African Americans and Nuclear Power 
The African American Environmentalist Association supports nuclear power. Our position on
nuclear power started with a comprehensive assessment of the issue over a twenty-two year period by AAEA president Norris McDonald.
In 1991, he became a chronic asthmatic and has faced death in the intensive care unit more than once.
His preteen son inherited asthma and has experienced serious symptoms.
Moreover, statistics show that asthma is rising significantly in the general population and asthma deaths are increasing, particularly in the black community.
McDonald believes that his chronic condition started as a result of warming temperatures in 1991, the hottest year on record at the time, and air pollution from mobile sources.
He did not have a car in the summer of 1991 and relied on bus and rail service.
Unfortunately, standing at a bus stop on nonattainment days can give healthy people asthma. It turned a person with virtually no asthma problems into an acute, chronic asthmatic.
Mr. McDonald went into respiratory arrest in an ambulance on the way to the hospital on July 21, 1991.
In the 1980’s, Mr. McDonald worked for an environmental organization with the largest team of nonprofit, public interest energy lobbyists in the United States, the Environmental Policy Center, now Friends of the Earth. EPC’s large antinuclear team included some of the most recognized experts in the world. McDonald headed the Energy Conservation and Transportation Project at the time and led the fight to maintain Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFÉ) Standards. McDonald testified in the U.S. Senate at the confirmation hearing of former President Ronald Reagan’s Department of Energy Secretary Herrington. Global warming was not an issue on the environmental community’s radar screen in 1980.
CALVERT CLIFFS NUCLEAR POWER PLANT on the Chesapeake Bay. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) approved the Calvert Cliffs license extension on March 23, 2000, making it the first of six current U.S. nuclear power plants to achieve license renewal.
AAEA President featured in American Nuclear Society (Click
Feb Issue)
Nuclear News magazine
There is now a general consensus in the scientific community that global warming and global climate change due to manmade influences are real. Asthma appears to be rising with these changes in our atmosphere. AAEA believes that summer smog is the single worst factor, behind cigarette smoking, in creating respiratory problems in the United States. Rush hour traffic creates these dirty air (nonattainment) days. You can see the air in every major American city during summer months. The 200 million cars and trucks we drive each day are creating unhealthy and even deadly conditions for about 150 million Americans. The great benefit to America is that rush hour literally drives our economy. We can’t stop rush hour. We can, however, change the hydrocarbon based pollution coming from the tailpipes of our vehicles.
America uses 16-17 million barrels of oil every single day. About half of that comes from imports. A significant portion of our imports comes from the Middle East. Although we have about 550 million barrels of oil in our Strategic Petroleum Reserve (underground in Texas and Louisiana), a supply disruption from OPEC and Arab nations would cripple America in a few months. We would use our military to secure the oil we need. This could lead to a global war over oil (World War II started for the same reason). America could be faced with nuclear strikes on its own soil in such a conflict. We are currently threatened with biological, chemical and other forms of attack.
Click HERE to run a Nuclear Power Plant
Is there a reasonable, profitable way to clean the air and reduce our dependence on foreign oil? Electric vehicles are the solution. Unfortunately, scientist will tell you that if America retrofitted to hybrid and all electric vehicles, pollution from hydrocarbon-fueled electric power plants would virtually neutralize the clean air benefits. Is there a clean electric power technology that has proven its reliability over the past twenty years? In our opinion, nuclear power can safely provide the electricity for the electric cars we need to clean the air and reduce our dependence on imported oil.
AAEA is also aware of the misconceptions about nuclear power. The biggest misconception is that these plants can blow up like atomic bombs. They cannot and have not. The other misconception is that radiation releases pose an unacceptable risk to the public. We submit that this risk is no greater than the risk of transporting gasoline and other hazardous substances in trucks all over the U.S. every day to supply our vehicles, homes and businesses. Tons of hazardous materials ride the highways in 18-wheelers. An estimated 125,000 hazmat trucks roll every day, according to the National Tank Truck Carriers Inc. At least 45,000 of those are gasoline tanker trucks with an average 8,700 gallons on board.
We are in a new America and converting from a petroleum-based economy to an electricity-based economy will enhance our national security. Oil will remain crucial to our overall economy, but it will not be an Achilles Heel in terms of our health and national security. After years of considering and studying nuclear power, it is our opinion that this technology can be operated safely and provides an almost inexhaustible source of power for America. New designs and streamlined procedures should be enacted immediately so that our nation can reap the benefits of this technology. Subsidies for promoting nuclear power should be linked directly to subsidies (dollar-for-dollar) for solar and wind power so that these other viable alternative technologies can also be utilized to maximum advantage.
AAEA will promote building a significant number of new nuclear power plants. We will also promote African American ownership in the entire nuclear industry, from mining of uranium, enrichment, fuel fabrication, plant ownership, waste packaging in castes, transportation, reprocessing and contracts at Yucca mountain.
Dr. Shirley Ann Jackson, Former Chairman
Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Professor Shirley Ann Jackson, MIT graduate, is the 18th president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, effective July 1, 1999.
Professor Jackson, 54, was chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission from 1995-1999. She was the first African-American woman to serve in that role. The chairman is the principal executive officer and official spokesperson for the NRC. Professor Jackson has been responsible for the administrative, organizational, long-range planning, budgetary, and certain personnel functions pertaining to an emergency involving an NRC licensee. As chairman of the NRC, Professor Jackson articulated a vision that reaffirmed the agency's commitment to public health and safety. She enhanced its regulatory effectiveness and initiated a bottom-up strategic assessment to examine all NRC activities.
She received the SB (1968) and PhD (1973) in physics from MIT -- the first African-American woman to receive a doctorate from MIT and the first African-American woman in the country to receive a doctorate in physics. She is also the first African-American woman to head one of the nation's top technological universities. Prior to joining the NRC: from 1991-95, she was professor of physics at Rutgers University, serving concurrently as consultant in semiconductor theory to AT&T Bell Laboratories. From 1976-91, she conducted research in theoretical physics, solid-state and quantum physics and optical physics at Bell Laboratories.
Professor Jackson has also conducted research at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center and the Aspen Center for Physics.
A native of Washington, DC, Professor Jackson is married to Professor Morris A. Washington, a physicist at Bell Laboratories. They have one son.
Hazel O'Leary, Former Secretary
U.S. Department of Energy
O'Leary, Hazel Rollins served as the United States Secretary of Energy under President Bill Clinton from 1993 to 1997. She was the first woman and the first African American to hold that post. DOE, among other energy programs, manages America's nuclear weapons production programs.
Before O'Leary became secretary, she worked for the U.S. Federal Energy Administration and the Department of Energy under Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. In these positions, she was responsible for federal government programs designed to conserve energy and protect the environment. From 1989 to 1993, O'Leary was an executive of the Northern States Power Company, a utility based in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
O'Leary was born Hazel Reid in Newport News, Virginia. She earned a bachelor's degree from Fisk University in 1959 and a law degree from Rutgers University in 1966.
William D. Magwood, IV, Director
Office of Nuclear Energy, Science and Technology
William D. Magwood, IV is the Director of the Office of Nuclear Energy, Science and Technology in the U.S. Department of Energy. He was appointed to this position on November 8, 1998. As the Director of Nuclear Energy, Science and Technology, Mr. Magwood is the senior nuclear technology official in the United States Government and the senior manager for all of the Office's programs. Under Mr. Magwood's leadership, the Office of Nuclear Energy, Science and Technology has led the Nation in a new consideration of nuclear technology as a means to address difficult problems facing the Nation in the 21st Century.
From 1984-1994, Mr. Magwood held technology management positions with two energy-related organizations. He managed electric utility research and nuclear policy programs at the Edison Electric Institute, Washington, DC; and he was a scientist at Westinghouse Electric Corporation, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he analyzed radiological and hazardous waste disposal, treatment, and handling systems, and provided technical support to nuclear fuel marketing efforts.
Mr. Magwood holds a B.S. degree in Physics, and a B.A. degree in English from Carnegie-Mellon University. He also holds an M.F.A. degree from the University of Pittsburgh
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