lecture

1. Cara Daggett
(caranew@gmail.com)
Office Hours:
Thursday after class
(til @ 7pm) – Gilman
atrium
Energy
&
Global
Politics
October 27,
2015

2. Class Outline
Today:
- Thesis Sharing
- Nuclear History to Present (Lecture)
- Debate Preparations
Thursday:
- Debates: Nuclear Power pro and con
- Natural Gas Zombie
- Peer Reviews Assigned

3. Paper Dates
First Papers (due today, Oct 27)
Peer Reviews:
- Assigned Thurs, Oct 29
- Due Thurs, Nov. 5
My Feedback:
- Paper Remarks Returned (week of Nov. 10)
- Sign up Genius this weekend (Nov. 12, 16, 17)
Final Papers (due Dec. 11)
- Expand first papers
- 10-12 pages

4. Nuclear Propaganda
Walt Disney: “Our Friend, the Atom”

5. Nuclear Accidents & Protest
Nuclear Plants ordered in U.S. (1953-
2008): 253
- 48% cancelled
- 11% shut down prematurely
- 14% = 1+ year outages
- 27% = operated without outage
1979: Three Mile Island
1986: Chernobyl
2011: Fukushima

6. Global Nuclear Power

7. Global Nuclear Power

8. Nuclear & the 1970s Oil Crisis
Emergence of Three Systems:
- Economy (@ 1930s)
- Energy (1970s)
- Environment (1970s)

9. Global Nuclear Power

10. Brand: Eco-pragmatism
• Energy problems as engineering ‘design problems’
o “Define them, frame them in a way that is solvable, solve the damn things,
and once you’ve got a solution, act on it.” (Brand, 91)

11. Do Artifacts Have Politics?
(Langdon Winner)
• Technological things as
“ways of building order in
our world.”(28)
• Early Flexibility before
‘lock in’
– “For that reason the same
careful attention one
would give to the rules,
roles, and relationships of
politics must also be given
to” [technological systems]
(29)

12. Nuclear Footprint
Source: Nuclear Energy Institute

15. Radioactive Fears
““From the perspective of the young, nuclear is just another
technology, to be judged on how well it works, not on antiquated
obsessions of their elders.” (Brand, 90)

16. Planetary Danger: Humans vs. Radiation

17. Recent Nuclear Updates
Nuclear Renaissance in Peril?
- Fukushima
- Iran
- Recession
- Natural Gas

18. Nuclear Debate
WASTE
WEAPONS
DEMOCRACY
Proposition:
“Nuclear power should be a key fuel in the ‘green’ solution to
climate change.”