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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With that in mind, your next question is:
I do want peace, non-violence and prosperity―intensely. But I rarely say "believe in". Is "believing in" different from wanting? If an evil emperor forces me into a fight to the death, I still want peace, but that's separate from whether I defend myself once in the arena. I may let myself be killed, but not because I "believe in peace". A virtue ethicist may say "we must dismantle our nuclear weapons, for it is virtuous. Yes, credible reports found that the dictator next door plans to nuke us afterward, but it's morally irrelevant." A consequentialist says "the consequences of nuclear weapon use would be catastrophic, so we should work extremely hard to avoid it. Disgusting though it is, dismantling our weapons NOW will not prevent nuclear attack, so we must not YET." (I think the most common moral system is "whatever I feel like": if you "feel" something is wrong, it is; if you feel it's right, it is. This one tends to cause interpersonal conflicts so I recommend against.)
Why do I push it strongly? Partly it's because the global warming issue is very important, and partly it's more personal: no party really represents me. The Liberals and Conservatives don't, because they are wrong on so many issues. But with a few tweaks, I suspect the Green party could.
The most important tweak would not be nuclear power, but respect for evidence, which is often ambiguous. By analogy: I mentioned I support Ukraine, but I can't count how many times pro-Ukraine people ticked me off by jumping to conclusions or saying untrue things that they wholeheartedly believed. I oppose such behavior, not because they are enemies but because they are allies. Such behavior can cause bad consequences. Do you think when a pro-nuclear guy pointed me to 4 studies on pro-nuclear site x-lnt.org, I just believed them? Not at all; they seem like cranks. Did I jump to the conclusion they're cranks? No, I found the papers. Did x-lnt link to them? No, I had to look them up. I'm not asking others do such work; rather I'd ask that the party SURVEY experts, and disavow cherry-picking them.
Airplanes were dangerous in the 1960s; now they'e thousands of times safer than driving. That's a utilitarian outcome: investigators worked tirelessly to understand what caused every single accident, then found ways to increase safety _without_ making airplanes too expensive.
A utilitarian would be appalled if airplanes had a perfect safety record, but deaths on highways skyrocketed because only the wealthiest could afford to fly. That wouldn't be a moral victory but a moral failure. My support for nuclear energy follows similar logic.
[1] https://dpiepgrass.medium.com/the-universal-morality-15c2a2fbe558
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