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Anthony Melendez
Professor Lynn Raymond
UWRT 1102
18 March 2015
Nuclear Power
For my groups semester long multimodal project, we are discussing the topic of
electricity. We use electricity in our daily lives, to power our smart phones, computers, light our
houses, and to make civilized life possible. That electricity has to come from a source, and with
the majority of Americans being connected to a power grid, one of those sources of power are
nuclear power plants. Like it or not, nuclear power keeps Charlottes schools, businesses, and
hospitals open. In fact, there are two nuclear power plants operating in the Charlotte area. Since
nuclear power is a part of our lives I wanted to explore the pros and cons of it.
I found two articles discussing nuclear power. The first article was written by Patrick
Moore, who helped found Greenpeace in the 1970s yet states how his views have changed and
how he is now pro-nuclear power (Moore). The second article was written by Dr. Bruce Barrett
and Dr. Monica Vohmann. They argue that nuclear power is too dangerous and too costly
(Barrett, Vohmann).
The following are some parts from the pro-nuclear power article stood out to me. Patrick
Moore talks about how coal energy CO2 emissions are very high and nuclear energy greatly
reduces these emissions. Despite what critics say, nuclear energy is safe and no one has died
from a radiation related incident in the United States. In his response to the claim of nuclear
waste being dangerous for thousands of years, Patrick Moore states: Within forty years, used

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fuel has less than one-thousandth of the radioactivity it had when it was removed from the
reactor.
In the anti-nuclear power article, Dr. Barrett and Dr. Vohmann make some statements that
contradict what Patrick Moore had to say in his article. They claimed that radioactive poisons
produced now will last for tens of thousands of years and nuclear power is not costeffective. In their article Dr. Barrett and Dr. Vohmann discuss the nuclear disasters at
Fukushima Dai-ichi as well as Chernobyl and Three Mile Island in the United States. They talk
about the alpha particles, beta and gamma radiation and their effects on humans.
I am neither pro-nuclear nor anti-nuclear. I can agree with points from both articles and
think there are pros and cons to nuclear power. No doubt, with the increasing world population
and more developing countries emerging, there is a higher demand for energy to produce
electricity so we can maintain our comfortable lifestyles and further technology. With the higher
demand for electricity we also have to keep in mind that we have a responsibility to not only the
future generations, but to earth, the place we call home for the foreseeable future. I think we can
all agree coal is unsustainable, but is nuclear energy really the answer? Like both articles stated,
there are alternative energy sources such as wind, solar, tidal, geothermal and hydroelectric.
Whether we use nuclear power or not, we must make great strides to produce clean energy in
order to leave earth happy and healthy for our future generations.

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Works Cited
Moore, Patrick. Going Nuclear: A Green Makes the Case. Washingtonpost.com. The
Washington Post Company, 16 Apr. 2006. Web. 17 Mar. 2015.
Dr. Barrett, Bruce and Dr. Vohmann, Monica. Nuclear Power Too Dangerous, Too Costly.
Madison.com. The Cap Times, 14 Apr. 2011. Web. 17 Mar. 2015.