Scaremongering

So according to Dr Richard Dixon (Inside Environment, 1 September), isotopes will fly with evil intent towards Glasgow following the possible disintegration of the Hunterston reactors.

This, I think, we could put down to scaremongering when rational argument fails to fit the purpose. Cracking of the graphite bricks in a reactor core, like wear and tear in any machinery, is an expected process which is constantly monitored and will eventually lead to decommissioning.

Many years ago on this page I expressed surprise that the Scottish Government would not allow new nuclear reactors because they were “dirty, dangerous and expensive“(cods wall op) yet was quite happy to allow the existing ones to operate far beyond their original lifetime, the reason, of course, being that they were needed, as they still are .

I wonder how manypeople are aware that renewable energy has seen off far more lives directly and through long-term illness than nuclear, including Chernobyl.

Here are just a few examples. In 1975 a Chinese hydropower dam burst killed about a quarter of a million; the deaths and long term illnesses resulting from extraction, again in China, of metals for wind turbine construction are of course, covered up, but are probably in the thousands. Even our own little pumped storage scheme at Ben Cruachan killed about three dozen, and hundreds more ended up with chronic lung disease.

That Scotland could “run on 100 percent renewable energy” simply indicates that Dr Dixon needs to talk to a power engineer.

Indeed, I like his argument that current electricity generation is so over capacity that we need to pay to have it turned off ,but need to keep piling on the windmills!

(DR) A MCCORMICK Kirkland Road, Terregles