Four climate scientists, three of whom have published in peer-reviewed literature on energy issues (a sampler from Wigley, Hansen and Caldeira), are pressing the case for environmental groups to embrace the need for a new generation of nuclear power plants in a letter they distributed overnight to a variety of organizations and journalists.

Amory Lovins, Joe Romm and Mark Jacobson would disagree, I’d bet. I certainly know many other energy and climate analysts who would sign on in a heartbeat, including the physics Nobel laureate Burt Richter and Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz.

Here’s the text of the letter, by Kenneth Caldeira of the Carnegie Institution, Kerry Emanuel at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, James E. Hansen of Columbia University and Tom Wigley of the National Center for Atmospheric Research and the University of Adelaide*:

To those influencing environmental policy but opposed to nuclear power: As climate and energy scientists concerned with global climate change, we are writing to urge you to advocate the development and deployment of safer nuclear energy systems. We appreciate your organization’s concern about global warming, and your advocacy of renewable energy. But continued opposition to nuclear power threatens humanity’s ability to avoid dangerous climate change. We call on your organization to support the development and deployment of safer nuclear power systems as a practical means of addressing the climate change problem. Global demand for energy is growing rapidly and must continue to grow to provide the needs of developing economies. At the same time, the need to sharply reduce greenhouse gas emissions is becoming ever clearer. We can only increase energy supply while simultaneously reducing greenhouse gas emissions if new power plants turn away from using the atmosphere as a waste dump. Renewables like wind and solar and biomass will certainly play roles in a future energy economy, but those energy sources cannot scale up fast enough to deliver cheap and reliable power at the scale the global economy requires. While it may be theoretically possible to stabilize the climate without nuclear power, in the real world there is no credible path to climate stabilization that does not include a substantial role for nuclear power We understand that today’s nuclear plants are far from perfect. Fortunately, passive safety systems and other advances can make new plants much safer. And modern nuclear technology can reduce proliferation risks and solve the waste disposal problem by burning current waste and using fuel more efficiently. Innovation and economies of scale can make new power plants even cheaper than existing plants. Regardless of these advantages, nuclear needs to be encouraged based on its societal benefits. Quantitative analyses show that the risks associated with the expanded use of nuclear energy are orders of magnitude smaller than the risks associated with fossil fuels. No energy system is without downsides. We ask only that energy system decisions be based on facts, and not on emotions and biases that do not apply to 21st century nuclear technology. While there will be no single technological silver bullet, the time has come for those who take the threat of global warming seriously to embrace the development and deployment of safer nuclear power systems as one among several technologies that will be essential to any credible effort to develop an energy system that does not rely on using the atmosphere as a waste dump. With the planet warming and carbon dioxide emissions rising faster than ever, we cannot afford to turn away from any technology that has the potential to displace a large fraction of our carbon emissions. Much has changed since the 1970s. The time has come for a fresh approach to nuclear power in the 21st century. We ask you and your organization to demonstrate its real concern about risks from climate damage by calling for the development and deployment of advanced nuclear energy. Sincerely, Dr. Ken Caldeira, Senior Scientist, Department of Global Ecology, Carnegie Institution Dr. Kerry Emanuel, Atmospheric Scientist, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Dr. James Hansen, Climate Scientist, Columbia University Earth Institute Dr. Tom Wigley, Climate Scientist, University of East Anglia and the National Center for Atmospheric Research

There’s more from Caldeira in a recorded video chat we had awhile back:

I also encourage you to read Vaclav Smil’s excellent recent IEEE Spectrum piece examining the relative speed at which different energy options can be scaled up.

Smil sent this note after reading the piece. I tend to agree with him on the tough realities facing nuclear in most of the West:

As I have said many times: in the Western world nuclear energy has been de facto dead for decades, now it is also getting de jure dead, with its outlawing in Germany and (even in the best case) severe curtailing in Japan. I cannot see — with essentially saturated U.S. energy demand, cheap gas, abundant oil and slow but continuing incursions of solar and wind – anybody rushing into U.S. nuclear in any big way. So we are down to this: nuclear futures dominated by China, Russia, India, Iran and North Korea: good luck with that.

Over on Facebook, Lynda Williams criticized me for not mentioning Ken Caldeira’s relationship with Bill Gates’s nuclear energy projects. I sent him the comment and he offered this reply (which could be of value to readers here, as well):

Speaking out on unpopular issues is a cost to me, not a benefit. Part of the cost is that some people who don’t like the message decide to try to undermine the messenger. My wife wishes that I had the sort of relationship with Bill Gates and Nathan Myhrvold that your reader imagines, in which personal enrichment is a likely outcome of me making utterances that they find pleasing. For better or worse, such is not the nature of things. Bill Gates does, indirectly, give money to Carnegie Instiution for Science primarily to support postdoctoral researchers in my group working on a range of climate and energy issues. I believe this is a consequence of the quality and relevance of my science, and is not dependent on my political views. As part of my normal Carnegie Institution for Science job, I have a working scientific relationship with Nathan Myhvold of Intellectual Ventures. In the interest of full disclosure: over the last year, I did receive $1500 from Intellectual Ventures, for consulting on issues related to climate and agriculture. I have no financial relationship with TerraPower.

Postscript, Feb. 3, 6:05 p.m. | A rebuttal to this letter has been posted by three Japanese researchers and Japan’s former lead climate-treaty negotiator.