Pandora's Promise

I saw a showing of this film at MIT, paired with a discussion by the director, Shellenberger, and a nuclear scientist. The audience was probably an unusual crowd, and they laughed at parts that other folks likely won't.

One of the researchers at MIT pointed out that most of this information is not new to anyone--that the facts and issues are really the same as scientists have known. But there was great appreciation that someone has chosen to try to tell the story to the general public. And to accomplish this in part with interviews from folks who had been opposed to nuclear power, and who consider themselves to be environmentalists, was effective and interesting.

It was also helpful to have the historical context--how the fear of weapons became entirely tangled in the idea of the technology for non-military uses. But it also laid out the facts about how our craving for power has led us to burning fossil fuels that have harmed far more people than nuclear power ever has. And how France's reliance on nuclear means their carbon footprint is dramatically lower than that of the Germans, who think they are more environmentally friendly.

It could open some minds. It could start some conversations. It's worth your time if you care about the atmosphere.

This film interviews several environmentalists and peace campaigners who have changed their mind on nuclear, and explores the reasons why they have changed their mind from "anti" to "pro". The film doesn't gloss over the disasters at Chernobyl and Fukushima; some of the speakers visit these locations in person and acknowledge their unease in a thoughtful way, but they also press on and discuss quantitatively whether people have been poorly informed about the actual dangers. The film is a myth-buster, which gives the open-minded viewer the chance to compare polemics with facts that the viewer can verify. The film makers take a radiation dose meter around the world, showing on screen the readings in capital cities, inside a nuclear power station, in aeroplanes, on a beach in Brazil (to which people flock for its natural radiation), near Fukushima, and near Chernobyl. Viewers who like me love numbers are advised to take a sheet of paper and pen to note down the readings at the beach, near Fukushima, and near Chernobyl. No doubt the main response to this film will be a brawl between "pro" and "anti" people, most of whom have not seen the film. They all need to calm down and watch this film.

Some people compare this film with An Inconvenient Truth. I think Pandora's Promise is a better documentary.

Contrary to what other reviewers say, it is not "propaganda by the nuclear industry" - only a couple of the people involved in the film were ever employed by the nuclear industry; most of the people interviewed are genuinely independent thinkers, mainly environmentalists, with no hidden agenda, who have taken the trouble to look at facts and data, and who have been willing to imagine that their opinions might be wrong. This is a trait to be admired.

See the film, study the facts, then decide. (And, incidentally, I should say the film's photography is great!)

As an Environmentalist, and someone who cares deeply about the fate of the planet, Pandora's Promise was a refreshing look at the reality of Nuclear Energy.

As a society, we face some tough choices. The traditional environmental movement opposes Nuclear Energy, instead favouring Solar, Wind and other renewables. Unfortunately they cost considerably more than burning fossil fuels, and no amount of technological advancement will change this - it's just way too cheap to dig up coal and chuck it in a furnace. And that's exactly what's happening the world over.

Over 1000 new coal plants are planned worldwide(1). Coal is a killer. Coal plants pump out far more radiation than nuclear power plants, due to the radioactive elements present in coal, which are released into the atmosphere by the burning. Particulates alone are responsible for over 13,000 deaths *per year* in the United States(2), and some estimates say over 100,000 deaths per year in China. This doesn't include coal mining accidents. Even the best coal mines in the US kill over 30 people per year(3). Coal mining killed over 6000 people in China alone in 2004 (3).

Coal is a *killer*. We need to stop burning it. It has killed far more people than nuclear power ever has, and this is something that a lot of people in Environmentalist movement just simply ignore.

Many Environmentalists claim to believe in science - certainly when conservatives deny climate change, environmentalists point to the science. Yet they bury their heads when it comes to Nuclear.

Nuclear Energy has killed *zero* people in the United States (4). There were no deaths after the accident at Three Mile Island, and zero deaths as a result of Fukushima (4). Chernobyl was a catastrophic accident and indeed did lead to many deaths, 56 (4) direct deaths and potentially as many as 4000 premature deaths due to cancer (4), but these figures pale into significance next to the figures on coal.

So how can the environmental movement be so opposed to nuclear? It just does not make sense.

I am in favour of Wind and Solar power, but the wind and the Sun don't provide power 24 hours a day. There are no economic storage methods. We need base load power. We need cheap energy.

So what can provide CO2 free, safe and cheap energy? Nuclear power can. It's a perfect ally of renewable power. Nuclear energy is a natural phenomena, it is responsible for 50% of the heat at the Earths core, without which the planet would be as dead as Mars - without a molten core, solar winds would strip the earth of it's protective outer layer.

Existing Nuclear has many problems, but these are solvable. Unfortunately in the 50s and 60s the world settled on Light Water Reactors. These use Water as a coolant. Because water boils at 100^C, too low a temperature for efficient power production, reactors have to keep the water under pressure to get temperatures high, effectively creating pressure cookers kept at 300 atmospheres. This leads to high cost, and any fault results in steam escaping. In Fukishima, when it lost coolant, the high temperatures disassociated the hydrogen and the oxygen, creating an explosive gas mixture at the top of the building which is what exploded, spreading radiation particles from the reactor core. It just does not make sense to use Water as a coolant.

Nor does it make sense to use solid fuels. All existing reactors use solid fuel, which results in incomplete burn up, approximately 1% of the fuel is used. This produces a large amount of spent fuel, which must either be reprocessed, or stored as waste.

There are solutions. In the 60s, at Oak Ridge National Laboratories, a radically different design was developed, called the Molten Salt reactor. Unfortunately Pandora's Promise didn't cover this at all, but this design solves almost all the problems with existing nuclear power.

In a Molten Salt reactor(6), rather than having solid fuel rods with high pressure water in a pressurised reactor container, you instead dissolve the nuclear fuel in a salt. Thanks to the salt being a liquid, the fuel circulates, allowing 99% of the fuel to be burned, producing just 1% of the waste of existing reactors. Because the salt is already molten, you can't suffer a "meltdown". If the reaction starts to go too fast and get too hot, the salts expand and the reaction slows down - it's inherently self regulating. A failsafe is to have a passively cooled drain tank attached to the reactor - a fan blows over the pipe between the reactor and the drain tank, freezing some of the salt in the tube. If the building loses all power, the fan stops, the plug melts, and the fuel drains into the tank. What's more, reactors of this type can be used to burn existing spent nuclear fuel.

So with an MSR, you have completely safe nuclear energy, vastly reduced waste, with a vastly simpler design. MSRs can also use Thorium as a fuel instead of Uranium, an element as abundant as Lead that's safe to hold in your hand and is produced as byproduct of mining, making it free - people will pay you to take it away.

I'd highly recommend people who care about the environment watch this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9M__yYbsZ4

Not all nuclear power plants are equal. Nuclear Power is as far as I'm concerned, humanity's last hope to avoid catastrophic runaway climate change, and I'm desperately fearful that we won't embrace it. If we don't embrace it, the planet is doomed.

References:

1: http://goo.gl/DIksK

2: http://goo.gl/0g8kF

3: http://goo.gl/DOXyb

4: http://goo.gl/B17dt

5: http://goo.gl/i8Qc1

6: http://goo.gl/1LxQs

Stone's earliest documentary used declassified footage acquired through the Freedom of Information Act to tell the story of the Bikini islanders and American servicemen affected by nuclear weapons testing. Pandora's Promise shows he remains a dedicated researcher twenty five years later.

With captivating images of energy production from all over the world, Stone explores the contradictions of science and ideology related to climate change, urbanization, and nuclear power. The personal narratives of the people featured in the film provide an unapologetic point of view on disruption in the historic environmental narrative. Beautifully shot, enjoyable to watch, the film's highlighting of counter intuitive information will present inconvenient truths that inspire conversation after the credits roll.

Should awaken folks like my fellow Sierra Club members, NRDC & Greenpeace contributers, etc. to the folly of their organizations' uninformed, anti-nuclear stances.

The myths around radiation from nuclear plants are exposed clearly, as is the extreme variation in normal (background) radiation around the world, up in the air, etc. The director is innovative in how these facts are exposed to the viewer.

The movie also does an excellent job of deflating myths and downright lies about Chernobyl's effects, and the exploitation of that event by irresponsible people like Helen Caldicott who choose to spread fear and sell books rather than discuss the facts. The movie shows Ukrainians who never left their homes & church in the exclusion zone. To complement this, www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1Z5__IkaCs -- Chernobyl's radioactive wolves is an excellent documentary.