{"id":512,"date":"2012-09-07T16:37:08","date_gmt":"2012-09-07T20:37:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2012\/09\/change-the-atomic-energy-act-how-about-change-the-georgia-electric-territorial-act.html"},"modified":"2012-09-07T16:37:08","modified_gmt":"2012-09-07T20:37:08","slug":"change-the-atomic-energy-act-how-about-change-the-georgia-electric-territorial-act","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2012\/09\/change-the-atomic-energy-act-how-about-change-the-georgia-electric-territorial-act.html","title":{"rendered":"Change the Atomic Energy Act? How about change the Georgia Electric Territorial Act?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\nIn reaction to\n\nthe NRC denying a nuclear permit for Calvert Cliffs,<\/a>\n\n<\/a>\nsome nuclear backers suggest\n\nchanging the\nAtomic Energy Act of 1954 to permit majority foreign ownership\nof nuclear reactors.<\/a>\nWhat will they suggest next?\nAsking Iran to invest in U.S. nukes?\n<\/p>\n

\nSteve Skutnik wrote for http:\/\/theenergycollective.com 5 September 2012,\n\nA cost-free way to open up nuclear investment<\/a>,\n<\/p>\n

\n

\nIf this seems entirely backward in a world of global production and\ninvestment, that’s because it is. The current regulation is an\n\n<\/a>\nartifact of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, which first authorized\nprivate ownership of nuclear facilities. (Prior to this\u2014per\nthe Atomic Energy Act of 1946, all nuclear technology was considered\na state secret, during the short time in which the U.S. enjoyed a\nmonopoly on the technology.)\n<\/p>\n

\nIs there any real compelling reason for restrictions on foreign\nownership and investment in nuclear facilities to exist at a time\nwhen the U.S. holding a monopoly on the technology has long since\npassed? Issues of safety here of course are irrelevant\u2014the\nfacilities would be licensed and regulated by the NRC, just as any\nother nuclear facility is now. About the only salient objection is\nthe political one\u2014i.e., the implications of a foreign entity\nmaintaining controlling ownership in key infrastructure. (Although\nit’s hard to see anyone getting particularly upset about the\nreverse\u2014U.S. entities owning a controlling stake in\ninfrastructure in other nations.)\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\nYeah, sure, strict regulation<\/a>\nwill deal with that, just like it prevents fracking from setting\ndrinking water on fire, or BP from poisoning the Gulf.\nThe new NRC head is\n\nmaybe well-meaning<\/a>,\nbut it’s the same NRC\n\nthat gave Vogtle 1 a clean bill just before it had to shut down<\/a>\nand the same NRC that’s ignoring\n\ncancer in Shell Bluff.<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\nOh, by the way, the article gets to the main point eventually:\n<\/p>\n\n\n

\n

\nMeanwhile, an issue to consider is the fact that bringing together\n\n<\/a>\ncapital to complete a construction bid like Calvert Cliffs 3 is no\nmean feat (particularly in an economy where investors seem all too\nskittish about long-term investments in energy infrastructure).\nGiven the difficulty then, it seems positively insane for any\npolitical leadership to turn away large investments in long-term\nenergy infrastructure (especially non-emitting baseload like\nnuclear, which has a long expected operational lifetime).\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\nThat’s right, unless Calvert Cliffs gets a\n\n“great, big company” like Southern Company<\/a>\nor Duke Energy to go in, it’s dead in the water.\nMaybe there’s a lesson here about putting too many eggs in the same basket?\n\n<\/a>\nMaybe it’s a lesson about the false dependability promise of baseload\nthe same summer\n\nmillions in the U.S. had no power<\/a>\nand\n\n300 million in India had none<\/a>,\nexcept for those who already had distributed generation installed?\n<\/p>\n

\nI’ve got a better idea: how about we change the\n\n1973 Georgia Electric Territorial Act<\/a>\n\n<\/a>\nto let you and me generate distributed electricity on our rooftops and\nparking lots and sell our excess through the grid on an open market?\nUnlike centralized baseload generation, there would be much less\nchance of it all going down at once.\nThe incumbent electric utilities could take a cut for transport.\nAnd companies like\n\nGeorgia Solar Utilities (GaSU)<\/a>\ncould build big solar plants without having to kowtow to Georgia Power.\n<\/p>\n

\nAnd how’s this for a back-handed compliment:\n<\/p>\n

\n

\n\n<\/a>\n(The lawsuit, incidentally, was filed by the anti-nuclear activist\ngroup NIRS, indicating that anti-nuclear groups will not hesitate\nuse every tool at their disposal to block or shut down any nuclear\npower facility\u2014and to hell with the cost to the environment as\na result.)\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n\n<\/a>\nFunny how solar and wind cost are much cleaner environmentally,\nboth in operation and in needing no fuel.\nGo\n\nNIRS!<\/a>\nHere’s their\nfacebook page.<\/a>\n\n<\/a>\nAnd let’s not forget\n\nPublic Citizen<\/a> (\nfacebook<\/a>),\n\nBeyond Nuclear<\/a> (facebook<\/a>),\nand Southern Maryland CARES.\nCheers to the successful plaintiffs!\n<\/p>\n

\n-jsq\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In reaction to the NRC denying a nuclear permit for Calvert Cliffs, some nuclear backers suggest changing the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 to permit majority foreign ownership of nuclear reactors. What will they suggest next? Asking Iran to invest in U.S. nukes? Steve Skutnik wrote for http:\/\/theenergycollective.com 5 September 2012, A cost-free way to […]","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[97,48,40,142,14,49,16,17,8,18,2,19,20,104,21,22,23,24,36],"tags":[8736,1752,8720,8717,1751,8746,143,8704,1750,8721,8706,908,8707,8701,8708,8699,8709,8710,632,1444,8737,8711,8712,389,1753,8713,8714,108,1754,8716],"class_list":["post-512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-activism","category-code-enforcement","category-community","category-cwip","category-economy","category-elections","category-environment","category-ga-psc","category-georgia","category-georgia-power","category-government","category-history","category-law","category-nuclear","category-planning","category-politics","category-renewable-energy","category-solar","category-wind","tag-activism","tag-atomic-energy-act","tag-code-enforcement","tag-community","tag-constellation","tag-cwip","tag-duke-energy","tag-economy","tag-edf","tag-elections","tag-environment","tag-exelon","tag-ga-psc","tag-georgia","tag-georgia-power","tag-government","tag-history","tag-law","tag-maryland","tag-nirs","tag-nuclear","tag-planning","tag-politics","tag-progress-energy","tag-public-citizen","tag-renewable-energy","tag-solar","tag-southern-company","tag-southern-maryland-cares","tag-wind"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p585fK-8g","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/512\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}