Since the first edition, the intention has been to get behind the controversies and selective arguments and present facts about energy demand and how it is met, in part, by nuclear power. The text has been thoroughly checked by experts who carry public responsibility for their professional roles in their area of expertise. The fourth edition was published as a joint Australian and Canadian initiative for schools and the public, and that collaboration continued. Every form of energy production and conversion has an effect on the environment and carries risks. Nuclear energy has its challenges but these are frequently misunderstood and often overstated.
Nuclear energy remains a safe, reliable, and economical source of electricity.
But many people do not see it that way. This 6th edition comes out at a time when the contrast between environmental concern focused on tangible indicators of pollution is beginning to stand in stark contrast to Romantic environmentalism, which is driven by mistrust of science and technology, and which demonises nuclear power. This contrast is heightened on the one hand by increasing evidence of the contribution to global warming from burning fossil fuels, and on the other by the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. The introduction to the first edition of this book in the 1970s expressed the opinion that if more effort were put into improving the safety and effectiveness of commercial nuclear power, and correspondingly less into ideological battles with those who wished it had never been invented, then the world would be much better off. With Chernobyl behind us and the great improvements to safety in those plants which most needed it, plus the welcome recycling of military uranium into making electricity, it seems that we are now closer to that state of affairs.