by Joan King
8/27/13 Gainesville — Opinions — we all have them. I wish I could find some acceptable way to repeat the standard joke about opinions, but this is a respectable family paper. If you don’t know what I am talking about, ask a friend.

This is the Opinion page, and the Times does not censor its readers’ opinions as long as they are not lewd or libelous. The Times prints them all, and the page is one of the most popular parts of the paper. But please remember, saying doesn’t make it so. In other words, don’t confuse opinion with fact.

Read the whole article: Gainesville Times

by Mark Bittman
8/23/13 – There is a new discussion about nuclear energy, prompted by well-founded concerns about carbon emissions and fueled by a pro-nuclear documentary called “Pandora’s Promise.” Add a statement by James E. Hansen — who famously sounded the alarm on climate change — and, of course, industry propaganda, and presto: We Love Nukes.

Before we all become pro-nuclear greens, however, you’ve got to ask three questions: Is nuclear power safe and clean? Is it economical? And are there better alternatives?

No, no and yes. So let’s not swap the pending environmental disaster of climate change for another that may be equally risky.

Read the whole article: New York Times

by Scott Judy
8/21/13 ENR – Favorable economics for natural gas-fired energy production is putting pressure on builders of Georgia’s $14-billion Plant Vogtle nuclear expansion project, with Southern Co. and contractor CB&I facing heightened scrutiny as they deal with continuing cost and schedule overruns.

Philip Hayet, a Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) analyst, summed up the changed fiscal environment when he testified in early August that, “if a decision had to be made today to build a new nuclear project, it would not be justified.”

Read the whole article: Engineering News-Record

by Julie M. Rodriguez
8/16/13 — Conservatives in Georgia were in for a shock in July when they saw Atlanta Tea Party members hanging out with representatives of the Sierra Club. According to Debbie Dooley in an article for Grist, this is just one of the Tea Party’s latest attempts to champion the free market.

Dooley calls it “The Green Tea Coalition.” It’s a partnership of free-market loving conservatives and environmental activists working toward a common goal: lifting state restrictions on renewable energy and allowing residents the choice of running their homes on clean power.

Read the whole article: TruthOut

By Debbie Dooley
8/12/13 GRIST – Some people may have done a double take on July 11 when they saw me and fellow members of the Atlanta Tea Party celebrating next to the Sierra Club as it was announced that Georgia’s largest energy provider will invest in a huge increase in solar power. Why was the Tea Party rallying with groups across the aisle like the Sierra Club?

It’s time for a new party. I’m calling it the Green Tea Coalition.

The premise is simple: Those who believe in the free market need to reexamine the way our country produces energy. Giant utility monopolies deserve at least some competition, and consumers should have a choice. It’s just that simple, and it’s consistent with the free-market principles that have been a core value of the Tea Party since we began in 2009.

Read the whole article: GRIST.com

by Tom Ferguson
8/12/13 ATLANTA – The Georgia legislature, in its great (yawn) wisdom, saw fit to grant Georgia Power the power to charge us ratepayers in advance for two nuclear reactors. The 16 billion dollar plus reactors are under construction at Plant Vogtle on the Savannah River just south of Augusta. CWIP (Construction Work in Progress) was passed as the Georgia Nuclear Energy Financing Act.

In testifying at the committee level many citizens argued against the proposal brought by a legislator, known technically as a lapdog. One participant’s testimony was rather brief, to wit:

The apparently irresistible lobbying and campaign contributions that seduced national legislators into signing onto privatization and deregulation schemes over the past decades brought us to the economic melt-down we are now just beginning to enjoy. The push for SB31 is more of the same. I hope you’ll consider that history and two other things in your deliberations: Nuclear power is the wrong horse; This bill is an industry fantasy and a consumer rip-off.

Truer words were never spoken.

Read the whole article: Like the Dew

by Gloria Tatum
8/10/13 (APN) DECATUR — The Green Tea Coalition (GTC) was launched Tuesday, August 06, 2013 at the Atlanta Friends Meeting House, 701 West Howard Avenue in Decatur, Georgia.

Over one hundred people attended from the right, left, and middle of the political spectrum, from all around the State of Georgia, from Savannah in South Georgia to Ringgold in the north.

It is an unexpected mongrel mixture of advocates coming together to raise awareness for cooperation to achieve everyone’s mutual goals.  The GTC attendees do not agree on many issues, but plan to focus on common ground to protect the environment, the economy, their children and grandchildren, and to help Georgia move into the twenty-first century with clean, safe, renewable energy solutions.

Read the whole article: Atlanta Progressive News

by Gloria Tatum
8/2/13 (APN) ATLANTA — On July 18, 2013 the Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) held the first of two scheduled hearings on Georgia Power’s request to pass 381 million dollars in cost overruns, in connection with the construction of two new nuclear reactors at Plant Vogtle, onto ratepayers, in the form of higher electricity bills.

Georgia Power had also asked the PSC to change the certified cost, or budget, to complete the project from 6.11 billion dollars to 6.85 billion dollars, adding another 737 million to the current, or first amended, budget for the new reactors.

The PSC has a second scheduled hearing on August 13 and 14, 2013.  The subject of the hearings is who will eventually pay the hundreds of millions in cost overruns: the public; or the company and its shareholders.

 Read the whole story: Atlanta Progressive News