Collaborative Proposal Creation
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Proposal text
Be it resolved that the Green Party of Canada long conflicted between the horror of nuclear weapons and the need to support reliable and clean nuclear power,
• will adopt a view of nuclear power that is consistent with the best scientific knowledge and practices, and
• will advocate for the continued development of nuclear power technologies, extraction technologies, nuclear waste disposal, and alternative nuclear fuels.
Type of Proposal
Public policy that the party would represent
Objective / Benefit
The GPC has a longstanding public position of preferring renewable power generation instead of nuclear power generation. Yet not one policy currently addresses the beneficial effects of nuclear power. All policy references to nuclear are to the prevention and control of nuclear weapons.
The objective of this policy is to establish a new policy that addresses the benefits of the use of nuclear power generation in a changing environment that urgently needs reliable power generation.
- Whereas the policies of the Green Party of Canada are to be based on scientific principles, and
- Whereas we now know how to build nuclear power plants that are far safer than our current operational designs, and
- Whereas nuclear power generation can be demonstrated,
- to be the least polluting of all electricity generation technologies, in terms of CO2 production per MW of capacity,
- to have the smallest footprint in terms of station size, acres per MW of installed capacity,
- to have the lowest volume of waste production in terms of tons per MW,
- to require the least input of scarce resources in terms of tons per MW,
- to have the best safety record of all generation facilities in terms of loss of human life per MW of installed capacity, and
- Whereas we do know what to do with spent nuclear fuel to ensure safety.
This policy will complement and expand the policies of the Green Party of Canada, making them more appropriate in an intellectually honest way.
If your proposal replaces an existing policy or policies, which one does it replace?
This is new policy. All existing policy addresses various aspects of the undesirability of nuclear weapons. It does not in any way reduce the relevance of those policies.
List any supporting evidence for your proposal
1. Jack Devanney, The Two Lies that killed nuclear:
https://jackdevanney.substack.com/p/the-two-lies-that-killed-nuclear
2. Jack Devanney, Why Nuclear Power Has Been a Flop:
3. Cleo Abram, The Big Lie About Nuclear Waste:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IzQ3gFRj0Bc
4. Burning Nuclear waste:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3u44skO-nMo
5. IEA on Nuclear Power:
https://www.iea.org/energy-system/electricity/nuclear-power
6. Our World in Data, Death Toll from Chernobyl and Fukushima:
https://ourworldindata.org/what-was-the-death-toll-from-chernobyl-and-fukushima
7. Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, LNT:
https://nuclearsafety.gc.ca/eng/resources/health/linear-non-threshold-model/index.cfm
8. Original text of this proposal: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/j5bvh4dagagllrhus59h9/GPC-Nuclear.docx?rlkey=8ozj24vcajsvofrtgtpy9pt85&st=uvmsga8g&dl=0
Does this proposal affect any particular group and what efforts have been made to consult with the group or groups?
There are many in the party and outside, who consider Nuclear Power to be so dangerous as to be categorically denied as a solution to our future power needs. This policy reverses that perception of Nuclear Power. It is likely to alienate such people in their support of the party.
There is also likely to be an adverse reaction from the Global Greens, which would need to be carefully managed, though it is to be hoped that this motion will start a greens-wide reassessment of their positions on nuclear power.
Jurisdiction: Is this proposal under federal jurisdiction?
Yes
Please indicate the language the proposal is being submitted in.
English
This proposal is being evaluated
Posted on the Continuous Motion Development Vote tab for member review prior to the all-member vote.
Amendments (3)
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Created at
24/05/2024 -
- 0
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Created at
05/07/2024 -
- 0
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Created at
10/07/2024 -
- 2
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I am deeply familiar with the Moltex Molten Salt Reactors that may be used in New Brunswick. Full disclosure, after following Molten Salt Reactors closely for about seven years, I eventually decided to invest £7000 in Moltex. This is my only "connection" to the "nuclear industry" -- I know you'll think it means I'm biased, but you'll have the causation backwards: I studied up on all the details over many years before investing, so it's not a case of "it is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it". In fact my salary pays for software related to fossil fuels, and I am doing my best to make that software obsolete.
Demonization is popular in politics, so you might dislike me for this, but the fossil fuel industry of Alberta is huge, and when I was on EI I understood the EI rules to mean I should apply to all jobs I was qualified for, so I included fossil fuel companies among my job applications and was hired, after first asking about the presence of people who deny humans cause climate change at the company (luckily, that wasn't really a thing). Believe it or not, a lot of us want to transition to clean energy. Recently I've been pushing my boss hard to open up sales channels to new geothermal tech, which is closely related to oil/gas tech. I voted Green the first time in 2000 or so, but I've always been voting against the big parties. Obviously I'd prefer to have a party I can proudly vote for.
So yeah, Moltex has never built a fast-spectrum reactor but it's pretty clear that
1) They can achieve it at lower cost than traditional reactors via hazard-reduction[1]. In brief, the cost of NPPs is driven largely by the cost of hazard mitigation and regulations, both of which are reduced if hazards can be eliminated. Moltex's design eliminates the following key hazards of traditional nuclear plants: (i) high pressure, (ii) coolant that can boil away very quickly in a theoretical worst case, (iii) excess reactivity, (iv) loose cesium and iodine. (no one gave me this list, I simply know what I'm talking about.) Eliminating water is the most important thing, because it enables a smaller containment structure and much bigger safety margins simultaneously.
2) It may use plutonium waste as fuel for electricity, which can reduce the world's main source of long-term waste without needing newly-mined uranium.
I can't reply directly to people, but Derek said "a reactor in general is a terrible way to make plutonium for a bomb" and that's against my understanding. Not only is it a fine way to make plutonium for a bomb, it's by the most common way. It's uncommon for a _power plant_ reactor to be used for that, because proliferation is unpopular and dedicated reactors for weapons can be simpler. But in the 1960s/70s it wasn't unusual to build a dual-use reactor, typically after first building a reactor producing weapons-grade plutonium, e.g. Magnox after Windscale in Britain, and UNGG after EL-2 in France.
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