Attendees should not lose sight of the fact that technologies are up and running in the U.S. today that have been quietly contributing to CO2 emissions reductions for decades. I am referring to the 104 nuclear plants in operation across the country, including the one at Oyster Creek.
Nuclear power generates about 52 percent of the electricity produced in New Jersey and it does so with no carbon-based greenhouse gas, which is thought to cause global warming.
As a co-founder* and former leader of Greenpeace, I was once a strong opponent of nuclear power generation, but times have changed and I have updated my views accordingly. Now I find my self part of a growing number of leading environmentalists around the world who have come to understand that nuclear energy is an in tegral part of any campaign to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
I recently toured the Oyster Creek nuclear power plant in Ocean County, and found the staff there to be strongly focused on public safety and environmental protection. Based on my more than 35 years in the environmental movement and my understanding of the current energy trends in the state, I think the extension of Oyster Creek's operating license will play a crucial role in Gov. Corzine's important greenhouse gas legislation....MORE
I believe Mr. Moore is right on this issue and I also believe I am obligated to point out something I recently found:
*"In "Greenpeace: How a Group of Ecologists, Journalists, and Visionaries Changed the World," author Rex Weyler writes "Greenpeace was founded by Quakers Dorothy and Irving Stowe, Marie and Jim Bohlen, and journalists Ben Metcalfe, Dorothy Metcalfe, and Bob Hunter. This group organized the first campaign to sail a boat into the U.S. nuclear test zone on Amchitka Island in the Bering Sea.
"Canadian ecologist and carpenter Bill Darnell coined the name "Greenpeace" in February 1970. A year later, Moore wrote to the organization, applying for a crew position on the boat and was accepted."
Moore wrote his letter on March 16, 1971, two years after the group was founded, describing himself as a graduate student "in the field of resource ecology." Clearly, then, Moore was not a founder of Greenpeace. Founders don't write letters applying to join. After the Stowes, Metcalfes and Bob Hunter left the organization, Moore briefly served as president, from 1977 to 1979. Former members recall that his bullyism nearly scuttled Greenpeace. He launched an internal lawsuit against his rivals in other Greenpeace offices, was replaced as president in 1979, and eventually drummed out of the organization as a troublemaker."
