164 The Environmental Debate
mining,” because within less than a century there
will be very little left to mine—no copper, no tin,
no lead, no mercury, no zinc, and so on. In the
desperate search for substitutes, the most fruitful
source would be plastics and organic chemicals.
But these are made from coal, oil, and gas, which
we are now simply burning up at a rate of mil-
lions of tons each [and] every day. Wouldn’t it be
much better if we instead burned uranium, which
has no other important uses, leaving the coal, oil,
and gas for future generations to use as a source
of materials they will so sorely need?Source: Bernard L. Cohen, Before It’s Too Late: A
Scientist’s Case for Nuclear Energy (New York: Plenum,
1983), pp. 1-2, 4-5.problems could be largely eliminated by large-
scale use of nuclear power. The tragedy of the
misunderstanding deepens.
As we project into the future, the tragedy
multiplies. Burning coal, oil, and gas is caus-
ing earthshaking climatic changes that could
eventually turn our Midwestern grain belt into
a desert, and flood out our coastal cities—New
York, Miami, New Orleans, Houston, Los Ange-
les, and a host of others. Nuclear power could
prevent this if the misunderstandings about its
dangers could be eliminated.
The most important problem for our distant
progeny will be a shortage of materials that we
now obtain by mining. We are now consuming
the world’s scarce mineral resources at a voracious
rate; indeed our era has been called “the age of
DOCUMENT 132: Bob Graham on Restoring the Kissimmee
River—Lake Okeechobee—Everglades Ecosystem (1983)For more than a hundred years, south Florida wetlands have been subject to draining, channelization, and other
manipulations that severely stress the region’s entire ecosystem and disrupt the natural quantity and timing of the
flow of water into the system. Agricultural runoff further compromises water quality. In August 1983 Florida’s
governor, Bob Graham, proposed a long-term restoration program to save the Everglades, and in November he
issued an executive order to move the program forward. Graham’s program, which took into account the needs
of the whole south Florida ecosystem, was the kind of wide-ranging program for the area advocated by Marjory
Stoneman Douglas in the 1940s [see Document 85] but which had failed to gain adequate public support.
Since the issuing of Graham’s executive order, progress in restoring the Kissimmee River—Lake Okeechobee—
Everglades ecosystem has often been stymied by political opposition and bureaucratic inertia. On the bright side,
all lands needed (102,061 acres) for the restoration of the river have been acquired; continuous flow has been
established in the project area; much of the planned back-filling has been completed; more than forty square
miles of the river-flood plain ecosystem has been restored, including almost 20,000 acres of wetlands and forty-
six miles of the historic river channel;^8 and long-absent wildlife has returned to the Kissimmee Basin.
In the Everglades, the restoration task has been more difficult and progress slower. Following a federal lawsuit,
the state of Florida built 45,000 acres of water treatment areas to improve the quality of agricultural runoff, and
the Corps of Engineers developed a new plan to improve water flow into Everglades National Park. In 2008 Gov.
Charlie Crist implemented a much-compromised proposal with the purchase of 27,000 acres for water treatment.
The Kissimmee River—Lake Okeechobee—Everglades plan is but one of several environmental restoration
projects undertaken around the country to undo carefully planned and frequently government sanctioned
manipulations of ecosystems.A. “Save Our Everglades” Issue Paper
The Kissimmee River, once gently meander-
ing for 90 miles from Lake Kissimmee to Lake
Okeechobee, was channelized in the 1960[’s] by the
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers at the request of the
State. This one-time paradise of fish and wildlife is
now a 48-mile canal, 30 feet deep and 200 feet wide,
commonly known as the “Kissimmeem Ditch.”