The following article, written by Dr. Michael Ivanco, was published in the Hamilton Spectator’s Points of View page on Friday, March 9, 2007. The article was written in response to a series of articles and letters recently published in the Spectator regarding the nuclear power debate.

The debate over nuclear power is so polarizing that it is little wonder that people who are not experts in the energy industry do not know whom to believe. I'm writing about the articles recently on the nuclear power debate.

As another scientist (I feel like I need to apologize for that) who knows a lot about the industry, I recognize that there are grey areas in this debate. However, it is frustrating to see some statements made that are absolutely not true, yet portrayed as fact.

An example of a frequent one that was repeated in the opinion piece by Janet Fraser -- and I'm not blaming her because she heard David Suzuki say that same thing -- is that nuclear power is expensive. This is simply untrue.

Ontario's experience notwithstanding, there is nothing inherently expensive about it. For example, countries in Europe that have very high concentrations of nuclear power generation, France (80 per cent) and Sweden (50 per cent), have among the lowest electricity rates (residential and industrial) on the continent.

While there were cost overruns in Ontario nuclear projects, the six most recent Canadian nuclear projects, carried out overseas subsequent to Darlington, were delivered on budget and on time. Yet, even with the cost overruns on the Ontario projects, the most expensive electricity in Ontario is that produced by natural gas and wind power. These are facts that you will not read about on the websites of groups that oppose nuclear energy, but they are the facts and can be found on websites that don't care one way or another about the subject.

There is no reason to doubt that David Suzuki's opposition to nuclear power is genuine and for the best of reasons. However, he does not have a monopoly on wisdom. The Society of Energy Professionals, a 7,000 strong group of engineers and scientists who work in the electricity sector in Ontario, of which I am a member, advocate aggressive conservation measures, expansion of wind power and other renewables and the use of biofuels to offset the carbon footprint of fossil-fired generation.

In short, this is much the same path advocated by the Suzuki Foundation, Greenpeace and others. However, our group also advocates a reliance on nuclear for baseload power generation in Ontario. It is the only economical, low-carbon footprint generation source available for baseload power generation.

If you don't trust those who work in the electricity industry in Ontario, consider that there are other icons of the worldwide environmental movement such as Dr. James Lovelock (father of the Gaia hypothesis) and Stewart Brand (founder of the Whole Earth Catalogue) who have the exact opposite views on nuclear power that David Suzuki has. Lovelock is credited with changing the opinion of Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace, on the subject. They do not work for the nuclear industry and have nothing to gain from supporting the technology. In their view expanding the use of nuclear power is the only way to make a significant dent in greenhouse gas emissions without destroying the world economy.

They see the opposition of other environmentalists to nuclear power as one of the biggest obstacles to solving the global warming problem, since they are proposing unrealistic solutions to real problems. They believe that opposing the most significant low-carbon electricity generation technology available is irrational if you believe that greenhouse gas emissions are the greatest threat to our species; akin to a drowning person refusing a rescue boat because they are afraid that it might spring a leak.

You do not have to be against nuclear power to be an environmentalist. I, too, am concerned about climate change, have children whose future I would like to safeguard and live downwind of Nanticoke, yet I have no concerns about it being potentially converted to a nuclear power plant. If it were, it would eliminate about 20 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions a year, equivalent to taking about four million cars off of the road in Ontario; just about all of them in other words.

There is nothing else that I have seen proposed that would come anywhere close to making that kind of difference.