In a special blog post on The Energy Collective earlier last week, Tennessee Senator Lemar Alexander reflected on the environmental concerns discussed during the first Earth Day 40 years ago.

Pointing out that initial focus was on the state of the planet and various kinds of pollution, he recalls how during “the first Earth Day and that is that, at the time, the Sierra Club and other environmental organizations were supporting nuclear power.  In fact, nuclear energy was regarded as a savior to our environmental dilemmas.  It cleaned the air of pollution and didn’t take up a great deal of space.”

Alexander explains why anyone would consider nuclear energy as a green energy source:

“The main thing is its tremendous energy density.  The Nature Conservancy took note of this last August in their paper on “Energy Sprawl.”  The authors looked at the amount of space required to produce energy from the various technologies – something no one had ever done before.   They came up with some remarkable findings. 

Nuclear turns out to be the gold standard.  You can produce a million megawatt-hours of electricity a year – that’s the standard they chose – from a nuclear reactor sitting on one square mile.  That’s enough electricity to power 90,000 homes.”

A post from Senator Kerry in the Earth Day spirit could also be found on the Energy Collective calling for Americans “to force Congress to pass climate and energy legislation, the comprehensive stuff not the weak tea…

And here’s what I’m saying and what we need you to demand: this is the way to transform our energy economy – put Americans back in control of our energy production – instead of sending so much of our money to oil-rich regimes around the world (yes, $100 million every day to Iran!)  – and creates millions – millions – of the clean energy jobs that can power our economy in the next century.”

Both of these posts have one clear message: clean energy solutions, including both nuclear energy and renewables, are a must for America.

Thanks to everyone who signed up for the Energizing Earth Day initiative. This included well over 200 individuals and organizations that have pledged their support for clean energy, including nuclear energy and renewables, as a way to protect our environment and our planet.

Even through Earth Day 2010 has come and gone; there is still time to sign up. We will keep the site live for a little while longer so a few more can sign up. Also, please remember the Climate Rally will be held on the National Mall on April 25, where people can express their support for more clean energy as a way to control greenhouse gases.

Also a special thanks to artist Suzanne Hobbs of PopAtomic Studios who supplied the dedicated art for Energizing Earth Day and to author and environmentalist Gwyneth Cravens who wrote a series of special blog posts for our Earth Day coverage at the AREVA North America Blog.

We also would like to thank the following organizations for their support:

• ADAGE
• Constellation Energy
• Dewey Square Group
• Duke Energy
• EDF Inc.
• Energy Northwest
• Grow Idaho Falls
• Idaho Falls Power
• Idaho National Laboratory
• Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding
• Nuclear Energy Institute
• Pew Center on Global Climate Change
• UniStar Nuclear Energy

Best regards,

Jarret Adams

by Gwyneth Cravens
CravensPowertoSavetheWorld.com

As I looked out the window, and I saw the sun coming up and the curvature of the Earth, I thought, “Wow. The Earth is round.” But when I saw it with my own eyes, it meant something different to me. And looking at the Earth’s atmosphere and seeing how thin it is, you realize the Earth is a very fragile planet.
—Eileen Collins, space-shuttle commander

In a microcosm, Earth Day, 1970, had the effect of creating a community out of a New York City block full of isolated strangers. All over the country similar small miracles occurred. What had been an ignored commons was transformed and so, for a time, were we. Now it’s more evident than ever that what happens to the atmosphere or the ice caps and glaciers on one part of the globe becomes everyone’s problem. The increasing droughts in some areas due to temperature rise are putting dust in the lungs of children thousands of miles away. China’s smog drifts to California. We can’t survive as isolated, self-regarding entities. We’re linked to the destiny of all humans and the destiny of the earth, as Stewart Brand foresaw when he searched for a visual way to express that truth. Our personal destinies, and the destinies of our children, grandchildren, and remote descendants are intimately linked to choices we make today.

The environmental movement, misinformed, with good but terribly misguided intentions, scared the public about nuclear power. Nuclear plants that had been planned were not built. Others were shut down. My fellow protestors and I wanted the Shoreham nuclear plant closed, and it was. (As a result, almost all of Long Island’s electricity now comes from fossil fuels—mostly dirty, deadly diesel.) But anti-nuclear activists did not cause the hiatus. Problems abounded in the fledgling nuclear industry – cost overruns, increasingly longer construction times, lack of experience with the new technology among private-utility operators, and in some instances a lack of a safety culture. For all these reasons, we kept burning more coal and gas when a far better option, if wisely employed, was available. And in fact many American nuclear plants have been run very well, quietly and efficiently providing cheap electricity that otherwise would have come from burning coal.

When I began my nuclear journey I didn’t know about base-load electricity—the steady flow that reliably meets the minimum demand at all times. I thought we could get all the power we needed from wind, sunlight, conservation and efficiency. These all are useful, but the fact is that base-load comes from only a few sources: fossil fuel combustion (about 75%), hydroelectric dams (about 6%), and nuclear power (20%). Of these, nuclear power is the only clean, readily expandable resource and has the smallest environmental footprint. To reduce carbon emissions, fossil fuel plants must be replaced whenever possible with nuclear plants. We’re accustomed to thinking of them as gigantic, but in fact reactors actually come in a variety of sizes and can be adapted to a variety of needs. (The Nuclear Navy has demonstrated the flexibility of reactors. After the earthquake in Haiti, a nuclear aircraft carrier, the U.S.S. Carl Vinson, came to the rescue. Process heat from the ship’s reactor enabled the desalination of 400,000 gallons of seawater a day to keep people alive.)

Climate scientists use probabilistic risk assessment methodology to analyze climate change. Reactor scientists use the same methodology to determine reactor and fuel-cycle safety. So why do some people in the technical community remain skeptical of climate-change science, which is derived from a vast body of data and which is supported by nearly 100% of climatologists? And why do those in the environmental community who are convinced of climate change because of the science want to limit or obliterate nuclear power? There are good reasons that high-profile climatologists like James Hansen campaign for more nuclear plants.

No matter what our opinions, we all are participating in the huge release of carbon into the atmosphere with every keystroke, every flip of the switch in our households, every purchase of a doodad from China. Ocean acidification, destroyer of oxygen-producing marine life, and the rapid rise in the average global temperature will not wait while we argue about which side is right. It’s time to drop all that and become more conscious of our shared destiny.

We need to listen to one another. I look forward to a time when nuclear engineers routinely participate in Earth Day and understand that they in fact comprise the leading edge of the environmental movement. Because of my own experience about prejudices I harbored because of wrong information, I’d like to see every anti-nuclear activist tour a nuclear plant and learn about the extraordinary scientific, humanitarian, earth-friendly feat occurring within its sturdy walls. I encourage people on both sides of the debate to examine their biases and to help others make the transition from myth to science-based fact.

The power to save the world does not like in rocks, rivers, wind, or sunshine. It lies in each of us.

Gwyneth Cravens is the author of Power to Save the World: The Truth About Nuclear Energy and has written articles on science and other topics for The New Yorker, Harper’s, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and other publications.

by Gwyneth Cravens
CravensPowertoSavetheWorld.com

Yesterday I mentioned some beliefs I once held:

• Manmade radiation is far more dangerous than natural radiation—cosmic radiation, for instance.
• Even a tiny speck of manmade radioactive material can kill you.
• Radiation from a nuclear plant can travel hundreds of miles and kill you.
• Nuclear plants are just ticking atomic time bombs. Without warning they can explode and kill millions and cause cancer, and mutations. The Chernobyl accident killed tens of thousands of people.
• Nuclear plants could easily be taken over by a few gunmen and the fuel in the reactor stolen and turned into an atomic bomb.
• The people who work in the nuclear field are indifferent to humanity and to the environment.
• A coal-fired plant is safer than a nuclear plant any day.
• Nobody knows what to do with nuclear waste. Mountains of it are piling up everywhere. It lasts forever and will turn huge tracts into radioactive wastelands.

This list of problems seemed to me a deal-breaker for nuclear power as an environmental savior. (I believed the information to be true because it had been told to me repeatedly by organizations responsible for good works, like saving whales and cleaning up birds caught in oil slicks.) And was Rip Anderson-the scientist who told me that if we were going to protect humanity and ecosystems from devastation we needed nuclear power–aware of its dangers? I knew nothing of his day job, which turned out to be leading the team that got the country’s first permanent, deep-geologic, nuclear waste repository, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, certified by the EPA and opened. I soon discovered that he was an expert in probabilistic risk assessment. He listened patiently to my concerns, and carefully explained that they lacked scientific basis. He introduced me to his colleagues—experts in physics, engineering, radiation biology, microbiology, radiology, epidemiology, geology, risk perception, and other endeavors—and he suggested I see for myself what went on in the nuclear world. That’s how the Nuclear America Tour began.
read more…

We’ve long been a fan of the art shop PopAtomic Studios and their work.

When we began the project for Energizing Earthday, they jumped to mind as a key partner for the new branding. For readers unfamiliar with them, PopAtomic Studios is a design shop based in NC, lead by Suzanne Hobbs. She describes the mission for the studio:

“After many years of dinner table conversations with Dad and his Nuke friends about the need to improve public perceptions of Nuclear Energy, in December of 2008 I decided to take matters into my own hands. As a formally trained sculptor and public artist, I have been lucky to work for some of the most respected artists in my field including Nina Hole and Mel Chin. I have learned the the subtle ways that art influences our daily lives and I realized that I could use my knowledge to show, rather than tell the world the truth about nuclear energy. My intention is to show that nuclear is the safest, most reliable energy source available as well as the best solution to Climate Change, through the creation of thought provoking icons and site specific public artwork. After all, you can’t have a Nuclear Renaissance without Art!”

For the specific Earth Hour branding, the design process began this way:

“For the logo I used existing, instantly recognizable icons, but I put them into a new context. I use these sorts of icons because they transcend the language and generation gaps that sometimes hinder communication. Pairing a lightbulb (bright ideas, energy, electricity) and earth (connectedness, foresight, responsibility), which tend have positive meanings with a cooling tower (not as clear on meaning, positive for some, scary for others) begs the questions ‘what is the relationship between these images?’ and ‘Is nuclear energy in fact a positive solution to the energy problems facing our planet?’”

And the creation of the brand was very physical and non-digital, using real tactile materials to bring iconic elements together:

“I cut everything out of paper and carefully put the pieces together, often scanning different arrangements until I am satisfied. Color is very important in communicating through images, so I tend to use bright inviting colors that I can tweak on the computer using virtual color mixing. Sometimes this process leads to funky shadows and color variations that I feel add to the finished product, making it stand out as an individual artwork rather than just another logo.”

Suzannne describes her plans going forward:

“Eventually I plan to open a collective studio space and educational resource center focused on providing simple, accurate information about energy for kids and adults alike. We also plan to offer fun artwork ranging form t-shirts to jewelry to cooling tower shaped coffee mugs, so we can all proudly show our support of nuclear energy in our daily lives. You can check out what we’ve created so far at PopAtomic.org.”

Here is a snippet from this article on Earth Day, written by Robert Keane, collumnist for Investment Advisor Magazine:

The Green Advisor: Earth Day Revisited

“April 2010 will mark the 40th anniversary of the first Earth Day….
…As has often been stated in this column, one of the biggest challenges facing the global economy is finding sustainable and affordable sources of energy. The problem of meeting the planet’s energy needs is inseparable from the problems facing the environment. Even those who pooh-pooh the idea of climate change caused to some degree by man-made carbon emissions can get behind the idea of cheap and clean energy. Some of that will likely come from further development of wind and solar power, but there are also tremendous opportunities afforded by applying new thinking and new technologies to energy sources we already have.

Yes Nukes
There’s no doubt that as a society we face challenges, some of which seem insurmountable, but the optimist in me says the same has been true in every age and some of my recent reading gives me cause for some optimism about our energy future. Let’s start with nuclear power, which is finding a renewed acceptance in the U.S.

In February the Obama Administration announced $8.3 billion in loan guarantees to build two new nuclear reactors in Georgia. The 2011 Obama budget would triple—to $54.5 billion—the amount available for loan guarantees for nuclear construction. In announcing the loans, President Obama noted that the new reactors would reduce carbon pollution by 16 million tons a year, compared with a similar coal-powered plant.

The biggest problem with nuclear power has always been the radioactive waste it produces. New technology has been developed for nuclear waste recycling in France (which never abandoned its nuclear programs and generates more than 75% of its electricity from nuclear power) reportedly offering the potential for getting more energy out of the same nuclear material, thereby producing less waste…”

Gwyneth Cravens
CravensPowertoSavetheWorld.com

The first Earth Day was proclaimed in 1970, and where I was living, in New York City on the Upper West Side, it was the first warm, sunny day in weeks. My neighbors and I and our children rather spontaneously crept out of our brownstone apartments, actually exchanged pleasantries, and swept the sidewalks and picked up litter. We felt better about ourselves and our neighborhood—and about the earth. Something momentous was occurring that fit right in with the optimistic social revolution that was underway. I’d read in the Village Voice about ecologist Stewart Brand’s insistent question: “Why haven’t we seen a picture of the whole earth?” Thanks to his campaign and his inspirational writings, we now have that beautiful icon to remind us to think globally while acting locally.
​

I was thus motivated to adopt practices that benefitted the environment. For example, when I moved out of the city I started an organic garden and a compost heap. I recycled. I protested the opening of the Shoreham nuclear plant in Long Island. I sent donations to Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth.

Fast forward to the late 1990s, and an encounter with a scientist, Dr. D. (Rip) Richard Anderson, who patiently led me to understand that it was only by looking at the whole picture regarding energy and the environment that we could begin to understand what’s at stake and what actions are needed to protect the only home in the universe that we have. Rip is an oceanographer, a chemist, and an expert in probabilistic risk assessment who has led several big projects for Sandia National Laboratories, and he’s also an organic gardener, a beekeeper, and an environmental activist alongside his wife, Marcia Fernández. They campaign on behalf of clean air, clean water, and open land in New Mexico, where they reside. Rip began to explain to me the alarming consequences of the human race’s transfer of vast quantities of carbon from underground into the atmosphere. Drawing on a paper napkin, he connected accelerated global warming and ocean acidification, which he considers the greater threat, to the choices we’ve made about the energy we use to run our world civilization.

“What should we do?” I asked. “Keep extracting oil and gas and coal and burning them until the planet becomes a living hell? Build a lot of wind turbines and solar arrays?”

“As soon as people’s beer gets warm,” he replied, “I expect they’ll choose nuclear power.”

I tried to mask my surprise and annoyance. No way could nuclear power be good for the environment. Having grown up during the cold war in New Mexico, where bomb scientists and engineers worked around the clock to win the arms race, I’d developed an aversion to anything nuclear and while in college there and in grad school in New York had participated in ban-the-bomb and Mothers for Peace events.

Here’s what my environmentally inclined, anti-nuclear, us-versus-them friends and I thought we knew about nuclear energy:

• Manmade radiation is far more dangerous than natural radiation—cosmic radiation, for instance.
• Even a tiny speck of manmade radioactive material can kill you.
• Radiation from a nuclear plant can travel hundreds of miles and kill you.
• Nuclear plants are just ticking atomic time bombs. Without warning they can explode and kill millions and cause cancer, and mutations. The Chernobyl accident killed tens of thousands of people.
• Nuclear plants could easily be taken over by a few gunmen and the fuel in the reactor stolen and turned into an atomic bomb.
• The people who work in the nuclear field are indifferent to humanity and to the environment.
• A coal-fired plant is safer than a nuclear plant any day.
• Nobody knows what to do with nuclear waste. Mountains of it are piling up everywhere. It lasts forever and will turn huge tracts into radioactive wastelands.

To be continued . . . .

Gwyneth Cravens is the author of “Power to Save the World: The Truth About Nuclear Energy” and has written articles on science and other topics for The New Yorker, Harper’s, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and other publications.

Columnist John Tierney of the New York Times offers some valuable insights on how to be green and a shade blue as Earth Day approaches. He asks:

On the 40th anniversary of Earth Day, is the middle-aged green movement ready to be revived by some iconoclastic young Turqs?

The term Turqs, as in turquoise, to describe people who are both green and an open-minded type of blue – a term coined by environmentalist Stewart Brand, author of “Whole Earth Discipline.” An interesting facet of this piece is Tierney’s take on nuclear energy’s role:

Mr. Brand has also renounced his opposition to nuclear power and now promotes it as green energy because of its low-carbon emissions and its small footprint on the landscape. He wants to see the development of small modular reactors, and he quotes a warning from the climate scientist James Hansen, “One of the greatest dangers the world faces is the possibility that a vocal minority of antinuclear activists could prevent phase-out of coal emissions.”

Over the last 40 years, Stewart Brand has emerged as one of the leading environmental voices and one who now strongly supports the use of nuclear and other clean energy sources as a method of combating greenhouse gases effect on global warming.

In 1960′s he founded, edited and wrote for the “Whole Earth Catalog” which was deeply influential in the US environmental movement. In 1966, he asked himself a basic question, which was how can we begin to see the earth as it is, as a finite resource?

“I herded my trembling thoughts together as the winds blew and time passed. And I figured a photograph—a color photograph—would help make that happen. There it would be for all to see, the earth complete, tiny, adrift, and no one would ever perceive things the same way. But how to accomplish this?”

He then began pushing an effort to press that the NASA help us produce that first image of the full, whole planet Earth seen from a distance, an image that up until then had never been taken.

Brand writes:

“It is no accident of history that the first Earth Day, in April 1970, came so soon after color photographs of the whole earth from space were made by homesick astronauts on the Apollo 8 mission to the moon in December 1968. Those riveting Earth photos reframed everything. For the first time humanity saw itself from outside. The visible features from space were living blue ocean, living green–brown continents, dazzling polar ice and a busy atmosphere, all set like a delicate jewel in vast immensities of hard–vacuum space. Humanity’s habitat looked tiny, fragile and rare. Suddenly humans had a planet to tend to. The photograph of the whole earth from space helped to generate a lot of behavior—the ecology movement, the sense of global politics, the rise of the global economy, and so on. I think all of those phenomena were, in some sense, given permission to occur by the photograph of the earth from space.”

From the State Department yesterday:

“Forty years ago, Earth Day began in the United States as a “teach-in” – a day to educate people about the environmental challenges facing our planet. Today, we know more than ever about the challenges of preserving our environment – from clean water to climate change – and Earth Day has evolved into a call for sustainable solutions and local action all over the world….

Today, environmental awareness and activism are on the rise across the world – proof that Earth Day’s teachings have begun to change all of us, and change the environment we share. We have come a long way these last 40 years, but we have so much more to do. And we need your help to do it.

So Happy Earth Day. Let’s make our country and our world as green as possible in the years ahead.”