Tierney wonders why so many greens refuse to even consider nuclear energy.

Which energy path, hard or soft, should we take? That was the question I put to Lab readers, and I liked a lot of the answers better than what either presidential candidate offered in last night’s debate. While John McCain stressed the hard path of nuclear power and Barack Obama stressed the soft path of renewable energy, they both operated from the same assumption: it was their duty to chart the nation’s energy future.

I prefer the answer offered in a comment by Lee Schipper of the International Energy Agency. Instead of choosing either path, he suggested, impose a tax on carbon emissions, remove subsidies and then see whether utilities build nuclear reactors or wind farms or solar arrays.

That answer is taboo in presidential politics, partly because it would force candidates to admit that they can’t really see the future of energy technology, and partly because any talk of ending subsidies would be anathema to industries along both paths. The nuclear and renewable energy industries both depend so heavily on such a complex array of subsidies that it’s hard know which ones could survive on their own.

It’s possible, as Amory Lovins argued in his comment, that new nuclear power plants would turn out to more expensive than relying on conservation or renewable energy. His skepticism about nuclear power is shared by Jerry Taylor, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute, who is one of my favorite experts because he’s agnostic when it comes to choosing energy paths — he criticizes subsidies to both nuclear power and renewable energy. When I asked him about Mr. McCain’s nuclear plans, he told me in an email:

The nuclear energy industry says that without a 100% federal guarantee to Wall Street (or whatever we’re supposed to call it now) that all loans will be paid off by the taxpayer if necessary, utilities will not be able to get loans to build new nuclear power plants. McCain wants to build, what, 45 new plants by 2030? 45 x $6 billion (the low end cost of a new plant) = $270 billion. So old Mr. Fiscally Responsible “You Will Know Their Names” is putting the taxpayer on quite an economic hook. If those loans go belly-up, kiss that money goodbye.

At the same time, Mr. Taylor is skeptical of the soft path offers and points to evidence that energy conservation often isn’t cost-effective and that renewable energy is impractically expensive. One reason for the high electric rates in California was the “stranded costs” from renewable energy-projects that were supposed to save money but turned out to be white elephants.

While Mr. Lovins, like Mr. Obama, stress the practicality of solar energy, other experts point to its problems so far. Consider this detailed analysis of solar photovoltaic (PV) electricity production in California by Severin Borenstein, director of the University of California Energy Institute. He concludes:

Solar PV is also argued to have enhanced value within an electrical grid, because the power is produced at the location of the end-user and therefore can reduce the costs of transmission and distribution investments. My analysis, however, suggests that actual installation of solar PV systems in California has not significantly reduced the cost of transmission and distribution infrastructure, and is unlikely to do so in other regions. . . . The market benefits of installing the current solar PV technology, even after adjusting for its timing and transmission advantages, are calculated to be much smaller than the costs. The difference is so large that including current plausible estimates of the value of reducing greenhouse gases still does not come close to making the net social return on installing solar PV today positive.

Given these uncertainties, I think it’s risky to choose either path — or to rule out either one. As I wrote in my Findings column, I’m not sure nuclear power will be economical, but I don’t understand why so many greens refuse to even consider it, and why they’ve worked so hard to stir up fear of a technology that doesn’t spew carbon dioxide.

So I was glad to see Mr. Lovins write in his comment: “Nuclear power and all other ways to produce or save energy should be allowed to compete fairly, at honest prices, regardless of their type, technology, size, location, or ownership.”

Now if only there were a way to create that fair competition — and break the political taboo. Any ideas?

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