Apple launched its 2022 Earth Day initiative Thursday with $1 for every Apple Pay transaction until the environmental holiday on April 22 donated to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), an explicitly anti-nuclear group.
“WWF has a vision for the future which phases out the use of fossil fuel and nuclear in the
share of energy use across the globe,” reads a 2003 position paper from the non-profit outlining a stance maintained nearly 20 years later.
The WWF promotion was highlighted by energy author Alex Epstein on Twitter as merely the latest example of Apple promoting an anti-nuclear agenda. The company deceptively promotes its operations as run entirely on renewable energy, which excludes nuclear power, with the purchase of green credits from other consumers on local power grids to provide a cover for its use of reliable coal and natural gas.
Green pursuit of a low-carbon future absent the introduction of more nuclear power on existing grids is nothing but a fantasy. Today nuclear power generates nearly 20 percent of U.S. electricity and more than half the nation’s carbon-free energy from 93 reactors, according to the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI). In contrast, the Department of Energy reports wind and solar produce 12 percent. While nuclear reactors maintain the ability to produce stable output, solar panels and wind turbines are dependent on weather.
Over-reliance on unreliable wind and solar has triggered short-term energy crises in Europe and California. Europe’s dependence on Russian fuel to generate instantaneous power when weather-dependent sources failed while shutting down nuclear plants has further constrained the West’s diplomacy with President Vladimir Putin waging war in Ukraine. The U.S. runs the risk of a similar dependency on Russian resources without diversifying its uranium supply to fuel the nation’s nuclear reactors. Forty-six percent of U.S. uranium comes from Russian-backed states.
Embracing nuclear, however, remains the only environmentally sustainable solution to a lower-carbon future, with plants requiring 300 to 400 times less land than that required to mass-produce from wind and solar, according to an analysis from Environmental Progress’s Michael Shellenberger.
Last week, a wind power company was fined millions after it pled guilty to killing at least 150 protected eagles.
Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com.
