Energy efficiency is the answer, as it was in 1970

It may be one of the worst problems the world faces, but global warming isthe best break the nuclear industry has caught in a long time.

Ever since the 1986 nuclear meltdown in Chernobyl left a wave of death andmayhem, nuclear energy advocates have understandably been on the defensive.There's been no investment in new nuclear plants in North America in 20years. But now, with the public increasingly focused on the global warmingnightmare associated with coal, oil and gas, the nuclear lobby seems to havecarved out an improbable new niche for itself as a clean energy source.

Right here in Ontario, the McGuinty cabinet, under pressure to make good onpromises to close coal-fired electricity plants, is contemplating revivingits nuclear commitment.

But there's still that awkward question: What about the fact that waste fromnuclear plants remains radioactive for a million years?

This strikes me as a deal-breaker. Whatever kudos it wins on the globalwarming front, nuclear energy still generates a deadly waste that lasts — asRoberta Flack once said about her love — till the end of time.

Last year, a U.S. appeals court ruled against Washington's plans to burynuclear waste in a Nevada mountainside because the plans would only protectthe public for 10,000 years — even though the National Academy of Sciencesconcluded radioactive leaks would remain a danger for a million years.

And then there's the prospect of terrorists driving planes into nuclearplants. Why spend billions on a “war on terror” and then construct perfecttargets for them to attack?

What's driving this foolishness is the coming energy crunch. Ontario'snuclear plants are in rapid decline, leaving us facing severe powershortages within the next five years. But even if we're unfazed by theprospect of a meltdown, a terrorist attack, a million-year waste problem andthe mega-billion-dollar cost of new reactors, there's an added hitch: Newreactors can't be built in time.

A reactor takes 15 years to build, notes energy consultant Ralph Torrie.Cutting corners on regulatory standards — hardly a great idea — could shavefive years off that time, still leaving us five years short.

Promising alternatives like wind power can't make up the shortfall in timeeither.

Torrie insists the only hope of avoiding a crisis is for government tolaunch a massive effort to achieve greater energy efficiency, which couldsignificantly reduce our consumption. This worked before. After the soaringoil prices of the 1970s, there was a flurry of new efficiency regulations oncars, appliances and buildings. Within a decade, our energy efficiency hadimproved by 30 per cent, Torrie says.

Once oil prices came down in the mid-'80s, governments largely abandoned theefficiency quest.

It's time to revive that quest, which achieved so much with so littleeffort. “Imagine if we actually tried,” says Torrie.

Among other benefits, it would help save the planet — now and till the endof time.

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