New York’s ambitious carbon reduction law, the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, also known as the CLCPA, doesn’t say much about nuclear power. But it does require New York to reduce economy-wide greenhouse gas emissions 40% by 2030, and no less than 85% by 2050, from 1990 levels.

The question one climate scientist is asking is this: “Why not employ nuclear power” to help meet those goals?

Dr. James Hansen is a climate scientist and former director of NASA’s Goddard Institute. In 1988, Hansen sounded the alarm on global climate change. Currently, he directs the Climate Science, Awareness and Solutions Program at Columbia University’s Earth Institute. He is in Albany to testify before New York State’s Climate Action Council about the council’s draft scoping plan. Earlier this month, Hansen wrote a column for the Albany Times Union outlining his position.

He discussed the geopolitical implications of fossil fuels on Capital Tonight.

“[Germany’s] dependence on Russia is due in large part to the unfortunate leadership of Germany. They’re totally dependent on gas from Russia,” Hansen said. 

As the war in Ukraine unfolds, countries that depend on oil and gas are at the mercy of authoritarian regimes like Russia. Hansen argues that by investing in nuclear, countries like Russia and Saudi Arabia wouldn’t have the same geopolitical strength. 

“I’m certainly a big supporter of renewable energy, which Germany is doing a good job building. But I’ve been publishing papers…for a decade saying that the first thing you should do when you get renewables, is retire the coal. And then the next thing, retire the gas. And finally, you can retire the nuclear,” he explained. “Germanys got it backwards. They retired the nuclear.”

The Climate Action Council’s Draft Scoping plan “gives short-shrift to nuclear power” according to Hansen. However, there are several serious problems associated with nuclear power: It has the potential to be dangerous; people still remember Fukushima.  It’s also expensive. And here in New York, we already subsidize nuclear power.

“Nuclear power has the potential to be less expensive than fossil fuels. If you look at the amount of steel and concrete that go into building a nuclear power plant, it’s actually modest,” said Hansen. “But you have to build enough of them, and you have to have a supportive government.”

Hansen blamed the Democrats in power in Washington for installing what he called “anti-nuclear people” at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Their mission, he claims, is to make building nuclear plants as expensive as possible.

“The potential is there. We should be, in New York state, leaders in the technology of the future,” Hansen.

There are other arguments for and against nuclear power that can be found here and here.

Dr. Hansen admitted that the disposal of nuclear waste remains an issue.

“The present technology burns about 1% of the nuclear fuel. The nuclear waste is actually valuable. It can be reprocessed into fuel for future reactors. And we know how to build those,” Hansen said. “But we’ve just abandoned our leadership in nuclear technology.”

Today’s climate hearing is one of ten that the Climate Action Council will be holding around the state. You can find the list of hearing times and locations here.