CounterPunch Exclusives

CounterPunch Exclusives

New York Gov. Huchul’s Push for Nuclear Power

Image by Lukáš Lehotský.

New York Governor Kathy Hochul has just issued a statement headed: “Governor Hochul Announces Major Milestone To Facilitate New Advanced Nuclear Development.”

It repeats her declaration in her State of the State address in January to have five gigawatts of new nuclear power—the equivalent of five standard-size nuclear power plants—built in New York State.

She announced: “Today’s action marks the start of a full examination of ways to bring new advanced nuclear power online.”

Last year, as she directed the New York Power Authority to facilitate construction of new nuclear power plants, Hochul said: “I’m the first Democratic governor in a generation to say to nuclear: ‘I’m embracing this.”

Then and in the new announcement she said the new nuclear power plants in New York would produce “zero-emissions electricity” and be “advanced” models.

However, as environmental attorney Susan Shapiro, long involved in challenging nuclear power, said at what has been a series of “Forums for a Nuclear-Free New York” held in recent months to counter Hochul’s nuclear drive: “It is patently untrue that nuclear energy is zero-emissions or a carbon-free source of energy.”

The nuclear fuel-cycle, which includes mining, milling and fuel enrichment and fabrication, is “carbon-intensive,” said Shapiro. Moreover, nuclear power plants themselves emit carbon, a radioactive form, Carbon-14. The claim that nuclear power is “emissions free” is a “fraud on the public,” said Shapiro. It’s “not zero-emissions, not carbon-free, and not part of a solution to climate change.”

While pushing nuclear power, Hochul at the same time is delaying implementation of the state’s Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act—heralded when it was enacted in 2019 as the way to offset climate change by........

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