Also a big problem has been the ignorance in much of mainstream media about energy issues--especially concerning nuclear power. For example, at the news conference Friday, Matthew Wald, who covers nuclear power for The New York Times, demanded most defensively of Pica how he squared eliminating "2,400 megawatts of carbon-free energy" that would be generated by the San Onofre nuclear plant. Wald either doesn't want to acknowledge or doesn't know that the "nuclear cycle"--the mining, milling, fuel enrichment and other components of nuclear power--emit greenhouse gases and contribute substantially to global warming, and thus the energy from San Onofre was never "carbon-free."
The San Onofre plant, built along an earthquake fault, has been an obvious threat to anyone traveling along Interstate 5, the major highway linking San Diego and Los Angeles. Its twin domes sit right next to Interstate 5.
"We are now left with one of the largest, most concentrated nuclear waste piles on the planet," said Ace Hoffman of Carlsbad, California, who has written extensively about the serious safety problems at San Onofre. "This will be an eternal problem, but thankfully it is no longer a growing problem"It will take millions of years--not just days--to be safe, but at least we are headed in the right direction." As to the employees of San Onofre, said Hoffman Friday: "I hope they all will find jobs in the solar and wind technology energy sectors."
Two nuclear reactors amid millions of people will now be shut down permanently. The electricity they would have generated can be replaced, said utility veteran Freeman, an engineer, through energy efficiency and with solar and wind power made available on-demand with a variety of energy storage systems.
And, as Damon Moglen, climate and energy director of Friends of the Earth, said at the conference, with San Onofre's closing "we will see California move even more decisively" on renewable energy and become "one of the largest non-nuclear economies on our planet ."
That's a big step in the vision of a nuclear power-free world using energy that people can live with--safe, clean renewable energy.
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