Most Californians now favor nuclear power - poll
Date: 24-May-01
Country: USA
Author: Vibeke Laroi
The Field Poll of 1,015 California residents found 59 percent favor building more nuclear plants, 36 percent are opposed and 5 percent are undecided.
"When Three Mile Island hit, there was a lot of public fear. California was at the forefront of anti-nuclear sentiment in the United States," Mark DiCamillo, director of the Field Poll, told Reuters.
"For this state to be shifting as it is now to be supporting nuclear power as a viable option for creating more electricity is a major, major policy shift," he said.
The 1979 Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania effectively halted the U.S. nuclear industry in its tracks. No nuclear plants have been ordered in the country since then.
California, with two nuclear plants accounting for nearly 18 percent of its energy needs, has a rocky nuclear history.
In 1989, residents of Sacramento County voted to close down a nuclear plant. The Rancho Seco plant was the first - and only - operating nuclear power station in the United States to be shut down as the result of a local referendum.
The state's two-unit, 2,200-megawatt Diablo Canyon nuclear plant had to be redesigned twice: once after an earthquake fault was discovered near the site, and later when engineers read the blueprints backward.
Since Three Mile Island, a majority of Californians have opposed building more nuclear plants, while before the accident most were in favor, according to previous Field Polls conducted by the San Francisco-based Field Institute, a nonprofit public policy research organization that was formed in the mid-1970s.
The previous Field Poll on nuclear power was done in 1984, when only 33 percent favored building more nuclear plants and 61 percent were opposed. "Nuclear power was not even on the policy table for decades so we never had any reason to measure it (since 1984)," DiCamillo said.
NUCLEAR BACK ON THE TABLE
But now nuclear power is back on the table.
Some Silicon Valley leaders have even said quietly that California should take another look at nuclear power after a 1996 flawed electric deregulation law and supply crunch has sent the state into its wort-ever energy crisis.
Californians face steep electricity bills and the potential of around 260 hours of power blackouts this summer, while the state's top utility is in bankruptcy proceedings. Residents are paying a steep price for their new-found knowledge of the importance of electricity - and not having it.
DiCamillo noted the 59 percent support finding came in the middle of California's energy crisis. "This is...a time when Californians are very concerned about energy," he said.
Mitch Singer, a spokesman for the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), an industry trade group, said the survey results are not surprising at a time when nuclear plants have improved their safety record and cut costs and are operating more efficiently and without emitting any greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
Despite the apparent change in public attitude of nuclear power, roadblocks remain, including the age-old issue of siting, especially in environmentally-conscious California.
"It would probably be more difficult to site a new nuclear plant in California than in some other states," Singer said.
"If you ever posed a question 'Do you want a nuclear power plant built in your community?', I think you'd get a resounding no, not in my backyard, but that's the situation on many issues," DiCamillo.
But the question remains moot as long as the United States does not have a permanent home for storing highly radioactive spent nuclear fuel produced by the nation's 103 nuclear reactors that account for 20 percent of the country's energy needs.
A California state law passed in 1976 prohibits the construction of any new nuclear power plant until there is a "demonstrated and approved" technology for the permanent disposal of the spent fuel from these plants, although what exactly is meant by "approved" is subject to interpretation.
