"Use Nuclear Power For Peaceful Purposes"

It is a pity that Brian Wilson buys into the global warming thing at the end. This is about high-skilled, high-wage, high-status jobs for the working class, and it is about independence from Arab oil and Russian gas: One Nation politics, with an equal emphasis on the One and on the Nation. No wonder that it is so opposed by the (just as anti-"renewable") Greens of all parties, particularly the Lib Dems and the SNP, of which latter, and of whose pseudo-Labour and pseudo-Tory fellow-travellers, Wilson is a much-missed old hammer from the perspective of the Unionist tradition in the North of Scotland as carried over into Labour Movement.

The increasing weakness of the case against a new generation of nuclear power stations in the UK is reflected in the shifting ground of arguments used against them. I have repeatedly heard from opponents over the past few days that they are not "a panacea" and that they will not be available to fill an energy gap in the middle of the next decade.

Both of these statements are true. But since nobody is claiming that nuclear is "a panacea" and since the holy grail of the anti-civil nuclear power movement is to delay by fair means or foul, they are also unconvincing. Equally, the recurrent effort to portray nuclear as an "alternative" to renewables and energy efficiency is dishonest. From a carbon reduction perspective, all three are crucial elements in any intelligent strategy.

It has also entered the vocabulary of this debate that "environmentalists" are opposed to retaining a nuclear component in our energy mix. That is another generalisation at odds with the truth. Exceptionally eminent figures in the environmental movement such as James Lovelock have long since recognised that, whatever the challenges of nuclear power, they are as nothing compared to those of global warming.

Many others whose instincts are anti-nuclear have had to reassess their positions in the context of the carbon reduction debate. How can it make any sort of sense to allow the only substantial source of carbon-free electricity currently available to us to wither away over the next 20 years, so that everything we do on renewables will in carbon reduction terms simply be cancelled out?

The maintenance of nuclear's current share of our power generation mix - and I know of nobody who is talking about increasing it - is simply a sensible, medium-term contribution to a balanced energy policy. Hopefully, by the time this generation of stations has delivered its contribution to our needs, there will indeed be other technologies to fill the gap. Pretending that this situation exists now - or will exist within the next decade - is a delusion.

The three imperatives of energy policy must be affordability, security of supply and carbon reduction. Nuclear can make a contribution to all three - just as it has done over the past 40 years. There is no such thing as cheap electricity. If we avoid the up-front costs of nuclear technology, we will pay in other ways - either through continuing increases in carbon emissions or through over-dependence on imported gas.

I find the attempt to pit nuclear against renewables positively offensive. From bitter experience, I know that many of the people who are against nuclear will also oppose the infrastructure that is required to deliver on renewables. Their mantra is "do it offshore". But it is ludicrous to portray this as an easy fix - to harness and then transport electricity from the deep and hazardous waters around our coastline. Eventually it will be done. But we are not there yet by a very long chalk.

So let's try to argue the case on its merits rather than hiding behind fallacious arguments. We need a diverse mix of power generation - gas, clean coal, renewables, nuclear. We need to do far, far more on energy conservation in order to stabilise demand. We need to remember that electricity and energy are not synonymous, so that the carbon reduction battle is engaged with far more effectively in sectors like transport and buildings.

The single-minded hostility to civil nuclear power is a crusade from another age. I am old enough to remember when a slogan of the left was: "Use nuclear power for peaceful purposes." We should revive it for use in the war against global warming.