Premier Debate 2016 September/October ld brief

AFF—Phil

Rights

Plans to introduce nuclear power will be accompanied by restrictions on civil liberties.

Martin 7 [Brian; Honorary professorial fellow at the University of Wollongong, Australia; "Opposing Nuclear Power: Past And Present"; 2016. Bmartin.Cc. Accessed August 8 2016. http://www.bmartin.cc/pubs/07sa.html] [Premier]

Should plans for nuclear power ever be rolled out, they will be accompanied by measures to squash opposition: severe penalties for public servants who speak out, severe penalties for trade union bans and consumer boycotts, and severe penalties for protesters. It is possible that violent incidents - perhaps provoked - will be used to justify a crackdown.

Framework

Ethical discussion are key to discussions about nuclear power

Parkins et al 11

[professor at U Alberta in energy and society; energy transition; food security; sustainable agriculture; social impact assessment; natural resource management, “Social and Ethical Considerations of Nuclear Power Development,” University of Alberta, April 2011] [Premier]

Given this focus on risk theory and risk management, definitions of risk are an important first step in understanding the contribution of social science literature to the question of nuclear 3 power. Taken from Rohrmann and Renn (2000), risk is “understood as the possibility that human actions, situations or events might lead to consequences that affect aspects of what humans value” (p.14). The idea of human values is central to this definition. Families, communities, future generations, environments, wildlife, and many other dimensions of human value are wrapped up in questions of nuclear power development. Conversely, if human values are not in question, then we are no longer talking about risks and risk management. Because of this link to values, this paper positions risk assessment and management as an ethical deliberation. A key point here is that risks (and nuclear power more specifically) are inseparably linked to what people consider important to themselves and therefore represent a risk issue in broad terms. Experts, in particular, may argue that probabilities of harm are low from nuclear power, but given the link to human values (and ongoing public concern about nuclear power development), risk management will remain at the heart of the debate about nuclear power development for a long time to come. If risk is understood in terms of the Rohrmann and Renn definition above, then decisions about nuclear energy must weigh between competing value sets as they are put at risk by different nuclear choices. In this sense, ethics is a process of determining what is “good” and how we should develop things in order to facilitate more of the good. Institutions and social interaction implicitly make ethical decisions on a constant basis, but doing ethics is to make these decisions more explicitly, carefully, and with fuller awareness of the goods involved in different choices. Ethics are integral to decision-making and not something done separately. Other considerations – technical issues, economic calculations, possible ecological damage, climate change mitigation, risk assessments and so on – are pieces of information that feed into the decisionmaking about nuclear power. But the decisions cannot be made on technical information alone. Decisions depend on what various actors consider to be “the good” and what value they attach to each of the pieces of information. For example, cost-benefit analyses (which are often calculated in monetary terms) do not automatically decide a matter. If we accept that higher dollar figures on the benefit side show us which decisions to make, an ethical decision about what constitutes “the good” has first been made: the good is that which makes or saves more money. This ethical decision also assumes that all goods and bads can be measured on the single metric of money.

Future Generations

They conflate rights and duties

Wilding 10 [Ethan, candidate at U Waterloo for PhD in philosophy, “The Ethics of Nuclear Power in Canada,” University of Waterloo, 2010] [Premier]

The most plausible solution to justifying obligations to future generations rests in realizing that not all obligations are contractual. As Kristin Shrader-Frechette (2002b) notes, social contracts “exist even when there is no prearranged plan of explicit reciprocity,” such as in the case of familial duties. This can most easily be seen in the parent-child relationship. By agreeing to bear children, parents take on the obligation to care for them. Even though some authors, like Callaghan, think that “children owe their parents a debt in return for their life . . . a parent’s duty is not contingent on the child’s reciprocity. The parents have duties [natural duties, perhaps] regardless of whether they are ever reciprocated” (Shrader-Frechette, 2002b, 102). In other words, there can be duties without rights. The same is true, so the argument from familial obligations proceeds, for future generations. We have a so-called natural duty toward future persons in a manner similar to the duty of care that obtains between a parent and child. Thus, even if future people have no rights, we can still be said to be under duties. For example, animals don’t have rights, yet we are plausibly said to have duties of non-cruelty, especially, toward them. Analogously, it would be cruel to dump a burden of poisonous waste on our descendants.

*For future generations, the duty to do no harm outweighs the positive duty

Taebi 11

Behnam Taebi, prof of philosophy @ Delft University, “The Morally Desirable Option for Nuclear Power Production” Philos. Technol. (2011) 24. [Premier]

We could distinguish between our two duties in terms of the types of goods protected by claiming that the no harm duty has to do with protecting the vital interests linked to the safety and security issues that exposure to radiation will bring. Similarly, the duty to sustain well-being relates to energy resources in the form of goods that could be used to safeguard well-being; we might therefore call them nonvital interests. If we accept this distinction, then the conclusion that in an internal conflict situation the no harm duty has a stronger moral appeal would seem straightforward enough. We have more compelling moral reasons to protect vital rather than non-vital interests. Let us now evaluate whether the distinction presented between the two duties is as clear-cut as has been indicated here; any overlap or interdependency might affect their moral stringency. One can, for instance, argue that if future generations are to enjoy their equal opportunity for well-being, their health and safety first need to be guaranteed. In other words, in order to be able to enjoy the fruits of the resources at their disposal, future generations must first be protected against ionizing radiations (one assumes that also in the future, being exposed to ionizing radiation will lead to serious health problems).12 It is indeed true that the no harm duty is a fundamental prerequisite attached to the duty to sustain welfare, but the scope of the no harm duty is much broader. Endangering the safety and health of people of the future would be wrong, regardless of the duty to sustain well-being. What is so innately morally wrong is the fact that future people whose safety and security are conceivably compromised by exposure to radiation would never be able to enjoy “equal opportunity.” Hence, the distinction in terms of the types of good these duties protect will still apply.

*Discount positive duties to future generations to preserve energy resources – we can’t predict that far

Taebi 11

Behnam Taebi, prof of philosophy @ Delft University, “The Morally Desirable Option for Nuclear Power Production” Philos. Technol. (2011) 24. [Premier]

Another important distinction we should make between the two duties pertains to the time periods (and thus to the number of generations) to which they relate. The duty to sustain wellbeing has been presented as a positive duty relating to the time span during which we could affect the lives of close future generations by influencing the availability of energy resources. However, our knowledge about future energy provision is very limited. Let me illustrate this with an example. There are now 440 nuclear power reactors operational worldwide, and an estimation made in 2010 forecasts that in due course, some 500 new reactors will be built (WNA 2010). These estimations that stem from before the Fukushima accident could turn out to be unreliable, but let us assume—for the sake of argument—that such predictions will be borne out. Even then, our ability to positively affect the well-being of people on the basis of the availability of the necessary energy resources will hardly extend to a hundred years.13 Beyond that period, it is very difficult or, more to the point, virtually impossible to foresee what the energy landscape will look like, let alone to positively affect it. On the other hand, the “no harm duty” as presented here will have a time span of thousands of years, the duration for which nuclear waste is radiotoxic and potentially harmful. Hence, if we cannot comply with both duties simultaneously, the no harm duty will become morally more compelling because of the type of goods it is protecting and because of the time span and the number of generations it involves.

*What future generations will want and need is unpredictable

Taebi 11

Behnam Taebi, prof of philosophy @ Delft University, “The Morally Desirable Option for Nuclear Power Production” Philos. Technol. (2011) 24. [Premier]

In view of these considerations, it seems unjustifiable to impose more risks on the present generation simply in order to reduce the waste lifetime. However, one of the problems with long-term waste disposal is the inherent uncertainty both in terms of technical predictions and regarding future societies. There is enough historical evidence to underpin the notion that we are hardly in a position to anticipate human behavior and the status of future societies a few hundred years from now, let alone 10,000 or 100,000 years on. The question that naturally follows from this is whether this should have a bearing on our moral responsibility towards future generations. Kristian Skagen Ekeli argues that our ignorance with respect to future generations “reduces our responsibility in a temporal dimension because in most areas it is impossible to foresee the interests and resource needs of future generations” (Skagen Ekeli 2004, 442); this corresponds to the way in which Martin Golding (1981, 70) views our duties to future generation as he argues “the more distant the generation we focus upon, the less likely it is that we have an obligation to promote its good.” Skagen Ekeli (2004, 442) argues, on the other hand, that there are things that we could be certain about such as the physiological needs of future people and that it is therefore immoral to impose risks upon future generations that threaten these physiological needs when risk assessment is presented that is “supported by scientifically based harm scenarios.” Even though Skagen Ekeli acknowledges the difficulties that arise from scientific disagreement about harm scenarios, he does not consider this to be an insurmountable problem. Unlike Skagen Ekeli, I argue that in addressing the acceptability of a certain technology with long-term consequences, all the uncertainties and the ensuing problem of disagreement on predictions do pose intractable challenges. This is particularly the case in the foreseeing of the long-term consequences of geological repositories.

*The closer the future generations are, the stronger our duties toward them

Taebi 11

Behnam Taebi, prof of philosophy @ Delft University, “The Morally Desirable Option for Nuclear Power Production” Philos. Technol. (2011) 24. [Premier]

At the same time as acknowledging the difficulties surrounding the long-term uncertainties of technical systems, it has been proposed that we should distinguish between different future people: “a repository must provide reasonable protection and security for the very far future, but this may not necessarily be at levels deemed 185 protective (and controllable) for the current or succeeding generations” (EPA 2005, 49036). People living in the next 10,000 years deserve a level of protection equal to the current level, and the generations belonging to the period extending beyond 10,000 years could be exposed to a much higher radiation limit. The underlying argument for this distinction is sought in the low degree of predictability for the remote future and the fact that any positive influence on such societies is meaningless, all of which is believed to diminish our responsibility towards future generations.22

*Status quo injustice outweighs risk of harming future generations

Taebi 11

Behnam Taebi, prof of philosophy @ Delft University, “The Morally Desirable Option for Nuclear Power Production” Philos. Technol. (2011) 24. [Premier]

If we now accept these arguments by acknowledging that the least well-off in society are indeed exposed to higher environmental risks and if we go on to conclude that the latter violates the norms of distributive justice—as for instance argued by Wigley and Shrader-Frechette (1996) in the case of a uranium enrichment facility in Louisiana—then the question of whether the extending of these activities is justified seems legitimate. To put it bluntly, can we justify increasing the injustice among contemporaries and disadvantaging the least well-off in present-day society in order to reduce the possibility of harming remote future generations? This casts serious doubt on the extent of the moral legitimacy of the prima facie duty of not harming future generations.25 This reasoning is however dubious as it assumes that current injustice should continue. We can argue that if there is a problem surrounding the distribution of burdens and benefits among contemporaries, we need to address and solve this problem irrespective of any additional activity.

A2 State not moral

Rulings on preemption prove Congress has an intent

Henderson 80

George B. II, lawyer, The Nuclear Choice: Are Health and Safety Issues Pre-empted? 8 B.C. Envtl. Aff. L. Rev. 821 (1980), lawdigitalcommons.bc.edu/ealr/vol8/iss4/5 [Premier]

The result of the modern cases has been to shift to Congress the burden of expressing its intent clearly. It is important to note that this establishes an important principle of federalism, one that puts on Congress rather than on the courts the burden of defining the reach of federal power. loa As an unelected body, the Supreme Court is poorly equipped to assess the competing interests of federal and state governments. Congress, on the other hand, in its unique role of simultaneously representing national and state interests, can better elaborate the scope of its laws and can better adjust and readjust their reach through the legislative process. The pre-emption doctrine is more appropriately used with restraint so that Congress, as the more qualified of the branches, will have the greater role in deciding where the proper balance of federal-state power should lie. lOB By refusing to "infer" lightly a congressional intent to pre-empt, the Court forces Congress to clarify its intentions. If the Court errs on the side of not finding a clear enough intent to pre-empt when in fact the intent was there, Congress can subsequently make itself heard.110 But where legislative ambiguity has indicated a failure to resolve issues relating to the federal-state balance of powers, the Court should refrain from substituting its own views of what the proper balance should be. The Supremacy Clause is more properly invoked as a consequence of statutory construction than as a result of judicial conclusions as to proper federal-state relations.lll

Coercion Advantage

Nuclear power requires government subsidies

Schneider et al 11

Mycle – consultant and project coordinator, Antony Frogatt – consultant, Steve Thomas – prof of energy policy @ Greenwich University, “Nuclear Power in a Post-Fukushima World 25 Years After the Chernobyl Accident” World Nuclear Industry Status Report 2010-11, http://www.worldnuclearreport.org/IMG/pdf/2011MSC-WorldNuclearReport-V3.pdf [Premier]

The economics of nuclear power are such that government subsidies are almost always required to support private sector construction of nuclear plants. Yet in many countries that wish to develop nuclear energy, limited government resources compete with pressing needs from health, education, and poverty reduction programs.5 Finally, it must be noted that the investment required for nuclear energy is not restricted to the power stations, but also must support a fully functioning nuclear program, a safe and secure site, supporting power generators, a large water supply, roads and 21 transportation and waste management facilities. An analysis from the Canadian Centre of International Governance Innovation (CIGI) suggests that “[r]eaching just a fraction of these milestones, requiring them to invest billions of dollars on infrastructure upgrades for several years, will be impossible for most SENES [emerging nuclear] states.”6

Consumers will be forced to pay

Schneider et al 11

Mycle – consultant and project coordinator, Antony Frogatt – consultant, Steve Thomas – prof of energy policy @ Greenwich University, “Nuclear Power in a Post-Fukushima World 25 Years After the Chernobyl Accident” World Nuclear Industry Status Report 2010-11, http://www.worldnuclearreport.org/IMG/pdf/2011MSC-WorldNuclearReport-V3.pdf [Premier]

The cost of capital is perhaps the most important—and most variable—element in the economics of nuclear energy. The capital cost depends in part on the credit ratings of both the country and the power utility in question; countries with more stable economies tend to get lower interest rates, as do utilities that have sounder finances. But the structure of the electricity industry is a factor as well. In countries that have traditional monopoly utilities, consumers effectively bear the project risk because any incurred costs are passed on—allowing for full-cost recovery. For financiers, this is the ideal situation, as consumers always pay. Some markets, such as those in most developing countries and some U.S. states, still assume full-cost recovery, making the financing of new nuclear build possible.