitalism without other considerations but an economic growth in which we can keep progressing and improving society as our technological and scientific abilities allow us without risking the planet.
They’ve been setting potential future dates for reactors to come online for decades too – I’ve not seen anything myself to suggest we should be taking such claims any more seriously now. I could of course be mistaken, but I’m not holding my breath. There is the further question of the costs of rolling out such technology should it become viable, and the compatibility of doing so with global capitalism (in the absence of substantial reform – i.e. like global eco-Keynesianism – requiring substantial pressure ‘from below’ and working against the logic of capital) – but that’s a separate issue.
On the question of growth etc., I think it might come down to the definition of the term rather than there being any significant disagreement here. But I was planning on writing something on this anyway (in the context of the Cancun climate agreement), so I will have a think about what you’ve written and respond more fully there.
(I’ll have to make sure and get it done before Saturday anyway, as that is my birthday/retirement from SSY…)
Neil
Aye, trying to move focus from purely fusion – I think carbon capture is not as bad as some green groups make out. Yes under capitalism this is just a cynical ploy to carry on as usual which needs to be challenged but under a socialist system whilst building an infrastructure of renewable energy or whatever else is available there is a need to limit the damage caused by our current energy production unless we want to ration electricity usage to a couple of hours a day. Also there are interesting developments of using solar power and CO2 to make synthetic petrol, its already being done all that’s needed is improved solar panels to make it viable on a large-scale, which could offer a recycled fuel source for the current transport system whilst switching over to electric means. Additionally once an alternative energy infrastructure is in place such carbon capture technology could be adapted & used for “scrubbing” CO2 from the air and limiting the damage already caused.
I think you could be right on it being an issue with the definition of the term rather than disagreement. The idea of what is or is not “economic” would greatly change when moving from a capitalist logic making it hard to find an adequate term for what I mean when referring to economic growth and material development. What I have seen in some green literature though which use the language of zero growth or degrowth is a commitment to the idea that humanity should progress no further as if somehow all forms of progress in-themselves are going to lead to destruction. This normally then entails the belief society should go back to means and ways of living from twenty or more years ago and give up any idea of further development. Now I am not saying socialists adhere to these views, far from it, but from using the same phraseology I think there is a need to distinguish ourselves from such views with an account of some form of “growth” and development under a socialist society which doesn’t lead to fucking over the planet.
Also you’re making me realise how old I am with this talk of SSY retirement! What’s the age limit again as I’ll be approaching it soon myself?
Aye, trying to move focus from purely fusion – I think carbon capture is not as bad as some green groups make out. Yes under capitalism this is just a cynical ploy to carry on as usual which needs to be challenged but under a socialist system whilst building an infrastructure of renewable energy or whatever else is available there is a need to limit the damage caused by our current energy production unless we want to ration electricity usage to a couple of hours a day. Also there are interesting developments of using solar power and CO2 to make synthetic petrol, its already being done all that’s needed is improved solar panels to make it viable on a large-scale, which could offer a recycled fuel source for the current transport system whilst switching over to electric means. Additionally once an alternative energy infrastructure is in place such carbon capture technology could be adapted & used for “scrubbing” CO2 from the air and limiting the damage already caused.
I think you could be right on it being an issue with the definition of the term rather than disagreement. The idea of what is or is not “economic” would greatly change when moving from a capitalist logic making it hard to find an adequate term for what I mean when referring to economic growth and material development. What I have seen on some green websites though which use the language of zero growth or degrowth is a commitment to the idea that humanity should progress no further as if somehow all forms of progress in-themselves are going to lead to destruction. This normally then entails the belief society should go back to means and ways of living from twenty or more years ago and give up any idea of further development. Now I am not saying socialists adhere to these views, far from it, but from using the same phraseology I think there is a need to distinguish ourselves from such views with an account of some form of “growth” and development under a socialist society which doesn’t lead to fucking over the planet.
Also you’re making me realise how old I am with this talk of SSY retirement! What’s the age limit again as I’ll be approaching it soon myself?
P.S. is there anyway to create a “post submitted” page as I never know if my post has been submitted or the page has just refreshed!
The only reason nuclear power plant disasters happen is because of capitalism’s fuckwit inability to foresee and prepare for possible catastrophe as a result of their blinding ignorance in the pursuit of “PROFIT!”. Of course they didn’t the necessary safety precautions in case of a natural disaster, because that would cut into their profit ratings, and they probably just thought “Its not like its going to happen anyway!”. If you plan and prepare for these things, shit like this doesn’t happen. The Chernobyl disaster was partly caused by the dumbfounding decision to take out the rods that prevent the nuclear fission from getting out of control. If you run and maintain a nuclear power correctly with safety (ie, not in the hands of privatised control) then it doesn’t go wrong. Don’t reject technological advances just because capitalism fucks them up. If I was living under socialism, I’d be looking to nuclear power as one of our potential energy sources.
Socialist planning can’t stop earthquakes from happening. And if an earthquake happens in an area where you have a nuclear power plant, then it’s always gonna be very dodgy
Emmmm, Chernobyl wasn’t under private control…
Yeah, it’s pretty much impossible to earthquake proof nuclear plants.
The Union of Concerned Scientists is an excellent organisation that’s produced some really useful info on what’s going on, check out:
http://www.ucsusa.org/
http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2011/ucs140311.html
The point for me about nuclear power however goes beyond the technical problems around waste, safety and renewability, into questions of what kind of socialist society we envisage. A society fueled by nuclear power is one that must be centralised, requires immense levels of technical specialisation, and that requires some form of police and security apparatus to protect the extremely hazardous materials it produces.
If you look at a map of where nuclear power plants are in the world, with a few exceptions they are in a belt between North America, Europe, the ex USSR and Japan. It says something about the kind of societies and economies that produce and use this technology. Highly centralised, energy intensive, militarised and securitised societies. Not the type I want to eventually live in.
This doesn’t mean I want to live in some kind of low tech rural idyll – I just would like to see societies modeled on decentralisation, direct democracy, and where technology reflects that, including energy supply. The internet, not nuclear power, is a technology suitable for a socialist society.
On the whole issue of growth, there is of course the obvious point that a huge amount of economic activity needs to take place to construct a socialist society. There’s also a need for us to slow our growth in order to allow underdeveloped regions of the world to grow towards a better standard of living. I think the issue has been posed well by Socialist Resistance in their ecosocialist programme for the crisis – http://socialistresistance.org/1081/their-multiple-crisis-and-our-solutions-an-ecosocialist-transitional-programme
But there’s a clear difference between saying that some socially necessary growth will take place in a better society, and recognising the fact that our society is cancerous because it makes economic growth a social necessity, over and above all other considerations. There is actually NO point about talking about energy efficiency technologies and saving energy under capitalism, because the Jevons Paradox shows that increasing efficiency will actually lead to businesses producing MORE output, consuming MORE resources and producing MORE waste as a result of the fact we’ve made the cost of production cheaper.
http://www.monthlyreview.org/101101foster-clark-york.php
I know Chernobyl wasn’t under private control, that was just a separate fact out of place
Anyway, the point is the chance of an earthquake happening in Scotland is very unlikely. If you build nuclear plants in high-risk areas and countries (which shouldn’t happen anyway) then the risks and responsibility lies in the hands of those who are planning to build them there. Technological advances come with risks. Don’t rule out nuclear power because of a catastrophe caused by natural disaster.
Chernobyl wasn’t caused by a natural disaster, and it killed anywhere between 4000 and a million people depending on who’s estimate you use.
I think the point is that technological advances aren’t socially neutral. Technologies are tools that societies design to meet their needs, based on their social model.
In the case of nuclear power, it’s more than a flippant point that Chernobyl was not under private control. The fact is that nuclear power is originally a byproduct of state militaries developing nuclear weapons. It has never existed without massive support and subsidy from the state, wherever it has been located in the world. That goes just as much for privately owned plants in the US as it does for state owned ones in the USSR. There’s the hidden externalities obviously, such as disposal of waste that can have a half life longer than the current age of human civilisation, as well as the provision of a security and police infrastructure to protect nuclear plants. But in capitalist countries, the subsidies are still more direct than that – nuclear power plants would be impossible to operate without state support to cover the cost of insurance. That’s because insurers are not daft bastards, and do not give good quotes on running a nuclear power plant!
My point is that nuclear power plants are a technology that has been produced by highly centralised states with modern advanced military and security apparatuses, and to maintain them in the future that’s the kind of infrastructure we’ll need. If we’d like to live in a society where we don’t have these things then we should explore other options.
I was reading a quote in the Guardian from Yuli Andreyev, who was the Soviet head of the clean up agency effort at Chernobyl. He was criticising the Japanese government for not being willing to sacrifice nuclear workers at the damaged plant, forcing them to work on in conditions that may kill them for the good of the greater public. On the one hand, there is a certain grim logic that would make what to do impossible if you were a worker under those circumstances. But I feel reading that that it’s a compelling reason why a socialist society should not build nuclear plants – no worker should ever have to make a decision like that.
Jack you are actually wrong long before the premise of nuclear bombs people were trying to create nuclear power after the discovery of radioactive materials like radon and a lot of work went into creating nuclear power. Nuclear Fission was first created in 1930. Also as probably a different type of socialist I believe ully in the state and a strong centralised state with democratic license and restrictions from its people. What I would prefer to see is the greater ability for people to get involved in politics in day to day stuff rather than the made up believe that you only have power for one day every four to five years.
My believe in centralised state is simple people need huge organisation Britain and many other countries are too full in terms of population we have no ability to feed our own people through our own agriculture base. The need to import is paramount and that would need continual centralised control. Also I believe that many into green politics are quite simply nuts the last scottish election the green party put in their manifesto that all lights should be shut off at six o’clock pm that is one of the most stupid comments I have ever heard. This will increase crime and also it is naive to think that huiman beings will all go to sleep at six o’clock. The politics of eco socialist seem to be thinking of a country idle not the vast cities which we inhabit and the people that need food. Also although your comment on slowing down growth so that devolping countries can grow up is indeed noble I feel it is completly unelectable. I personally belief in rationing but most likely it will never happen but it is still a saddening fact that the healthiest point in Britain was during the rationing period of the forties and early fifties.
The Iter project is a collection of countries working towards the creation of nuclear fusion it was established in 2006 and currently the power plant is under construction in the south of France. People shouldn’t get too taken with nuclear as uranium had only a 30 year supply left.
Also quicxk point on your sacrificing workers it is sad but at the end of the day those workers have a duty to insure the safety of Japan. If they do not fix it then the radiation will poison japan and kill millions.
I’d also like to point out that many people forseen a large earthquake but the Japanese government didn’t want to hear about it. Japan must be one of the worst place to have a nuclear power plant. Also if you weren’t looking at the stock markets Coal has went up.
When I said natural disaster I was talking about Japan, not Chernobyl. Chernobyl, as I’ve already stated, was caused by the plant workers decision to remove the rods that prevent the fission reaction from getting out of control. It was a terrible disaster, but ultimately it was the worker’s (or even the USSR’s for not providing sufficient education on the safety and maintenance of the plant) fault.
Obviously we have different opinions on the matter. I think in this case I agree with Don Juan, who I often find myself agreeing with when I’m reading the comments on these articles. But lets remember, it doesn’t matter what type of socialist we are, we all have the same enemy. We should be fighting against capitalism as a whole, not having arguments that distract and divide us.
Quickly jumping in to say I completely agree with what Jack (F) has said on various issues here. His point regarding the relationship between nuclear power and the necessity of a centralised, militarised state is one that was famously made by the academic Langdon Winner in the 1980s in an important contribution to early technology studies literature, called ‘Do artefacts have politics?’ (available on-line), and is an important one for socialists to keep in mind.
Jack, what are the various sources you mention RE death tolls from Chernobyl? Noticed that George Monbiot, in repeating his ‘proviso’d pro-nuclear’
stance this week, claimed a full tally of 43 (citing a UN document). Might be worth writing to the Guardian to respond.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2011/mar/16/japan-nuclear-crisis-atomic-energy
Work on the science of radiation and nuclear energy was taking place from the end of the 19th century. However, the funding, support and impetus to really develop it from the 1930s on came because states wished to develop nuclear weapons, and the modern nuclear power industry is a technological byproduct of that work. That is what turned what had been pure research in the 1930s towards a practical application – weapons of mass destruction.
I don’t believe it’s possible to abolish the state tomorrow, but surely socialists’ aim is people managing their own lives without the need of a hierarchical government? We want to create the conditions for the state to wither away because it’s no longer needed. That means building systems that meet our needs that can be directly controlled by communities themselves. For a socialist society to build nuclear power plants means we are accepting the continuation of centralised hierarchical control with a security apparatus. That’s not the socialism I fight for.
I’m sceptical that the agricultural situation for Britain is as bad as you make out, I think a lot of the reason that we are dependent on food imports is because capitalism finds it cheaper to produce our food in developing countries rather than anything inherent about the ecology of the British Isles. There’s far far more of our food that could be produced here.
But even if we accept that we’d need to continue to import food, I believe that a decentralised, community planned socialism is more viable technologically than it’s ever been. Modern communications technology means that very advanced systems of resource distribution are possible to be organised without the need for a massive bureaucracy in control.
It’s putting arguments in my mouth to say I think that people should have one day’s power every few years. Obviously everyone in the world should have access to power. However, that doesn’t negate the fact that our buildings are built inefficiently, technology is not designed with the aim of conserving energy and that basically our society wastes huge amounts of energy. We can live lives where we need to consume far less energy than we do now and still have a very decent standard of living, and most of the energy we consume being produced locally in an ecologically stable way.
I absolutely believe in the future of cities (I live in one!), and I actually believe that cities have a vital role to play in the transition to an eco socialist society. Although today many cities are vastly damaging to the environment, that’s because of the priorities on which they’re built. If we redesign cities to privilege democratic public space over the modular, private elite control we see now. Cities can produce far more of their own energy and food (see urban agriculture in Cuba), and can have a much more stable relationship with the ecological context around them if they were to be subject to democratic planning. On that basis urbanisation could actually benefit other organisms by allowing us to let more of the world’s surface become forested again, and devoting less land to human uses – alongside sustainable ecological agriculture in the countryside that privileges biodiversity in the areas we do farm.
This article http://www.countercurrents.org/davis290110.htm expresses the potential for cities to play a major role in the development of a new kind of human civilisation, and I really really recommend giving it a read.
I don’t quite know why you’re quoting what you say is Green Party policy at me. I’m not a member of the Scottish Green Party, and disagree with them about a lot of things. That doesn’t mean that I don’t think that a full understanding of the science of ecology, and human beings relationships with the rest of the biosphere, is essential to any attempt to build socialism, and that a human civilisation, whether socialist or capitalist, that doesn’t make this engagement is ultimately going to face collapse.
My point about Chernobyl was exactly that it wasn’t a natural disaster. People here seem to be saying that nuclear power plants are fine as long as they’re not built on geological fault lines, but the worst nuclear accident in history took place nowhere near the edge of a tectonic plate.
Yes, ultimately the Japanese workers have a responsibility to sacrifice their own lives for the good of others. But can we as socialists honestly say we think it’s right that any worker is ever put in that position? To me it is a powerful argument why we shouldn’t build nuclear power plants.
When fusion technology exists I’ll make my assessment over whether I think it’s a good or a bad thing. It doesn’t exist now, and using it as an argument for nuclear power is illogical because it bears little relation to the realities of existing fission plants.
The death figures for Chernobyl typically only count those directly killed at the plant and in the surrounding area. When you count the cancers caused by the release of radiation the death toll is much higher, and there’s been several different studies that have produced different results. This one done by Greenpeace suggests that there were over a million cancers attributable to Chernobyl, including 100,000 fatal ones:
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/news/features/chernobyl-deaths-180406/
Finally, I’d just like to say that I think this is an important debate, and I respect the views of others arguing for nuclear power. I don’t think discussing these issues out online is damaging or divisive for socialists, and I agree we have the same enemy. That doesn’t mean we can’t debate about where we’re going and what kind of society we’re trying to establish, which I think the issue of nuclear power cuts right to the heart of.
Nuclear weapons are a by-product of nuclear energy as first you need nuclear energy before you can create a bomb.
The deaths in chernobyl are a lot in fact effects in western europe are still prominient nevermind the mutation of genes leading to a greater percentage of disabled people especially round the effected area.
Fusion power does exist as the ITEr project is in the process of building a fusion reactor in the south of France, also fusion reactions have occured just not in a signifigant matter as to create power on a massive scale. I do not aim in the reduction of the state because I don’t believe the state is unatural I believe it is humanity to organise is to be human. I have already said I believe in greater democracy and even the complete control of industry in the hands of the people it worked in France when done in Paris. I believe the aim is to create a longing to improve the state ie infrastructure and economy not based on money but by knowing that you have done a good thing and that everybody recieves the same amount in wages.
In nuclear energy especially I believe it is a viable option but a dangerous one I will not argue the figures or the facts but if anyone looks to Nigeria oil can cause immense harm even in well organised states oil can be dangerous as shown in the gulf of Mexico.
The reasoning for Chernobyl was because the russians were performing experiments which were unsafe and risky this is not allowed at nuclear power plants in this country. Also what must be discussed is not the west which has access to a vast range of options due to its money but the devolping countries which have no such luxury how will they get power in the future without oil or fossil fuels.
I would also say about your point in reforesting at first you say you wish to use more land for agriculture and use it more effectively but this would go against reforesting large areas. The point is it was agriculture which took away the forests not urbanisation, efficiency is always a good thing and cities should be made in the most efficient manner but in terms of increasing our current output we would be c apable of it but to even greatly increase our output we would need the implentation of GM crops which are by far the most efficient way to grow crops. Subsistence farming would not do in terms of feeding this country by the country I am infering to Britain as a whole. In terms of Bio-diversity we would need GM crops to grow exotic fruits such as bananas and to have the standard of food we currently have avaiable