How Liberals Created, Then Destroyed, Publicly Owned Nuclear Power
The battle over New York’s Indian Point power plant was quietly a battle for the soul of American liberalism.
An inspector examines a giant steam generator containing thirty-nine miles of tubing at the Westinghouse plant in Lester, Pennsylvania, before the unit is installed at the nuclear power plant at Indian Point, New York. (Fox Photos / Getty Images)
On a chilly Sunday in February, thirty miles up the Hudson River from New York City, a few hundred environmentalists descend on the Indian Point Energy Center, a nuclear power station, dreaming of a world powered instead by wind and sun. Skewing young and college-educated, they’re led by a New York City Democratic congresswoman famous for her bold, progressive advocacy.
Fifty feet away, police are holding back the power plant’s supporters — the members, friends, and families of the Utility Workers Union of America Local 1-2, the union that represents four hundred employees at the plant. They outnumber the environmentalists several times over.
With chants, signs, and bullhorns, the union mounts its defense of Indian Point. It’s safe — they wouldn’t want their members working there if it weren’t. It’s clean — there’d be more air pollution and more dependence on imported fossil fuels without it. And it’s reliable — “When the lights go out, they’ll understand why nuclear energy should be on the scene,” a labor leader tells a reporter.
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