As New York scrambles to transition away from burning fossil fuels, nuclear energy is in the spotlight.
Last month, officials with the state energy authority, NYSERDA, announced the agency had begun gauging interest from companies who may want to develop nuclear power plants in New York.
Weeks earlier, Governor Kathy Hochul noted that new nuclear plants could help power technology companies in the state.
“We recognize that now is the time to position New York to fully engage this new sector,” said Doreen Harris, NYSERDA’s president and CEO, in a statement. The aim, she added, is to “support the increased deployment of renewables as we work toward a zero-emission grid of the future.”
New York has committed to achieving 100% emissions-free electricity by 2040, which means that no electricity would come from fossil fuel sources like oil and gas. The commitment is part of the state’s nation-leading climate law, passed in 2019, which aims to reduce the state’s greenhouse gas emissions.
But meeting those commitments poses a stark challenge. Already, official reports indicate that the state is unlikely to meet its key deadline of obtaining 70% of its electricity from renewable sources like wind and solar by 2030.
Research shows New York’s energy needs are expected to grow in the coming years, and renewable energy sources will likely not be able to keep up with demand.
That's why some officials and nuclear energy industry advocates say building more nuclear reactors, which generate electricity without creating climate-warming emissions, could play a key role in filling the state's energy needs.
“Nuclear has to be part of this,” said Dietmar Detering, chair of Nuclear New York, which advocates for nuclear energy’s expansion. “And now the state is getting it.”
A controversial approach
Though generating nuclear power doesn’t create the climate-warming carbon emissions that come from burning oil and gas, many environmentalists have concerns about building more of it. That’s because nuclear accidents can be extremely harmful, nuclear waste is dangerous, and nuclear power plants are expensive and generally take a very long time to build.
Currently, four nuclear reactors along Lake Ontario provide one-fifth of the state’s electricity.
But the state has faced problems with other nuclear power facilities in the past. The Shoreham nuclear plant, built on Long Island in the 1970s, cost nearly $6 billion and never opened because of concerns there would be no safe evacuation route if something went wrong. Ratepayers are still paying for the debt.
The state also closed the Indian Point nuclear power facility in 2021 after years of concerns about the potential health and safety threat it posed to residents of New York City and the Hudson Valley. Since then, environmental groups have filed lawsuits alleging continued environmental and health threats from the facility, including plans to release wastewater with traces of radioactive materials into the Hudson River.
“We have a long and very troubled experience with nuclear in the past,” said Raya Salter, a member of the state’s Climate Action Council, which created a roadmap for how New York should meet its climate commitments. “Going into an increasingly climate unstable and geopolitically unstable world, continuing to build these facilities, I think, continues to pose more threat.”
In September, more than 150 environmental groups signed onto a letter to Hochul opposing nuclear development. The groups stated that nuclear energy is too slow, expensive, and dangerous to be an effective solution to New York’s energy needs.
But in the meantime, nuclear power has gained support nationwide. Last month, the Biden administration announced it wanted to triple nuclear energy production by 2050. In 2022, the federal government set aside billions of dollars to fund nuclear research and incentivize development of nuclear energy technologies under the Inflation Reduction Act.
The energy equation
Many environmentalists, including Salter, hope to see the state focus on building more renewable energy, like solar and wind power, to reduce its emissions. Those are the recommendations laid out in the state’s official plan to meet its climate targets, called the Climate Action Plan.
“There are concrete steps that we should be taking,” she said, referring to the plans to expand renewables. “In my opinion, opening up the nuclear Pandora's box isn't a productive one.”
But as New York’s energy needs grow, renewable power alone is unlikely to meet the state’s demands, according to Lindsay Anderson, a professor of biological and environmental engineering at Cornell University.
“That's the big topic right now,” said Anderson. “How do we fill that gap, and how big is that gap?”
Anderson and her students have built a model of what the state’s energy needs will likely look like in the coming decades. Their research has found that even if the state builds as much wind and solar as the Climate Action Council has recommended, and builds batteries to store some of that energy, it still won’t be enough.
Anderson believes that looking into expanding nuclear power makes sense as a way to fill that need.
“I don't think we should stop investing in renewables and just go all nuclear,” said Anderson. “But I think there is definitely a place for it in this conversation.”