David R. Brower Quotes
It's very hard for me to know what to say about fusion right now, inasmuch as it is not yet scientifically feasible. I just can't understand how so many people are able to predict so much about something that still isn't scientifically possible.
Brower, David. "The Plowboy Interview: David Brower." Mother Earth News, no. 24, Nov.-Dec. 1973.
Rutherford had been the first to split the atom in 1919.
There was massive opposition to nuclear power in most countries of the world except France where the operators and technicians are so well trained and there are such high safety standards that the public had confidence in the nuclear management that did not exist in most other countries.
One of the great scientists of all time was totally wrong when it came to predicting the practical utility of the technological developments of science. In all fairness to Kelvin, once he had actually tried the new technologies, he became a great enthusiast for them and helped introduce them to the world.
Nuclear fusion is different from nuclear fission that currently powers atomic power plants. Fusion is the process the sun uses to generate all its power. Scientists understand exactly how fusion works—it’s much simpler than fission, but actually creating a way of doing it on earth has been a very difficult challenge. The National Ignition Facility has been trying to produce a fusion reaction for a number of years with no success.
David Ross Brower was a prominent environmentalist and the founder of many environmental organizations, including the John Muir Institute for Environmental Studies, Friends of the Earth (1969), Earth Island Institute (1982), North Cascades Conservation Council, and Fate of the Earth Conferences. From 1952 to 1969, he served as the first Executive Director of the Sierra Club, and served on its board three times: from 1941–1953; 1983–1988; and 1995–2000 as a petition candidate enlisted by reform-activists known as the John Muir Sierrans. As a younger man, he was a prominent mountaineer.
