Reduce Global Warming: Embrace Nuclear Power
compiled by David Barth, June 16, 2008
From Wired, June 2008, page 162.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has created a CO2-per-kilowatt-hour map that shows the relationship between
CO2 and electric energy usage. Two areas in the U.S. where there is a significant amount of electricity generated with
a minimal amount of CO2 released are the Pacific Northwest where hydroelectric dams produce much of the electrical
power and in Vermont where the 30-year-old Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant does the generation. One of the worst
areas is around Washington, DC, where coal-fired plants spew 5 times the CO2 per megawatt-hour than in
Vermont.
A UK government report in 2007 showed that nuclear power produces only 2 to 6 percent of the CO2 per kilowatt-hour than
natural gas, which is the cleanest fossil fuel.
Electric power generation creates 26 percent of the worlds' greenhouse gas emissions, and is the largest contributor to
global warming.
The Kyoto Protocol denies carbon credits to nuclear power plant construction in developing countries, forcing them to
use coal.
37 percent of U.S. CO2 emissions are from coal.