A Q&A with Stewart Brand

Stewart Brand has been the subject of multiple NNN blog posts over these last several weeks: his latest book, Whole Earth Discipline: An Ecopragmatist Manifesto, was reviewed and the kerfuffle between Amory Lovins and Brand has been discussed in multiple posts. Earlier this week, we had the opportunity to conduct an online Q&A with the author. The transcript is below.

How's the book tour going? What's the public response been like at your readings?
There's been good turnouts in the bookshops and vigorous signing[s].

What is the most commonly asked question at your book readings?
The main hot button question is always nuclear. Usually in the form of "But what about...??" And then they bring up something I haven't discussed but is in the book, such as the widespread photographs of defective babies people are told were caused by Chernobyl.

What are your (or your publisher's) expectations for book sales? (Somewhat related: any idea on how many copies of the Whole Earth Catalog have been sold?)
Viking printed 30,000 copies. Whole Earth Catalog in sundry editions wound up around 1.5 milion.

When you first pitched this book, whom did you see as your target audience? Has it changed at all since you've completed the book?
My target is and was environmentalists with doubts, and people with doubts about environmentalists. I think that as climate dangers become increasingly conspicuous everyone becomes in some sense an environmentalist.

What magazines or blogs do you read regularly to stay on top of environmental issues?
Science, Nature, New Scientist, Conservation, Sierra, Earth Island Journal, ScienceDaily, SciDev.net, Crop Biotech Update, Yale's environment360.

You were quoted in a Newsweek interview recently, stating that you believe nuclear power is "green." Was there an "A-ha!" moment that led to your position or was this a gradual process?
Gradual, as I got more acquainted with climate, with coal, and with nuclear.

Have you ever been inside a nuclear plant?
Not yet.

We know that you live comfortably on your houseboat, Mirene, in San Francisco Bay, but would you ever consider living near a nuclear plant?
Happy to. Ditto waste storage.

What advice, if any, would you give to nuclear energy executives on how to improve public understanding of the industry?
Get active about climate. Join and help environmental organizations as a fellow Green. Have booths at Green trade shows and such (with young engineers, not booth babes). Hire and promote young Green nuclear engineers. Explore and expand the "distributed micropower" of small reactors. Open all nuclear reactors to the public. Encourage visitors to photograph each other standing (and probably mugging) by dry casks of spent fuel. Flaunt the Megatons to Megawatts program and its successors. Help people understand fuel banking for developing nations, and promote it. Support objective research on the "linear no-threshold" theory of low dose radiation effects.

What grade would you give to the current administration's initiatives to address global warming?
B-minus. Better than the previous [administration's] D-minus.

What would be your main advice for the administration and Congress on effecting transformative change in the energy, global warming and environmental arenas?
Do the sums, see if proposed numbers add up. Then keep legislating and regulating and innovating until they do. For an example of doing it right, read David MacKay's Sustainable Energy (without the hot air).

Any plans on attending the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen?
None yet.

As one of several "old-school" environmentalists who have been quite vocal in their support for nuclear energy, what do you say to old friends who still oppose nuclear?
Don't assume you know what's in my chapter on nuclear. Read it, then let's talk.

Finally, your book has received praise from critics, but not from Amory Lovins. Any chance you two will sit down to a beer summit and hash it all out?
Unlikely.