Opinion: Rejecting nuclear power would be 'sheer folly'

Below is an article that puts the true facts in perspective. I believe in nuclear energy and I would like Malaysia to also have a strong nuclear industry. We do have uranium deposits and this energy source will still make us self-sufficient.

Have a read and tell me what do you think.

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London, England (CNN) -- We need three things from global energy and electricity supplies. They should be as economic as possible, as reliable as possible -- power cuts are very expensive -- and do as little damage to the environment as possible.

The challenge for energy policy, of course, is that often these three requirements pull us in different directions. The 1990s (especially in the UK) was extremely unusual in that a single policy -- the "dash for gas" -- was delivering on the economic, security and environmental fronts. Gas was cheap and plentiful and a lot of new generating capacity was built.

Now, however, the world is in trouble on all three fronts. Oil is hovering at around $80 a barrel dragging gas, coal and electricity prices up with it.

Security of supply is threatened in two ways. The main gas (and oil) reserves are in the Middle East and countries of the former Soviet Union -- not necessarily the most reliable suppliers for the long term. Many countries are also becoming alarmingly short of electricity generating capacity.

Meanwhile, despite growing fears of climate change the world is using a lot more energy and getting more of it from the main sources of greenhouse gas emissions -- oil, gas and coal -- than it did at the time of the supposedly groundbreaking Rio Conference in 1992.

As countries like China and India develop their economies world energy use is expected to double by 2050. Yet we have to cut releases of "greenhouse gases" like carbon dioxide by perhaps four-fifths over the same period if we are to stand a chance of managing the consequences.

It's impossible to believe there is a single simple solution to all of this. We need to use energy as efficiently as possible. We need to look for ways of capturing the carbon dioxide from coal and gas-fired power stations. We also need to use more renewables where they are technically feasible.

So why nuclear?

Its economics are probably favorable against any realistic assumption about fossil fuel prices in the future.

It does depend on the industry being able to deliver new stations to time and cost -- the experience in Finland and France, where the world's first nuclear reactors of the design known as the EPR are being built, is typical of the first-of-a-kind of any major technology, running seriously late and at much higher cost than first claimed, but that does not imply that future plants will follow the same pattern, assuming a sensible regulatory regime can be established.

But that of course is a matter for the commercial companies that will consider building them.

The fuel, uranium, is widespread -- countries like Canada and Australia are major producers. Unlike renewables, it does not depend on the wind blowing at the right speed, or the tide being in or the sun being out.

Indeed, for "baseload" -- the reliable electricity that we need for transportation, pumping water, keeping us warm (or cool) and so on -- nuclear energy does not compete with renewables but with coal and gas.

And nuclear energy doesn't add to serious releases of carbon dioxide.