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average, up to 7 million prevented
deaths and 240 gigatonnes
of prevented carbon emissions if it
replaces coal (Figures lb and 2b).
Our findings also have important
implications for large-scale fuel
switching to natural gas from coal
or from nuclear - an increasingly
common phenomenon. Although
natural gas buming emits less fatal
pollutants and greenhouse gases than
coal burning, it is actually much
more harmful than nuclear power,
causing about 40 times more deaths
per unit electric energy produced5.
Furthermore, for reasons discussed
in our paper (and subsequent peer-
reviewed papers), widespread and
unconstrained use of natural gas is
likely to actually worsen the climate
problem, contrary to popular belief’.
Another recentiy published, peer-
reviewed scientific paper7 examined
a similar question by taking a
substantially different approach. The
authors used a global climate-aerosol
model to quantify the air pollution-
induced mortality and global climate
change that would result if world
nuclear power was replaced entirely
by coal power. Their findings suggest
that an average of 150,000 deaths
per year were prevented globally by
nuclear power between 2005-2009,
with 2/3 of them in Europe. Despite
the very different methods used in
their study and ours, the two sets of
estimates are very similar, thereby
enhancing their order-of-magnitude
quantitative credibility.
Fundamentally, both of these
studies’ findings stem from the fact
that coal (and natural gas) cause
far more fatalities than nuclear
per unit of energy produced.
Furthermore, despite widespread
public misconceptions, nuclear
energy has caused very few actual
Europe America Europe
Figure 1. Cumulative net deaths prevented assuming nuclear power replaces fossil fuels. Results for
(a) the historical period in our study (1971-2009), (b) the high-end and (c) low-end projections of nu
clear power supply by IAEA for the period 2010-2050. Error bars reflect the ranges for the fossil fuel
mortality factors listed in Table 1 of our paper. The larger values in panels (b) and (c) reflect a sce-
nario in which all of the projected nuclear supplants coal (“all coal”), while the smaller values reflect
an “ail gas” scenario (the latter are unlabeled because they are all ~10x lower than the corresponding
all-coal cases). Countries/regions are arranged in descending order of C02 emissions in recent years.
FSU15=15 countries of the Former Soviet Union and OECD=Organization for Economic Cooperation
and Development (13 countries in this case).
I
3
u
Worid FarEast Weslem North South Asia Eastem
Europe America Europe
Figure 2. Cumulative net greenhouse gas emissions prevented assuming nuclear power replaces fossil
fuels. Same panel arrangement as Figure 1, except mean values for both cases (all coal and all gas) are
labeled. Error bars reflect the ranges for the fossil fuel emission factors listed in Table 1 of our paper.
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