There are technologies that decouple human well-being from its ecological impacts. There are politics that enable these technologies. Join me as I interview world experts to uncover hope in this time of planetary crisis.
Last refreshed: ⓘ
Follow this podcast in the Metacast mobile app to refresh it and see new episodes.
Don't just listen to podcasts. Learn from them with transcripts, summaries, and chapters for every episode. Skim, search, and bookmark insights. Learn more
Natural gas occupies a strange place in the climate debate. By helping to phase out coal, it has led modest decarbonization efforts in the United States and elsewhere, but it continues to emit climate change-causing CO2. Environmental NGO’s have switched between loving it and hating it. In this episode, returning guest Mark Nelson joins us to deepen our understanding of natural gas, fracing [sic], its economics, and more. We touch on the chemistry of hydrocarbons; the immense infrastructure need...
In the past two decades, Ontario has become a world leader in clean electricity by phasing out coal generation, which it did 90% by restarting units at the Bruce and Pickering Nuclear Generating Stations. Ineffective clean energy policies now threaten that leadership. With the decision of Ontario Power Generation not to refurbish Pickering, fossil gas is set to ramp up to fill the lost capacity. The closure of 3.1 GW of nuclear power at Pickering and its replacement with fossil gas will constitu...
Germany has once again embarked on a war on two fronts this time attempting to phase out its two main sources of reliable baseload power, Nuclear and Coal. Nevermind the fact that during a climate emergency nuclear, despite being almost zero carbon, is being phased out at breakneck speed while coal will languish on the grid for another 15 years. Germany is not alone. In many countries in the EU baseload electricity generation is on the chopping block. European energy systems are largely followin...
The IPCC has released its first major update in 8 years, the sixth assessment report (AR6). Zeke Hausfather, who contributed to the IPCC report and is a climate and energy analyst at The Breakthrough Institute, joins us to help us make sense of it all. AR6 provides greater resolution and precision in terms of our understanding of climate sensitivity and the resulting temperature ranges we can expect moving into the future. It also gives us a more confident estimate of climate impacts like sea-le...
Medical isotopes make modern medicine possible. We depend on a steady supply to sterilize medical equipment, as radiation sources for oncology treatments and for diagnostic imaging. Canada is a world leader in the production of medical isotopes and punches far above its weight. Canada's national research reactor, which closed in 2016, provided a number of isotopes including Molybdenum 99 which treated 76,000 patients a day in over 80 countries. Now CANDU power reactors have been put to the job a...
In the West, many nuclear advocates have pinned their hopes for a nuclear renaissance on Small Modular Reactors, or SMRs. SMRs range from a potentially faster way for nuclear nations to build more plants; to a way for countries to start their nuclear power programs; to special application power sources that serve specific country needs, such as those under development in Russia and China. Yet-to-be-built SMR designs make a lot of bold promises. A question looming over the nuclear industry is: wi...
We live in a radioactive world. Every minute, 7,000 potentially cell-damaging radioactive releases occur in our bodies. How are we still alive? And what are the real risks associated with radiation? In this episode, Dr. Keefer is joined by Dr. Douglas Boreham, a world expert in the effects of low doses of ionizing radiation, to tackle the biological effects of radiation. They discuss various types of radiation; the linear no-threshold hypothesis; fears of airborne "hot particles" of uranium; our...
Intermittent weather-dependent sources of electricity need backup storage to compensate for gaps in production. Elon Musk has promised that Solar + Powerall batteries ensure that your home will never lose power. In this episode, returning guest Mark P. Mills breaks down the concept of energy storage, the physical requirements and limitations of our current storage technologies, and what to expect in the future. Batteries will play an important role in the future of the grid and will continue to ...
Vogtle was supposed to be the beginning of a nuclear renaissance. The two AP1000's at this site were the first new reactors to be built in the USA in the 21st century. There was optimism that a novel modular design that economized space and materials would be on budget and on time. Vogtle, however, has become the poster child of the United States' inability to build affordable nuclear reactors. The timeline has almost doubled and the cost overrun tripled. The project bankrupted the reactor vendo...
Nuclear energy is only possible thanks to a highly-skilled, largely unionized workforce. In popular culture, nuclear workers have been portrayed as incompetent (e.g. the Simpson) or as evil incarnate by anti-nuclear activists like Dr. Helen Caldicott. In Canada, nuclear generation is publicly owned and run by a highly unionized workforce. It provides cheap, clean, and reliable energy to the commons AKA our grid. Due to the energy density of fission, each nuclear worker has an outsized role in pr...
Seth Klein, a writer and public policy researcher, joins Dr. Keefer to discuss his book, A Good War: Mobilizing Canada for the Climate Emergency . Klein draws on the history of Canada during World War II, when the country massively industrialized to help Britain with the war effort in what he describes as a "true society-wide mobilization." He uses this history to argue for a similar society-wide, wartime-like mobilization to fight climate change. Klein makes a bold argument: We have tried and f...
Gaopalelwe Santswere, a nuclear physicist and regulatory expert, joins Dr. Keefer to discuss the electricity sector in South Africa whose aging coal fleet is in need of replacement. Despite operating the only two nuclear power reactors on the continent at Koeberg, and plans in the early 2000’s for nearly 10,000MW of nuclear, the government is pursuing an energy policy that prioritizes wind and solar. Gaopalelwe tracks the influence of foreign powers in the direction of South African energy polic...
Returning guest Zion Lights, a powerhouse pro nuclear advocate whose most recent initiative has been to launch the group Emergency Reactor, joins me this episode with reflections on her activism in the pandemic; her observations speaking with more receptive, younger generations about nuclear power; navigating political media; "lifestyle politics" versus data-driven activism; and confronting backward environmentalist notions such as overpopulation and the idea that we cannot make progress on clim...
At its birth, nuclear energy entered a highly competitive market for electricity generation. Oil was so cheap that it was stealing market share for electricity generation from coal and driving prices to all-time lows. Despite being a brand new technology 1960s nuclear plants were hitting prices of 3 cents/kWh in today's dollars. Gaddafi and OPEC then contributed to the price of oil skyrocketing. All of a sudden, many wanted to build a nuclear plant and early adopters were reaping huge profits. N...
The Taishan nuclear plant in the Guangdong province of China houses two French-built EPR reactors, the first of their kind in the country. For the past couple of weeks, equipment has registered slightly elevated radiation readings inside and directly outside the plant. The cause so far appears to be leaks from one or more fuel rods. Mark Nelson joins me in this brief episode to reflect on this breaking story; its coverage in the media; the phenomenon of fuel rod leaks; issues with first-of-a-kin...
A special crosspost from the WeCANDUIt podcast. Jay Harris, an indigenous energy consultant and proponent of small modular reactor (SMR) for remote locations talks about the energy, nutrition and water challenges facing remote northern communities. We explore the fascinating history of SMRs in remote environments which goes back to the 1950's and we look at the possibilities and challenges of SMRs in the far north. Jay is a member of the Cowessess First Nation in Saskatchewan and has worked as a...
Edgardo Sepulveda, a telecoms regulatory economist, returns to the Decouple podcast to discuss energy equity and how it relates to discussions of energy poverty and energy democracy with a deep dive of the June 2 Public Power Resolution tabled by Cori Bush and Jamaal Bowman. Electricity is considered a “necessity good” in economics. For a variety of reasons in the industrialized world people will use about the same amount regardless of income. Given, however, that income is not evenly distribute...
Its a basic truism but every material object that we use as humans that we did not farm or harvest from the land was mined. In the developed world we have offshored much of this mining activity and it is thus largely invisible to us. How do we decouple mining from its environmental impacts? Stringent regulation of environmental and labour practices. How does modern Uranium mining measure up? With plans for an energy transition away from fossil fuels comes major mining implications. Replacing ene...
Humanity has emitted over 1 trillion tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere since the industrial revolution, raising atmospheric concentrations of CO2 from 280 to 417ppm. Every year, we add another 50 billion tonnes of CO2 equivalent, meaning that in 20 years we will double our total emissions. There are signs that global emissions are plateauing, and many governments around the world have penned ambitious commitments to reach net zero. However, talk is cheap, and many plans hinge on dubious assumpti...
Isabelle Boemeke, the nuclear influencer behind Isodope, joins me again to talk about Diablo Canyon, her experience as an unconventional advocate, staying positive, being honest about nuclear power, meeting people where they are in their understanding of nuclear power, dealing with false accusations, and how her communication styles vary between platforms. We also reflect on the women in nuclear advocacy who are leading the efforts to keep Diablo Canyon from an early demise.
The Byron and Dresden nuclear plants, which supply 30% of Illinois CO2-free energy will power down in 4 months without government intervention. These plants, which are licensed to operate well into the future, are uneconomic amid deregulated energy markets and the cheap natural gas unlocked by the fracking revolution. Keeping existing nuclear plants operating in the northeast USA has a carbon abatement cost of $25/ton of CO2. This is half the social cost of carbon in Biden's proposed carbon tax ...
In New England it has been calculated by Reiner Khur that the carbon abatement cost of rooftop solar is 800$/ton, utility wind and solar ~300$/ton and keeping existing nuclear on line ~25$/ton. In the context of a social cost of carbon and proposed carbon tax of 50$/ton the premature closure of Indian Point is a shocking indictment of the environmental NGO's that fought so hard to kill the plant. We need to add new generation to the grid not because of a growing demand for electricity but rather...
Adam Blazowski is a co-founder of the Polish pragmatic environmentalist group FOTA4Climate. FOTA came together in 2018 out of frustration with the limits of the mainstream environmental movement. The organization includes a broad spectrum of experts and activists ranging from energy analysts to herpetologists and characterizes itself as a “tech agnostic group.” FOTA are supportive of nuclear energy not because of a bias towards the technology but rather because they believe it is the most effect...
Carbon capture and storage. Loved by some, hated by others, essential to many an energy transition modeller for achieving net zero emissions. On today's show we explore some of the science and engineering challenges underlying Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS.) We look at CO2 capture at the stack, from the air and oceans examining the technical possibilities, the energy and material costs and the scaling difficulties. The history of human influence on the climate system is thought to predat...
On May 1st at 11am in a matter of minutes New York State lost more clean energy than all of it’s solar and wind energy fleet combined. This act of climate vandalism occurred in the context of the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act which mandates 100% carbon free electricity by 2040 and a massive increase in electrification of the heating and transportation sectors. On the sidelines environmental organizations like the National Resource Defense Counsel chearled the closure. The preme...
Heather Hoff is the co-founder of Mothers for Nuclear, and the mother of Zoe. She is a materials scientist, nuclear reactor operator and lifelong environmentalist. In the words of their website Mothers for Nuclear is an organization of environmentalists, humanitarians, and caring human beings. "We were initially skeptical of nuclear, but learned through asking a lot of questions. We started Mothers for Nuclear as a way to share our stories and begin a dialogue with others who want to protect nat...
Edgardo Sepulveda and Chris Keefer discuss the evolution of electricity markets, from early private companies to post-WWII state-led nationalization and traditional rate-of-return regulation. They critically assess the shift to deregulation and privatization, particularly its impact on prices, administrative costs, and the challenging investment landscape for long-lived assets like nuclear. The conversation highlights market failures, the role of environmental mandates, and potential solutions for integrating diverse generation sources to achieve deep decarbonization.
Environment, Social, Governance investing is a paradigm that is quickly becoming a driving force for global finance. Investors are increasingly paying attention and demanding disclosure of ESG metrics to guide their decisions. At best, nuclear energy sits in an ESG limbo. At worst, it is listed alongside alcohol, tobacco, and pornography as a sin stock. In the EU, the battle over whether to include nuclear in the EU Green Taxonomy still hangs in the balance. Nuclear checks all of the ESG boxes, ...
Russia has been in the nuclear energy game now for over 75 years and its nuclear industry has bounced back to become the leading exporter of reactors around the world. What accounts for this success? In the context of oligarchs balkanizing and profiteering off of sectors of the USSR's formerly centrally planned economy the Russian nuclear industry managed to re-consolidate itself into Rosatom, a collection of over 360 enterprises. Rosatom is a vertically integrated state owned enterprise which o...
The decision by the Japanese government to begin releasing 1.25 million tonnes of treated water from the Fukushima nuclear plant site over a 10 year period has caused a major stir not only amongst environmental NGO's but also regional countries with historic emnity to Japan. Greenpeace alleges that radionuclides released into the sea "may damage DNA of humans and other organisms." China states that "the release is extremely irresponsible and will pose serious harm to the health and sagety of peo...
