More than 1,000 additional people are dying each year from air pollution due to Germany's phase out of nuclear power in response to the 2011 Fukushima disaster, according to a new study.
Those deaths are attributable to coal-fired power predominantly replacing shuttered nuclear power plants in Germany, driving around a 12% increase in local air pollution.
That rise in pollution alone bears a price tag of $8.7 billion per year, more than 70% of the phaseout’s total annual costs of $12.2 billion, economists at the University of California at Santa Barbara, University of California at Berkeley, and Carnegie Mellon University determined in a paper circulated Monday by the National Bureau for Economic Research.
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Sad but true.
Nuclear option will carry this stain for how long into the fyture?