Go Nuke?
Posted on February 1, 2005
Filed Under Politics |
This article at Wired discusses the revival of nuclear power as the best strategy at curbing dependence on hydrocarbon emitting fossil fuels.
Some of the notable points:
- Coal burning plants release 100 times more radioactive material than an equivalent nuclear reactor - in to the air, not shielded storage units
- Also, heavy metals and other noxious materials
- Surprising pro-nukers; Gaia theorist James Lovelock, Greenpeace cofounder Patrick Moore, and Britain’s Bishop Hugh Montefiore, a longtime board member of Friends of the Earth
- 77% of France’s energy comes from nukes, 20% and sliding in NA
- Best quote: “if only we would get over our fear of the nuclear bogeyman and forge ahead - for real this time - into the atomic age.”
- Renewable electrical production (92% of which is hydro-electric) in the NA has fallen from 11.0 to 9.1% in the last 15 years.
- 1.82 cents per kilowatt-hour versus 2.13 cents for coal-fired plants and 3.69 cents for natural gas
- Spent nuclear fuel contains 95% of its energy content, everyone recycles, except for the US (and Canada?)
- Next best quote: “Flannel-shirted environmentalists who fight these realities run the risk of ending up with as much soot on their hands as the slickest coal-mining CEO.”
- Nuclear power generation is ideal (lots of heat and electricity) for hydrogen generation for fossil-free cars
- Why some environmentalists oppose nuke power: nuclear weapon proliferation risk, accident risk, waste storage, pollution from mining uranium
Regarding the last point:
1. Only the US has used nuclear weapons when it was not necessary, only the US has used nuclear weapons. Having a bat under your bed just in case, does not mean you beat just anyone over the head with it. We could all have bats under our beds and never use them, oh until someone busts in to your bedroom….
2. A list of the worst energy related accidents are here. If the concern is for human safety, opposition to nuclear energy should pale in comparison to coal, oil, and gas.
3. Recycling was banned in the US by Jimmy Carter (a nuclear engineer - wow I never knew that), for fear that the reprocessing (which is the method to make weapons grade uranium), every other country recycles its waste.
4. Pollution from mining uranium rates similar to the pollution from mining coal, oil, and gas… but the enery created from it does not pollute like coal, oil, and gas.
Something to think about.
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