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The 2008 CNTA Edward Teller Lecture and Banquet |
CNTA's 17th Annual Edward Teller Lecture/Banquet proceeded on November 12 at the Doubletree Hotel and Convention Center in Augusta GA. Please click on the link below for pre-event information.
2008 Teller Lecture Flyer
Our Guest Speaker this year was Gwyneth Cravens, environmentalist, journalist and novelist. Her fiction and nonfiction have appeared in The New Yorker, where she also worked as a fiction editor, and in Harper's Magazine, where she was an associate editor. She has contributed articles and op-eds on science and other topics to Harper's Magazine, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. She grew up in New Mexico and now lives on eastern Long Island.
In October 2007 her non-fiction book, Power to Save the World: The Truth About Nuclear Energy concluded that nuclear power is a safe energy source and an essential preventive of global warming. "We see how nuclear power has been successfully and economically harnessed here and around the globe to become the single largest displacer of greenhouse gases, and how its overall risks and benefits compare with those of other energy sources."
In her book Craven "refutes the major arguments against nuclear power one by one, making clear, for example, that a stroll through Grand Central Terminal exposes a person to more radiation than a walk of equal length through a uranium mine; that average background radiation around Chernobyl and in Hiroshima is lower than in Denver; that there are no "cancer clusters" near nuclear facilities; that terrorists could neither penetrate the security at an American nuclear plant nor make an atomic bomb from its fuel; that nuclear waste can be - and already is - safely stored; that wind and solar power, while important, can meet only a fraction of the demand for electricity; that a coal-fired plant releases more radiation than a nuclear plant and also emits deadly toxic waste that kills thousands of Americans a month; and that in its fifty-year history, American nuclear power has not caused a single death."
Ms. Cravens participated in a book signing at the Rose Hill Estate in Aiken SC.
Other highlights of the Teller Lecture and Dinner included the presentation of the 2008 Fred C. Davison Distinguished Scientist Award and the 2008 Robert Maher Memorial Scholarship. For 2008, we were honored to present the Davison Award to Dr. Frank T. Avignone, III, and the Maher Scholarship to Mr. Andrew Petrarca.
We would like to take the opportunity to thank all of our many sponsors, our CNTA membership, and supporters of the 2008 lecture.
2008 Photo Gallery
Return to Main Teller Lecture Page
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