Nuclear

Germany, the industrial juggernaut of Europe, is in an economic downturn as it enters its third year in a recession. What happened and what can be learned. The peoples rejection of nuclear power goes back to the 1970's when protesters objected to the building of nuclear plants. This was many years before Chernobyl. In 1993 the German Green Party was started to protect the environment especially the fight against climate change. To achieve their objectives they pushed for wind and solar to replace fossil fuels. Germany had 17 nuke plants and they started shutting them down after Chernobyl and the last three closed in 2023. A good case can be made that all of this was an emotional response. First off, no studies were conducted to find out how much wind and sun did Germany have and as it turns out,very little of either. Second no study was made to determine the environmental damage caused by the mining, processing and disposing of the materials needed for wind and solar as well as EV's. Third, scientist now agree that nuclear is an excellent source of carbon free power. The final nail in the coffin came when Germany, in response to the Ukraine War, chose to cut off natural gas and oil imports from Russia. The result is that Germany is now reopening old coal plants when they should be opening old nuke plants. Germany shut down nuclear out of fear and now say they will not reopen because of cost. Will the US learn anything from this or will they continue to believe that wind and solar can replace fossil fuels and refuse to build new small nuke reactors.