If there is one thing I know about politics it is this: persistence is usually rewarded (persistence can also be its own reward, but we'll save that discussion for a different day).  On a personal level, I've lost four elections - but, if I gave up after my first loss, I never would have won nine elections.  Similarly, some bills that I authored failed the first time out but are now law because I tried again. 

Perhaps the same will someday be said of my effort to lift California's nuclear power ban.  Earlier this year my first nuclear power bill was unceremoniously defeated in the Natural Resources Committee after the chairwoman, Assemblymember Hancock (a former Berkeley mayor), cut me off mid-sentence in my opening remarks.  I then wrote a nuclear power ballot initiative.  We pulled back on the nuclear power initiative when three rounds of opinion polls showed support at around the 50 percent level - too soft to pass a controversial initiative.  Finally, when the Governor called for a special session on water, I wrote another bill to allow a new nuclear reactor to power a desalination plant in San Diego County.  As with most of the bills in the special session, this one was never even heard. 

So, what has a year's worth of effort on advocating nuclear power as a way for California to generate reliable, cost-effective and safe power that also emits the least amount of lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions achieved?  We now have nuclear power at the table and being considered. 

Yesterday in San Diego the Senate Committee on Energy, Utilities and Communications chaired by State Sen. Christine Kehoe (D-San Diego) held its first hearing on nuclear power in more than 20 years.  Participating in the hearing were committee Vice Chairman Sen. Bob Dutton-R, Sen. Ron Calderon-D, and myself (as a courtesy extended by Sen. Kehoe).  In his opening remarks Sen. Calderon matter-of-factly stated that nuclear power has a role to play in meeting California's energy needs while reducing greenhouse gas emissions.  I couldn't agree more with a Democrat. 

In my opening statement I pointed out how California is the most electrically efficient of the 50 states and third most energy efficient overall.  Further, that last year's legislation to require a doubling of our renewably generated electricity to 20 percent by 2010 (seven years earlier than first planned), eliminate coal-generated power, and reduce greenhouses gas emissions by 25 percent in 13 years will greatly increase energy costs.  I pointed out that energy costs, along with taxes, regulation, workers compensation costs, labor costs, housing costs and the lawsuit environment, all factor into business decisions on where to invest and add jobs.  One would think that environmentalists would want goods and services produced in California, given that items produced here do far less harm to the environment than in Nevada, much less China or India.  "It's all the same planet," I said.  With four-to-five new reactors the electricity sector could meet its greenhouse gas reduction targets while nine-to-ten new reactors would allow us to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 25.5 million metric tons by offloading emissions from the transportation sector through use of electric vehicles and hydrogen-powered cars.  I concluded my remarks with a call to reprocess spent fuel as the French do, using up plutonium-239 thus avoiding having to store it for 200,000 years.  I also pointed out that the Russians are making electricity out of 37 metric tons of bomb-grade plutonium, using it up in the process.  We are starting to do the same as well. 

We took testimony from Southern California Edison (SCE), Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E), the Nuclear Energy Institute, the California Energy Commission, the Sierra Club, and others.  One of the more convincing experts was SCE's Richard Rosenblum, who, as Senior Vice President, Generation, is responsible for providing six percent of California's power with the two nuclear reactors at San Onofre.  Wholly unconvincing in his testimony was Carl Zichella, the Regional Field Director of the Sierra Club.  Perhaps it was my 13 years in the aerospace industry or my 24 years as a military intelligence officer, but using a large number of scary sounding adjectives does not make up for an utter lack of data.  Mr. Zichella's testimony and that of his anti-nuclear coreligionist, Dan Hirsch, reminded me of a couple of kids telling ghost stories trying to scare the hell out of each other.  Entertaining, yes.  Factual, no. 

It's taken a year of effort to get a powerful senate committee chair to hold the first hearing on nuclear power in more than 20 years.  It may be a truism, but with another year of effort we'll be another year closer to using the power of nuclear energy to meet California's ambitious global greenhouse gas reduction targets. 

Yesterday's hearing generated two articles in the San Diego press.  One by the San Diego Union-Tribune entitled, "Nuclear power back in spotlight" (see: http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20071211/news_1b11nuclear.html).  This was a nice follow-up to the Union-Tribune's editorial of last week entitled, "Kudoes to Kehoe" (see http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20071206/news_lz1ed6top.html).  While the Voice of San Diego published a piece titled, "After Two Decades, OK to Say 'Nuclear'" (see: http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/articles/2007/12/11/environment/910nuclear121107.txt).

All the best,

Chuck DeVore
State Assemblyman, 70th District
www.ChuckDeVore.com
www.PowerForCalifornia.com