Welcome to Nuclear Pledge
Nuclear Power announcement, 10 January 2007
What does it all add up to? Not much. We believe the nuclear industry won't do anything until a clear subsidy package is set out. But the statement does show at least one subsidy route the Government will use: carbon. Read more ...
Nuclear power is expensive - so expensive that it needs huge subsidies and / or price guarantees to make it viable. And who has to pay the cost? The British public and British companies. The public purse is already facing an £85 billion liability for nuclear waste costs alone from our existing nuclear power stations - the whole cost of our existing nuclear power program adds up to many hundreds of billions of pounds.
And now the Government is determined to go ahead with a whole new generation of nuclear power, even though all the benefits promised by nuclear power - greenhouse gas emissions reductions and energy security - can be achieved at far lower cost, and far lower risk, by renewable technologies such as wind and wave, and by energy conservation.
But the Government is determined not to give renewables and conservation a proper chance. Here's what Blair said in the July 2006 Energy Review:
" ... neither renewable energy nor greater energy efficiency can provide the complete solution to the shortfall we face. This will depend on securing energy supplies from abroad, in new nuclear power stations to replace those becoming obsolete and replacing older coal-fired stations with cleaner, more efficient technology."
In fact he is right in saying that "neither renewable energy nor greater energy efficiency can provide the complete solution to the shortfall we face" The complete solution is to have both at once!
"Can't pay, won't pay!"
The Nuclear Pledge is a promise:
- to resist paying any nuclear surcharge in my electricity bills to subsidise new nuclear power stations;
- if I successfuly withold the nuclear surcharge, to pay the money into a green fund, run by independent experts, which will pay for new, additional renewable electricity generation capacity, and energy conservation;
- to vote in a future General Election for a political party that promises a green electricity strategy based on renewables and conservation, and not on nuclear power;
- to take other non-violent actions of my own to oppose nuclear power and support a green energy future.
If enough people make this pledge, it will make nuclear power a nightmare for the electricity industry and the Government. They could be faced with trying to take thousands of their customers through the Court system, which is already severely overloaded. In short, it could stop the march to nuclear power in its tracks!
Read the Nuclear Pledge in full.
How will the Government do it? Read our page on Subsidising nuclear.
