243 Groups Urge Senate to Drop $50B in Nuclear/Coal Pork from Stimulus Bill
CONTACT: Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS)
Michael Mariotte, Executive Director
301-270-6477
243 Groups Urge Senate to Drop $50B in Nuclear/Coal Pork from Stimulus Bill
WASHINGTON – February 4 – Reflecting deepening public and
Congressional concern that the Senate economic stimulus bill contains
too much traditional pork barrel spending with no stimulative effect,
243 organizations and small businesses, and including musicians Bonnie
Raitt, Graham Nash and Paul Winter, today urged the Senate to remove a
provision from the bill that would allow $50 Billion in taxpayer loan
guarantees to fund construction of new nuclear reactors and “clean
coal” projects.
The provision was added to the original bill by the Senate
Appropriations Committee, at the urging of Utah Senator Robert
Bennett, who ironically has announced he will vote against the bill in
any case. A February 3 Washington Post article on the provision and
Bennett’s role is at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/02/AR2009020203162.html
The letter pointed out that the $50 Billion could not provide an
economic stimulus, stating, “This loan guarantee program is already
highly controversial and loaded with money for polluting technologies
like nuclear power and “clean coal.” Adding more money to this program
would have absolutely no stimulative effect on our economy, since no
nuclear reactors or “clean coal” plants can be built over the two year
period supposed to be covered by this bill.”
The groups noted that the Congressional Budget Office has predicted a
50% default rate among utilities that would use the loan guarantee
program to build new reactors. And the groups also pointed out the
little-known fact that the loans would not come from the private
sector, but from the U.S. Treasury itself.
“We also note that the structure of the program is such that the most
expensive and riskiest nuclear projects–those where the utility seeks
the maximum 80% of project costs–would be financed not by private
capital, which will not invest in nuclear power–but directly from the
U.S. Treasury through the Federal Financing Bank. We are not willing
to be bankers for new nuclear reactors or “clean coal” boondoggles.”
The letter and signatories can be viewed at:
http://www.nirs.org/neconomics/lgltrsigners.pdf.
On February 2, 20 national environmental and consumer groups also
urged the Senate to drop the loan guarantee provision. That letter is
at: http://www.nirs.org/neconomics/finalsenateletteronstimulusbill.pdf
