By hauntingthelibrary

James Hansen, the controversial scientist at the centre of the global warming movement has turned on America’s Democrat party in a shock announcement, savaging past Democrat administrations for “huge mistakes” that denied America the possibility of producing zero carbon emissions energy by now.

Andy Revkin of the New York Times reported that Hansen was not happy with the current Obama administration, as despite offering his services “I never heard back anything from the White House”. This “lame” approach, he said could be seen in past Democrat administrations:

Nowhere is the lame middle-of-the-road go-slow compromise approach clearer than in the case of nuclear power. The [Obama] Administration has been reluctant to admit that the Carter and Clinton/Gore administrations made a huge mistake in pulling the U.S. back from development of advanced nuclear technology.

That is the way to make nuclear power safer (nuclear power already has the best safety record of any major industry in the United States) and resistant to weapons proliferation.

New York Times. Dot Earth. NASA’s Hansen Pushes Obama for a Carbon Cost and a Nuclear Push.

Hansen also slammed President Obama for buckling to advocacy groups who impede progress on nuclear power, rather than being a “responsible leader” and authorizing a major new programme of building new nuclear power stations:

Nevertheless, the easiest thing that he could do, and perhaps the best that we can hope for, is for him to give a strong boost to nuclear power.

Unfortunately, he seems to fall prey to Democratic politics on this, rather than being a responsible leader.

New York Times. Dot Earth. NASA’s Hansen Pushes Obama for a Carbon Cost and a Nuclear Push.

Hansen’s comments may well be a dig at blogger Joe Romm, formerly Acting Assistant Secretary at the Department of Energy for the Clinton administration. Despite frequently proclaiming global warming to be an existential threat to humanity, Romm has hindered the move to low emissions energy by waging a campaign against nuclear power, which - as Hansen notes - has “the best safety record of any major industry”. Why is Romm ignoring the advice of the scientists he himself champions? Is it science, or is it politics?

Opinion:

This is a perfect example of how the campaign over man-made global warming is a political campaign far more than a scientific one. Nuclear power could provide the zero or low emissions energy that the warmists claim is desperately needed to save the world.

Yet they campaign virulently against it, on spurious grounds. They demand that we listen to the scientists on global warming. Yet, when those same scientists say that nuclear power is safe and should be pursued on a massive scale, they go silent, or point to a fringe minority who advocate against it on ideological grounds.

Why?

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