Climate change warriors: It's time to go nuclear

By Thom Patterson, CNN

November 3, 2013 -- Updated 1315 GMT (2115 HKT)

James Hansen says environmentalists and world leaders must accept nuclear power now to avoid catastrophic climate change.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Top enviro-scientists call on world leaders to embrace nuclear power
• Only nukes can make enough clean power to slow climate change, they say
• Nuclear energy is too expensive and risky, says Natural Resources Defense Council
• Scientist: Al Gore supports safer, better nuclear power, "but he won't come out and say that"

(CNN) -- Four top environmental scientists raised the stakes Sunday in their fight to reverse climate change and save the planet.

Climate and energy scientists James Hansen, Ken Caldeira, Kerry Emanuel and Tom Wigley have released an open letter calling on world leaders to support development of safer nuclear power systems.

Wait -- pro-nuclear environmentalists? Isn't that an oxymoron? Apparently, not so much anymore.

Embracing nuclear is the only way, the scientists believe, to reverse the looming threat of climate change which they blame on fossil fuels. Depending who you ask, they're either abandoning -- or leading -- traditional environmentalists who for a half-century have rejected clean-burning nuclear power as too expensive or too dangerous. Opponents cite disasters at Fukushima, Chernobyl and Three Mile island.