Indian Point Livestream
This post is excerpted from our Footprint to Wings Newsletter of April 29, 2020
And now to bring up another fun subject.
Indian Point Unit 2 is shutting down on Thursday and we'll be joining Generation Atomic and others in a livestream to protest the closure and thank the workers for all those years of life saving zero carbon energy. You're invited! Join the livestream! Sign the petition. Call Governor Cuomo at 1-518-474-8390 from 9 to 5, and leave your message to reverse the decision. It can still be reversed, though it's a really long shot.
Why make a last stand for an old, dumpy, unpopular nuclear power plant? Well, there's this song, for one.
And also because the biggest looming danger that our friends, family and descendants face is irreversible climate change.
How can we say we want to get to zero carbon, and then get all quiet when they're about to take 800 MW equivalent zero carbon energy offline? Is that what people like us do?
This is an 800 MW equivalent play. [Update: More, say my Indian Point friends. Indian Point has a higher capacity factor than 80%.]
What's an alternative play? Say you want to do your part for global warming by installing solar panels on your home.
You'd need to repeat that with a MILLION homes to replace this one dumpy reactor.
And then, once you go through all the effort to get that done - you will just have broken even with your shutdown. You're no more decarbonized than you were before. And then...you have the whole rest of the field to go. New York has about 40 GW equivalent more to go to get to zero. (40 GWyr end use power delivered. That's about 350,000 GWh.)
We looked at this in the First Gigawatt Down video.
The folks over at the #BeyondIndianPoint website have not watched our video (Please tweet at them to do so! Thanks!), and have only thought ahead to about 43,000GWh of replacement energy, which is about 5GWyr equivalent. Half of which is to come from energy efficiency. That leaves you with 307,000 GWh to go. 35 GWyr equivalent...in 2025.
But we're supposed to get to zero carbon by when?
That's a lot of zero carbon points we're giving up there as a planet.
This affects all of us.
Of course, there are many people who feel differently about this. Check out the video Riverkeepers, Mark Ruffalo and friends made to celebrate the shutdown. They worked hard to make it happen, and they're ready now to go #BeyondIndianPoint.
The video makes three claims. 1) Indian Point is very dangerous. 2) This was a long fight, and 3) Indian Point can be replaced with 100% renewable energy.
These points are all true.
But consider...
Can you think of dangers greater than Indian point? Viruses, for example. And climate change. How dangerous is climate change? Can we get some better quantification on this? What's the real tradeoff?
Can't argue with #2. Your fight is longer than my fight. I have hardly begun to fight.
Yes, Indian Point can be replaced with 100% Renewables (or, it looks like mostly “energy efficiency” in this infographic, but...how soon? How much NIMBY will you encounter (i.e., what's the #NIMBYCoefficient?)? And once you replace it, what else do you need to do to get to zero carbon? Will you have enough enthusiasm left at that point? You've got some increments in mind, but what's your #Endgame?
It's easy to block things, to play defense. Much harder to build things, play offense.
Show us your #FirstGigawattDown
Alienated, Bored, Inspired? Take Action!
If you read this far, you are likely outraged in one direction or another. I'm assuming if you're bored, you wouldn't have read this far. Unless you are SO bored, that you did. Or perhaps you're curious and pondering the information.
I'm not sure which it is, so here are some options:
If you're happy with the shutdown and want to make sure it stays shut, you should visit the #BeyondIndianPoint site and sign up to support it. Also, visit the Ruffalo video on Youtube and give it a thumbs up - right now it's 15 thumbs up to 381 thumbs down, which indicates it has few actual supporters and many detractors. That can't be right. (FYI, Moore et all and POTH hid their up v. down count. I wonder at the ratio).
If you want to halt the shutdown until there's a clear plan for New York to get to zero carbon, you should sign this petition, and/or call Governor Cuomo at 1-518-474-8390 and leave a message to express that sentiment. And also join us on Thursday for the livestream [Update: catch the recording here] and to thank the workers who have worked many years to bring us life saving zero carbon energy.
If you're surprised by our assertion that most eco organizations have not thought through their endgame, you should bring it up with them. If you're part of one of the US climate coalition organizations (scroll down on their homepage for the list of 500 organizations), you can talk about it with your fellow members and leadership. We all need to hold each other accountable, and develop our zero carbon endgames. One First Gigawatt Down at a time! Show us your #FirstGigawattDown!
Wow, what a radical email. Is this what you were expecting?
And there's so much I left out.
So many plays, so little time. Civilization on the line.
To zero carbon and beyond,
Rezwan