regard to physical climate change considerations. Ex-
panding the nation’s nuclear capacity to meet more
than 20% of the demand in the electric energy sector
could help further reduce GHG emissions.
This section also shows that while a paradigm
shift to power a portion of the transportation sector
with electricity via EVs or PHEVs would benefit en-
ergy independence, it could actually worsen GHG
emissions in a region, unless a significant percentage
of the electricity in that region is generated with fuel
sources cleaner than today’s coal plants. Since nuclear
plant design may take advantage of a number of cool-
ing system alternatives, the usage of large amounts of
fresh water for cooling might only be chosen where
this resource is not scarce. However, when nuclear
plants are located in coastal areas, considerations for
natural disaster events, such as tsunami, must be tak-
en into account and mitigated. If this is not properly
considered, then the public and political good will to
add nuclear capacity, motivated by its benefit to com-
bating climate change, can be negated by an incident
like that currently unfolding in Japan.
Economics
When it comes to national security considerations
and economics, it is generally accepted that the health-
ier a nation’s economy, the more robust its capacity to
address national security issues. Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, is credited with
stating: “Our national debt is our biggest national se-
curity threat” (CNN 2010a). Relating energy, econom-
ics, and security, The JOE states:
Another potential effect of an energy crunch could
be a prolonged U.S. recession which could lead to