Pandora’s Promise
Is a 2013 documentary film about the nuclear power debate, directed by Robert Stone. Its central argument is that nuclear power, which still faces historical opposition from environmentalists, is a relatively safe and clean energy source which can help mitigate the serious problem of anthropogenic global warming. The title is derived from
the ancient Greek myth of Pandora, who released numerous evils into the world, yet as the movie’s tagline recalls: “At the bottom of the box she found hope.”
The film promotes nuclear power as the only energy source that can both meet worldwide demand and help reduce carbon emissions quickly enough to minimize further damage to the Earth’s atmosphere. In it, engineers attest to the safety of advanced reactor technologies and disarmament experts comment on their reliability,without any reference to the risks posed by nuclear power. Erstwhile anti-nuclear power activists like Stewart Brand and Gwyneth Cravens are the major focus of the film, as they talk about their decisions to support nuclear power after many years of actively protesting against it. The major reason they offer this change is the growing threat of climate change.
Stone’s case is that it has been massively misunderstood and misrepresented by a 60s generation of environmentalists: he argues that nuclear is a hugely efficient and relatively clean energy source that is now vitally needed as billions of people in emerging economies such as India, China and Brazil are hungry for power. Wind turbines and solar panels, he says, are failing to meet even a fraction of urgent needs.
Stone travels to Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima with a Geiger counter to make the point that those nuclear crises were less critical than perceived. Wielding a UN/World Health Organization report, he confronts an anti-nuke ideologue. Chernobyl’s death toll was 56, not a million, he reminds him. Stone points to “the modern orthodoxy environmentalism” and its adherence to a doctrine that wrongly equates nuclear energy with nuclear weapons. But been a little critic, the film derides wind and solar energy unduly, and perhaps the film could have spent longer on safety. Criticizing how the movie relates all the major explosions of the reactors because of inadequate cooling. Also, i think, that holding up the Geiger counter at a disaster site and showing the surprisingly low number is a bit obtuse, and doesn’t address people’s fears about an explosion.
In conclusion I think is a very good film and it does in fact make you revaluate your opinion over nuclear power, and the whole myth around it. The problem is, as John Quiggin (Australian economist and polocy maker, see picture of article posted below) said on an article for the guardian, the problem is around economics.In the absence of a substantial carbon price, nuclear energy can’t compete with coal and other fossil fuels. In the presence of a carbon price, it can’t compete with wind and solar photovoltaics. The only real hope is that coal-fired generation is reduced drastically enough. Nuclear power will be a more attractive alternative than variable sources like solar and wind power. However, much of the current demand for that power is an artifact of pricing systems designed for coal, and may disappear as prices become more cost-reflective. The problem of climate change is not going away, and, in the absence of massive subsidies, no one is going to build nuclear power plants on a scale sufficient to make much of a difference. To address the problem of climate change, we need to use less energy, use it more efficiently and generate it more sustainably.
The Guardian, Nov. 2013.