Nuclear Weapons and the Environment

Intersection of Nuclear Weapons and Climate Change

The existential threats of nuclear war and climate change pose an unacceptable risk to humanity and our planet. They both have the power to end life as we know it on the Earth. These two existential threats must be understood as interconnected.

Cause or Effect?

Environmental effects of nuclear weapons

As the climate crisis intensifies, the risk and magnitude of global conflict will continue to increase. With regions threatened to become uninhabitable due to climate disasters, global tensions will only worsen. The atmosphere this instability creates vastly increases the likelihood of a nuclear exchange, whether deliberate or accidental.

The production of nuclear weapons, their extraction, construction, and testing, as well as the unchecked associated militarism, exacerbates the climate crisis by contributing to the burning of greenhouse gases, deforestation, and the destruction of ecosystems. Some of the sites where nuclear weapons have been tested remain uninhabitable to this day. The generation, transportation, and disposal of radioactive waste from nuclear weapons production has led to radioactive contamination in ecosystems around the world. Moreover, arguably the largest impact that nuclear war would have would be through climatic effects of nuclear winter.

Nuclear Winter

If a nuclear attack happened, war game simulations suggest that it would quickly spiral into a full blown nuclear war. The firestorms unleashed as a result of attacks on cities and military installations would cause dramatic changes in climate that have been termed nuclear winter. The amount of smoke would effectively block out the sun and reduce global temperatures by up to 15 degrees Celsius, depending on the exact nuclear war scenario. The extreme cold would kill our crops and vegetation and trigger massive starvation around the globe.

Wasted resources and growing instability

Photo via Warheads to Windmills

The nine nuclear armed States have spent over $400 billion since 2020 on nuclear weapons and delivery systems alone. These financial resources, as well as human ingenuity and energy, are currently being wasted while our world is paralyzed in addressing the threat of climate change. The effort currently expended towards nuclear weapons production must be redirected to mitigation and adaptation for the climate and associated environmental and public health crises.

The problem of nuclear weapons is a problem of political will. The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons exists as a global framework to eliminate nuclear weapons once the political will is reached through international pressure and public awareness. On the other hand, the climate crisis requires massive amounts of research, innovation, and resources to find the political solution that will enable us to both mitigate and adapt.

In a world in which States must engage in intensive cooperation to resolve the climate crisis, international relations must not be based on threats of annihilation. The existence of nuclear weapons erodes global cooperation and contributes to paralysis in the face of the shared climate threat. Therefore, nuclear disarmament must be the first step towards healing our planet.

Resources Wasted on Nuclear Weapons

Read more on nuclear weapons spending from the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons 2024 report: “Hidden Costs.”

Acute problems

The Runit Dome holding nuclear waste in the Marshall Islands, integrity threatened by the environment changes

The Runit Dome containment site in the Marshall Islands

Rising sea levels, flooding, and increasingly harsh environmental and weather patterns caused by climate change increase the risk of contamination from nuclear testing or production sites.

The case of the Runit Dome

From 1978 to 1980, the US government organized a radiological cleanup of Enewetak Atoll, which was a site of nuclear testing from 1948 to 1958. The collected contaminated materials from different islands were deposited in an unlined nuclear test crater on the island of Runit. To contain this radioactive waste, an 18 inch thick concrete dome was constructed at sea level. Although original plans included a lined bottom, this safety measure was scrapped for cost and speed. The dome, referred to by the people of the Marshall Islands as the Tomb, contains over 100,000 square feet of radioactively contaminated soil and debris.

The dome was never meant to be a permanent solution to this waste problem. And yet, 50 years later, it is not just still there but also under constant threat of damage from climate change. The main concerns lie in gradual sea level rise coupled with storm surges and flooding which could cause the spread of radionuclides throughout the atoll and beyond. As catastrophic weather events become more common, the aging dome’s risk of cracking and failure increases as well. Cracks were already confirmed in a 2013 study.

In response to concerns of this nature, the US Department of Energy has claimed that the Enewetak lagoon contains more radioactive materials than are currently stored in the dome, calling into question why the dome was built in the first place.

The case of Runit is just one glaring example of how climate change, especially rising sea levels and catastrophic weather patterns, increase the danger of nuclear contamination.

Environmental contamination from production

Between 1944 and 1988, the United States alone built hundreds of “production” reactors to produce plutonium for nuclear weapons. The process left behind hundreds of gallons of hazardous mixed liquid waste, containing both harsh chemicals and radioactive material. To date, there is no viable long term solution for the disposal of this waste, and much of it has already contaminated areas surrounding production sites, which are still affected to this day. This can be especially dangerous when they are near rivers or other water sources.

The United States is currently ramping up to begin production on more plutonium pits for nuclear weapons. While entirely unnecessary and dangerous for proliferation reasons, the environmental impact of this decision will be felt for generations.

What about nuclear power?

The proliferation of nuclear weapons is inextricably linked to nuclear power by a shared need for enriched uranium and by generating plutonium as a byproduct of spent nuclear fuel.

It is often argued that nuclear energy is carbon neutral and an ideal alternative to fossil fuels in the fight against climate change. This claim, and the need for the byproduct of nuclear power in the production of nuclear weapons, has led to extensive government subsidies of nuclear power plants and significant political support for increasing our nuclear energy usage. When investigated in detail, however, it becomes clear that nuclear energy is not carbon neutral, not cost efficient for the energy it produces, and poses significant risks to the environment in the form of radioactive waste containment, disposal, and contamination. Furthermore, persistence of nuclear energy enables potential proliferation.

You can have nuclear energy without nuclear weapons, but you cannot have nuclear weapons without nuclear energy. Ultimately, nuclear energy will have to be eliminated if humanity is to truly live in a nuclear weapons free world.

What is NAPF doing?

NAPF advocates strongly on the nexus of nuclear weapons and the environment. We highlight this connection at many events within the UN, and for the public. Article 6 of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons highlights the need for environmental remediation of areas affected by nuclear weapons testing. NAPF works closely with the Working Group on articles 6 & 7 to further these matters. Learn more about the working group here.