Stewart Brand is best known for editing “The Whole Earth Catalog,” a printed compendium of sustainable goods for back-to-the-landers and others interested in alternative lifestyles that had its heyday from 1968 to 1972. He was also involved in organizing rock concerts, including the Grateful Dead and putting together the first Earth Day. In 2005, he looked back at the environmentalist movement that he had a strong hand in creating and criticized it, specifically coming out in support of low-risk GMO crops and nuclear power.

 

In an interview in Conservation Magazine titled “Environmental Heresies,” Brand said, “Nuclear power is the only other form of power generation that is as harmless to the atmosphere as hydro — and hydro is largely maxed out. Fission reactors — especially the new, smaller and safer designs — should be deployed rapidly, particularly in the U.S., China, and India, where the greatest power demand is.”