The Latest: Scientists say nuclear is part of climate answer
By Associated Press
Dec 3, 2015 10:34 AM CST
A participant arrives at the Climate Generations Areas as part of the COP21, United Nations Climate Change Conference, in Paris, Thursday, Dec. 3, 2015. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)   (Associated Press)

LE BOURGET, France (AP) — The latest news from the U.N. climate conference in Paris, which runs through Dec. 11. All times local:

5:30 p.m.

Decades ago Stanford University climate scientist Ken Caldeira was arrested protesting the building a nuclear power plant in New York. On Thursday, he was at the Paris climate talks with three other scientists promoting nuclear energy as part of the way to wean the world off fossil fuels that cause global warming.

"We need to stop using the sky as a waste dump," Caldeira said in a news conference with MIT's Kerry Emanuel, University of Adelaide's Tom Wigley, and former NASA climate science chief James Hansen, who is often considered the godfather of global warming research.

The scientists said the problem of global warming was so dangerous and that renewables not quite enough that nuclear power, which has near-zero carbon dioxide emissions, has to be part of the solution.

"We don't care whether it's nuclear, solar or hydro," Emanuel said. "Whatever works. The numbers don't add up unless you put nuclear in the mix."

Another MIT professor, John Sterman, who wasn't part of the event, said nuclear won't help so much because it takes too long to build enough plants and by that time, global warming will be far worse.

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2:45 p.m.

Negotiators have produced a new draft of a climate agreement that's supposed to set the world on a path toward cleaner energy and reduce the carbon pollution blamed for global warming.

The new draft is 50 pages long, just four pages fewer than a previous draft issued before the start of the two-week talks taking place north of Paris.

It leaves the main crunch issues unresolved, including how to spell out the obligations of countries in different stages of development.

Environmental campaigners observing the talks lamented the lack of progress and urged negotiators to step up the pace before environment and foreign ministers join the talks next week.

"Overall, the text is mostly unchanged from what they were working with going into Paris," said Tasneem Essop of WWF. "Right now, they're still just rearranging the deck chairs on the ship to get a better view of the iceberg."

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