(February 12, 1993) From 1950 through 1990, US tax-payers, consumers and investors spent an estimated US$492 billion to develop and obtain nuclear power. Four-fifths of that, $396 billion, was spent by utilities, and most of it was passed on to, and paid by, utility customers n except for a small portion of cancelled plant costs and construction cost overruns which was absorbed by utility investors.
(386.3779) WISE-Amsterdam The remaining 20%, $96 billion, was spent by the US government, and thus paid for by taxpayers. These are the findings of a new report recently released by Greenpeace, in conjunction with Komanoff Energy Associates (KEA). The report, "Fiscal Fission: The Economic Failure of Nuclear Power", was co-authored by Charles Komanoff and Cora Roelofs, leading energy-costing experts.
"Fiscal Fission is the first full-scale compilation of taxpayer subsidies and utility investments in commercial reactor technology," said Peter Grin-spoon, director of Greenpeace's Nuclear Power Campaign. "Taxpayers and ratepayers have pumped at least half-a-trillion dollars into commercial atomic power since 1950 in exchange for a declining 8% of our national energy supply."
Says Roelofs, "The cost estimates in the report are very conservative. They take only those costs that could be fully documented and rigorously quantified. It shows that atomic-generated electricity has cost consumers an average of at least 9.0 cents a kilo-watt-hour, far more than other readily available fuels." It also shows that without even counting liabilities such as accidents and waste, or including related health costs, nuclear power has failed on economic grounds.
Komanoff and Roelofs based their work on the massive database built up by KEA over nearly two decades of studying the US nuclear power industry and serving as a prime source of information on electrical generating costs. Komanoff has published three books and numerous articles in technical journals on the economic and environmental impacts of energy supply and demand. In 1980, then- Governor Bill Clinton cited Komanoff as "a leading nuclear power economist... [who] dispelled the notion of 'cheap' nuclear power."
Komanoff's and Roelofs' report finds that the $492 billion total they cite represents a minimum figure for resources spent on nuclear power through 1990. Excluded costs could well total another $375 billion dollars in categories such as health effects of radiation, accidents, artificially low insurance costs and support for foreign rector development - even with-out counting the almost certain escalation in future waste and decommissioning costs.
The report further finds that during 1968-1990 alone, $160 billion more was spent on nuclear electric generation than would have been spent generating the same electricity with fossil fuels.
Contact: Copies of the full report and /or an executive summary are available from the Greenpeace US office, 1436 U St., NW, Washington, DC 20009, USA, tel: +1-202-462-1177
or Greenpeace International, Nuclear Campaign, Greenpeace House, Canonbury Villas, London N1 2PN, UK, tel: +44-71-354-5100.
For information regarding the substance of the report,
contact: Komanoff Energy Associates, 270 Lafayette, Suite 400, New York, NY 10012, USA, tel:+1-212-334-9767.