27: The UN.

My UN badge! I wish I could have kept it.

Our last official tour, which took place at the UN! Unfortunately, many of us were exhausted after the Mauthausen excursion. I was very tired, but excited to see the IAEA operations and hopefully ask some meaningful questions. Nuclear energy is a complex topic, and I personally have never landed on a definitive position as to whether I totally support it or not. On the pro side, it’s clean energy that can supply millions with power for a relatively reasonable cost. However, since Fukushima, the idea of nuclear power has fallen out of favor. PG&E has recently closed and decommissioned Diablo Canyon Nuclear Plant here in California, due to the fact that wind and solar power offers an energy alternative that doesn’t have such potential dire circumstances and is overall cheaper to run. While I support any initiative to supply cleaner and cheaper power to Californians, it doesn’t answer the question of what we do with residual nuclear waste from a power plant, nor do we always have 100% perfect precautions that would prevent a disaster. 

However, I am assuredly against the use of nuclear weapons in modern warfare, and I am curious about the following:

How is the IAEA dealing with the apparent crumbling of the Iran Nuclear Deal?

Can the idea of nuclear power versus nuclear energy ever truly be separated? By this, I mean that we often equate weapons and energy with nuclear medical science under the broad umbrella of “nuclear power.” If we eliminate nuclear weapons, what would that mean for both energy sources and modern medicine?

How does the agency work to break the stigma of nuclear power as an energy source?
Is there anything we as students can do to advocate for safer uses of nuclear power?

The U.N. courtyard, member nation flags around the fountain.

Our retro-futuristic conference room.

Unfortunately, many questions went unanswered due to the fact that the presentation given by the IAEA man was absolutely awful. As a PR person, he was boring, uninformative, and didn’t appear to have a lot of actual knowledge of what his department did. Very disappointing! The second lecture/presentation we received was better, given by a woman with impressive credentials. She reviewed some modules on crime and corruption. This would be where another question comes in though: 

If a country pursues help from the UN for corruption, could this potentially have negative consequences for the whistleblowers? Would this encourage some people to stay silent rather than speak out against their own government?

The overall UN experience, while lackluster, was an interesting window into how many nonprofit companies work (in my experience.) There is always a crunch on funds, and since the UN relies on the dollars of member countries, it can get convoluted and halted by a lot of red tape. I have the utmost support for the work the UN does, but I can’t help but feel a little shocked that the individuals who gave the presentations seemed nearly embarrassed about their role on the world stage. Any agency needs to be criticized and held accountable for failures, but we as a class came in with open minds and it seemed like that was a rarity for tour groups. This was unfortunate.

Interesting poster on the wall of the UN, created by a partnership between the USC Shoah Foundation and UN.

A moon rock, on display. It is 3.9 billion years old! 

After this excursion, I returned to the dorm and took a well-deserved nap. Our time in Vienna is quickly winding down, and there is a melancholy to these final few days. While I miss my husband and cats back home, Vienna has become a comforting friend.