Sir, – Michael McDowell is right that Ireland should repeal its ban on nuclear power and start planning for small modular reactors (“Unless we embrace nuclear, Ireland will remain partly dependent on gas”, Opinion, July 22nd).
Where he goes wrong is the vision of transport built around it. He suggests that, in a clean-energy world, there would be nothing wrong with two-car households.
But energy is only one of the car’s costs. It seems to me a private car sits parked roughly 95 per cent of the time while taking up a vast amount space in our towns and cities. Autonomous vehicles could well upend this ownership model. A car becomes something you summon by app when you need it, from economy to premium, in fleets that are used all day rather than idling at the kerb or on the driveway.
Clean energy makes cars cleaner and perhaps cheaper to run. It does not make them take up less room. This matters because Ireland has one of the fastest-growing populations in the EU.
RM Block
Building that growth around two-car households means more sprawl, pushing homes ever further from jobs and services. The alternative is compact towns moving people through shared fleets and public transport, including projects such as MetroLink, which Mr McDowell has spent years opposing in these pages.
This is a familiar position from a man who told the Dáil in 1996 that Luas was an “expensive toy train set” whose passenger forecasts were “grossly exaggerated”. Luas carried a record 55 million passengers last year. Shared electric fleets charging overnight are the ideal customer for always-on nuclear power. The technologies belong together. It is the two cars in the driveway that don’t fit. – Yours, etc,
Stephen Keegan,
Dún Laoghaire,
Co Dublin.
Sir, – Michael McDowell states that “Ireland can’t shed its gas dependency without nuclear”, and he also proposes that we remove the legislation banning nuclear power in Ireland. I agree that this legislation should be removed.
He seems to think that small modular reactors and other nuclear plants are essential to support intermittent renewable energy systems. However, nuclear plants are designed to deliver continuous power (base load), and they are not meant to be turned on and off frequently.
There are many systems available now that can back up the renewable, including battery systems, electro chemical storage, pumped storage, interconnectors with Europe and others.
At the moment, we use gas fired stations to back up renewables. The use of fossil fuels in electricity generation will be phased out over a number of years and replaced by renewable systems (mostly wind and solar) and other energy storage systems. There is no need for nuclear power in Ireland.
McDowell further states that nuclear power is “cheap and reliable”. Nuclear power is not cheap, and many reactors overrun their budget and can take years to complete.
Nuclear power is not zero carbon, but is a low-carbon source of energy. The life cycle GHG emissions from nuclear power is far lower than fossil fuels but it is not zero. – Yours, etc,
Nick Armstrong,
Dundrum,
Dublin.
Sir, – Michael McDowell is right about one thing: if Ireland genuinely intends to achieve net zero while maintaining a secure and dependable electricity supply, nuclear energy deserves serious consideration. The refusal even to discuss it has become increasingly difficult to defend.
The first question, however, is not whether Ireland should favour small modular reactors or conventional reactors, nor whether any future programme should be financed through public-private partnerships or direct State investment. It is whether legislation enacted more than a quarter of a century ago - reflecting the political, technological and economic assumptions of its day - should continue to close the door on nuclear power altogether.
Ireland today is a very different country. Our population has grown substantially, electricity demand has increased dramatically, legally binding climate obligations have emerged and energy security has become a pressing concern. Whether the statutory prohibition on nuclear generation remains justified is a question that deserves fresh and objective consideration.
Only if that prohibition is removed do the next questions arise. Even then, it would be premature to assume that relatively untested small modular reactors are preferable to the conventional reactor designs that have generated reliable electricity across much of the western world for decades.
Equally, there is no obvious reason why public-private partnerships should be treated as the default financing model when other well-established alternatives exist.
The Thornton Hall prison project should remind us of the wisdom of caution. That proposal, also based on a public-private partnership model, consumed tens of millions of euro in public money before ultimately being abandoned. It illustrates the danger of settling too quickly on a particular procurement and financing model before all realistic alternatives have been rigorously assessed.
McDowell is right to invite Ireland to reopen the nuclear debate. But the debate should proceed in the right order: first, whether the legislative prohibition still serves the national interest; secondly, if it does not, what technology best meets Ireland’s needs; and only then how such a programme should be financed. – Yours, etc,
Patrick O’Shea,
Mornington,
Co Meath.
