In a report I recently wrote with Carlo Stagnaro from the Italian think tank, Istituto Bruno Leoni, we explain the obvious: nuclear power is much less expensive than solar power.
This report was necessary because of the sloppy media coverage of a recent study by the anti-nuclear power advocacy group, NC WARN, which argued that solar power is less expensive than nuclear power.
The New York Times ran an article on the report that was so biased the paper was forced to write what amounted to an apology for the article. Here’s the mea culpa by the Times:
Editors’ Note: August 3, 2010
An article published July 27 in an Energy Special Report analyzed the costs of nuclear energy production. It quoted a study that found that electricity from solar photovoltaic systems could now be produced less expensively than electricity from new nuclear power plants. In raising several questions about this issue and the economics of nuclear power, the article failed to point out, as it should have, that the study was prepared for an environmental advocacy group, which, according to its Web site, is committed to ??tackling the accelerating crisis posed by climate change ? along with the various risks of nuclear power.?? The article also failed to take account of other studies that have come to contrasting conclusions, or to include in the mix of authorities quoted any who elaborated on differing analyses of the economics of energy production.
Although the article did quote extensively from the Web site of the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry group, representatives of the institute were not given an opportunity to respond to the claims of the study. This further contributed to an imbalance in the presentation of this issue.
I wish this type of biased environmental reporting was the exception, but unfortunately, it is the rule.
