On this day, July 5, in 1989
“More than 100 British scientists, including two Nobel laureates, have lent their names to an advertising campaign starting this week which says that focusing on nuclear power will worsen global warming by diverting attention from the real causes of the problem.
“The academics, also including 15 Fellows of the Royal Society, reject claims that more nuclear power stations are the answer to the greenhouse effect, and say the Government should concentrate on “real solutions” to global warming….
“The two Nobel laureates taking part in the campaign are Professor Dorothy Hodgkin, emeritus Professor of chemistry at Oxford University, and Professor Maurice Wilkins, emeritus professor of biophysics at London University.”
Brown, P. 1989. Nuclear power is not the answer: scientists. Canberra Times, 5 July, p.1
Why this matters.
Nuclear – a technology always in search of legitimacy, given its other problems (waste, security, meltdowns etc).. Its advocates had in fact been talking about coal’s nasty little CO2 problem for a long time.
What happened next?
Nuclear kept promising. Still is – see April 2022 Energy Security Strategy.