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Cites

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1		-Coal/Shift DA
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3		-Link
4		-Nuclear power will be replaced by coal construction and natural gas.
5		-Biello 2013, David. “How Nuclear Power Can Stop Global Warming,” December 12, 2013.http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-nuclear-power-can-stop-global-warming/. SD
6		-As long as countries like China or the U.S. employ big grids to deliver electricity, there will be a need for generation from nuclear, coal or gas, the kinds of electricity generation that can be available at all times. A rush to phase out nuclear power privileges natural gas—as is planned under Germany's innovative effort, dubbed the Energiewende (energy transition), to increase solar, wind and other renewable power while also eliminating the country's 17 reactors. In fact, Germany hopes to develop technology to store excess electricity from renewable resources as gas to be burned later, a scheme known as “power to gas,” according to economist and former German politician Rainer Baake, now director of an energy transition think tank Agora Energiewende. Even worse, a nuclear stall can lead to the construction of more coal-fired power plants, as happened in the U.S. after the end of the nuclear power plant construction era in the 1980s.∂
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9		-After a ban on nuclear power, coal consumption would rise dramatically. Nakata 2002
10		-Toshihiko Nakata Professor at Tohoku University, “Analysis of the impacts of nuclear phase-out on energy systems in Japan” April 2002
11		-Fig. 3 illustrates the changes in the electric power generation under the nuclear phase-out case. The total energy consumption and the carbon dioxide emissions for four scenarios in the year 2041 are shown in Table 4. We can see three ways in which the system has adjusted to make up the nuclear boiler after its phasing out: ∂ The use of coal boiler and coal IGCC rise and the total coal consumption rises by four times. The use of gas combined-cycles and gas boiler rise gradually, and the total gas consumption ∂ grows by three times. The renewables are not seen in the electricity market.
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13		-Germany proves that ending the production of nuclear power results in the increased use of coal.
14		-Lindsay Abrams (Staff Writer at Salon on sustainable energy), "Germany’s clean energy plan backfired", Salon, 07/30/2013, www.salon.com/2013/07/30/germanys_clean_energy_plan_backfired/
15		-When a nuclear power plant closes, a coal plant opens. At least, that’s the way things are shaping up in Germany, where the move away from nuclear energy appears to have backfired. For the second consecutive year, according to Bloomberg, the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions are set to increase. German Chancellor Angela Merkel made headlines back in 2011 when, in the wake of the reactor meltdown in Tokyo, she announced the impending closure of Germany’s 17 nuclear reactors. Up until then, nuclear-generated energy contributed to a full quarter of the nation’s electricity. At the time, the closings were framed as a positive effort to increase the country’s use of clean energy. As an expert then predicted to the New York Times: “If the government goes ahead with what it said it would do, then Germany will be a kind of laboratory for efforts worldwide to end nuclear power in an advanced economy.” But predictably, when nuclear plants began to shut down, as eight immediately did, something else had to take its place. And coal, which according to Bloomberg is favored by the market, did just that. In the absence of a strong government plan to push natural gas and renewable forms of energy, the share of electricity generated from coal rose from 43 percent in 2010 to 52 percent in the first half of this year, according to the World Nuclear Association.
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17		-Impact
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19		-The use of coal leads to detrimental health issues and is largely responsible for global warming. Keating 2001.
20		-Martha Keating (Policy Advisor at U.S. Environmental Protection Agency), “Cradle to Grave: the Environmental Impacts from Coal”, Clean Air Task Force, June, 2001 SD
21		-The electric power industry is the largest toxic polluter in the country, and coal, which is used to generate over half of the electricity produced in the U.S., is the dirtiest of all fuels.1 From mining to coal cleaning, from transportation to electricity generation to disposal, coal releases numerous toxic pollut- ants into our air, our waters and onto our lands.2 Nation- ally, the cumulative impact of all of these effects is magnified by the enormous quantities of coal burned each year – nearly 900 million tons. Promoting more coal use without also providing additional environmental safe- guards will only increase this toxic abuse of our health and ecosystems. ∂ The trace elements contained in coal (and others formed during combustion) are a large group of diverse pollutants with a number of health and environmental effects.3 They are a public health concern because at sufficient exposure levels they adversely affect human health. Some are known to cause cancer, others impair reproduc- tion and the normal development of children, and still others damage the nervous and immune systems. Many are also respira- tory irritants that can worsen respiratory conditions such as asthma. They are an environmen- tal concern because they damage ecosystems. Power plants also emit large quantities of carbon dioxide (CO2), the “greenhouse gas” 2 largely responsible for climate change.
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24		-The presence of coalmines in an area detrimentally affects the communities there, who are extremely poor minorities. Keating 2001.
25		-Martha Keating (Policy Advisor at U.S. Environmental Protection Agency), “Cradle to Grave: the Environmental Impacts from Coal”, Clean Air Task Force, June, 2001
26		-Children living in the vicinity of power plants have the highest health risks. Adults are also at risk from contami- nated groundwater and from inhaling dust from the facility. The poverty rate of people living within one mile of power plant waste facilities is twice as high as the national average and the percentage of non-white populations within one mile is 30 percent higher than the national average.51 ∂ Consequently, there may be other factors that make these people more vulnerable to health risks from these facilities. These include age (both young and old), nutritional status and access to health care. Also, these people are exposed to numerous other air pollutants emitted from the power plant smokestacks and possibly to air pollution from other nearby industrial facilities or lead paint in the home. Similar high poverty rates are found in 118 of the 120 coal-producing counties in America where power plant combustion wastes are increasingly being disposed of in unlined, under-regulated coal mine pits often directly into groundwater. ∂ Mineworkers and their families also often reside in the communities where the coal is being mined. Some of the additional health risks and dangers to residents of ∂ coal mining communities include injuries and fatalities related to the collapse of highwalls, roads and homes adjacent to or above coal seams being mined; the blasting of flyrock offsite onto a homeowner’s land or public roadway; injury and/ or suffocation at abandoned mine sites; and the inhalation of airborne fine dust particles off-site.
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28		-The by-product of coal is more radioactive than the byproduct of nuclear energy. Hvistendahl 2007
29		-Mara Hvistendahl (contributing correspondent for Science magazine, finalist for the Pulitzer prize) 12-13-2007 “Coal Ash Is More Radioactive Than Nuclear Waste”, Scientific American SD
30		-Over the past few decades, however, a series of studies has called these stereotypes into question. Among the surprising conclusions: the waste produced by coal plants is actually more radioactive than that generated by their nuclear counterparts. In fact, the fly ash emitted by a power plant—a by-product from burning coal for electricity—carries into the surrounding environment 100 times more radiation than a nuclear power plant producing the same amount of energy. * See Editor's Note at end ofpage 2 At issue is coal's content of uranium and thorium, both radioactive elements. They occur in such trace amounts in natural, or "whole," coal that they aren't a problem. But when coal is burned into fly ash, uranium and thorium are concentrated at up to 10 times their original levels. Fly ash uranium sometimes leaches into the soil and water surrounding a coal plant, affecting cropland and, in turn, food. People living within a "stack shadow"—the area within a half- to one-mile (0.8- to 1.6- kilometer) radius of a coal plant's smokestacks—might then ingest small amounts of radiation. Fly ash is also disposed of in landfills and abandoned mines and quarries, posing a potential risk to people living around those areas.
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33		-Global warming leads to the extinction of people and animals. Urban 2015
34		-Mark C. Urban “Accelerating extinction risk from climate change” Science 01 May 2015:
35		-Overall, 7.9 of species are predicted to become extinct from climate change; (95 CIs, 6.2 and 9.8) (Fig. 1). Results were robust to model type, weighting scheme, statistical method, potential publication bias, and missing studies (fig. S1 and table S2) (6). This proportion supports an estimate from a 5-year synthesis of studies (7). Its divergence from individual studies (1–4) can be explained by their specific assumptions and taxonomic and geographic foci. These differences provide the opportunity to understand how divergent factors and assumptions influence extinction risk from climate change.∂ The factor that best explained variation in extinction risk was the level of future climate change. The future global extinction risk from climate change is predicted not only to increase but to accelerate as global temperatures rise (regression coefficient = 0.53; CIs, 0.46 and 0.61) (Fig. 2). Global extinction risks increase from 2.8 at present to 5.2 at the international policy target of a 2°C post-industrial rise, which most experts believe is no longer achievable (8). If the Earth warms to 3°C, the extinction risk rises to 8.5. If we follow our current, business-as-usual trajectory representative concentration pathway (RCP) 8.5; 4.3°C rise, climate change threatens one in six species (16). Results were robust to alternative data transformations and were bracketed by models with liberal and conservative extinction thresholds (figs. S2 and S3 and table S3).∂ Regions also differed significantly in extinction risk (ΔDIC = 12.6) (Fig. 3 and table S4). North America and Europe were characterized by the lowest risks (5 and 6, respectively), and South America (23) and Australia and New Zealand (14) were characterized by the highest risks. These latter regions face no-analog climates (9) and harbor diverse assemblages of endemic species with small ranges. Extinction risks in Australia and New Zealand are further exacerbated by small land masses that limit shifts to new habitat (10). Poorly studied regions might face higher risks, but insights are limited without more research (for example, only four studies in Asian ). Currently, most predictions (60) center on North America and Europe, suggesting a need to refocus efforts toward less studied and more threatened regions

EntryDate

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1		-2016-09-10 16:14:50.0

Judge

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1		-Joseph Barquin

Opponent

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1		-Peninsula KJ

ParentRound

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1		-1

Round

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1		-1

Team

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1		-Marlborough Coates Neg

Title

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1		-Coal DA

Tournament

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1		-Loyola