*Sigh* The nuclear 'consultation'

I haven't posted on this blog for ages because the whole sham of the consultation process depresses me.

I've gone over the arguments against nuclear and for renewables of many types many times before. Yet the government is persistent and persistency tends to pay off.

My friend George Monbiot and my girl Kate Doubleday the eco-singer insist I keep up the blog however. So here goes.

I said to George I thought the green movment had made a mistake by withdrawing from the consultation process, since the government was using this as propaganda, and the votes at the end of the seminars (however rigged), without their presence and influence, have been used to suggest most people support nuclear power.

He disagreed. He believes that, like the Big Conversation sham of a couple of years ago, also seen as a sham and which sank without trace, this will come to be seen the same way.

He thinks that if Greepeace did take part, it would be seen as hypocritical, since they have attacked the process and succeeded in court once.

However, I believe that as this consultation is going to end in an Energy Act, whatever the spun outcome is, it will be used to justify the Act's content.

No doubt the civil servants have told everyone to get nuclear in there at all costs, and no doubt the lobbyists from the four companies lining up to build new nuclear power stations have a good reason to believe they've already got the green light.

The government's favourite pollsters, Populus, founded by two Tories and published in the Times, have produced a convenient poll proving conclusively that the public backs new build.

No doubt people like me and other grenies are all deluded, and we only choose to believe the info that fits our preconceived ideas.

Well, whichever is the correct tactic, only time will tell, but I do believe this - the government is going around saying that the nuclear waste problem is solved, when it isn't; that Scotland and Wales don't want nuclear power; and that the Royal Commision is right to be worried about the security implications of the waste issue.

When renewables could deliver, sooner than nuclear, through tidal energy principally, but also through a myriad of other technologies, the solutions to our energy 'gap' and our energy security, without endangering the lives of future generations or international security, and by backing new techologies that will last far longer than nuclear power once the uranium is all used up in 80 years max, it doesn't make sense to back nuclear on any grounds - not even cost.