As distasteful as it sounds, the fact remains that nuclear power is a clean provider of energy. Unless we could globally agree to live our lives without electricity, without transportation, and without heating or cooling ~ we are destine to use energy of some kind. Nuclear, with modern safeguards and well planned for spent fuel storage ~ fits that need. Pulling up facts from Chernobyl & Three Mile don't apply now, as in the decades since there as been lots of advancement in design safety. I know there are some alternatives, but don't just demonize nuclear without considering it!

pdf,

No system is perfect.

pdf: The article did point out that the nuclear power is not as clean as we would like to think, especially considering the long life of the radioactive waste. In addition, no matter what the advancements in technology, the consequences of any mishap is too great to advocate nuclear power as anything but an absolute, total last resort and even that is debatable.

A bargain with Faust is what nuclear energy reprsents. It is large in scope so any mistake can be large. Wind and Solar can be built in small units that are dispersed so there is time to refine and develop gradually, which is the history of most successful projects. May the appropriate force be with us.

If we don't come up with a solution, then we must by default accept a luddite-based future. Whether that solution is nuclear, I don't know ~ but the world situation is forcing us to make a choice, and coal/petro-based energy is NOT working! All I'm saying is, don't dismiss nuclear entirely, because there might be a way to get where we want to be.

Nuclear power should be banned from the Earth, plain and simple. All it's good for is creating tons of indisposable nuclear waste and the raw material for nuclear bombs and depleted uranium shells- neither of which have their place among rational, environmentally conscious, peace-seeking human beings. Truly green power like wind turbines, hydro electricity, geo-thermal energy, and solar power are our best hopes. Conservation of resources combined with the use and advancing technology of these means to free, clean energy would eliminate the need for petroleum, hydrocarbon, or nuclear derived electricity.

Sidenote, if I were a terrorist, I'd bomb the shit out of every nuke plant on the planet. They aren't much more than giant, immobile, radioactive sitting ducks.

Thank you, Curtis. To suggest that nuclear energy is "clean" is absurd on its face. Some of the very worst degradation perpetrated on the earth thus far have been the result of technical failings of nuclear technology. To deliberately assume that level of risk when there are safer alternatives is not sane.

I'll place my bets with Harry Reid (Senator from Nevada who has spent years trying to get sound science into the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository debate), and any other Democrats we can elect to make the safest choices about nuclear energy.

Republicans are on record for preferring only whatever they think is "competitive." After the 2008 election, I'd like to see President Obama sign any needed legislation that his Democratic Congress has enacted to define the rules about nuclear energy (and everything else.) The reason for this is that "competitive" is usually not a term that considers individuals.

Nuclear power is neither safe or clean. No new reactors should be built and all the old ones should be dismantled. It is lunacy to risk contaminating the earth for millions or
even billions of years.

"Some of the very worst degradation perpetrated on the earth thus far have been the result of technical failings of nuclear technology."

Please consider hiring a small plane and take tour across southern, West Virginia and eastern Kentucky, and then across parts of central Wyoming, and Montana, and Alberta.

Then, take a trip to the arctic lands and look at the dying forest, wildlife, and native peoples way of life. Then to Africa and see those dying of heat and famine. Then to places like Bangladesh, and many island and coastal nations which will pretty much disspaear under water or extreme storms over the next century. Then go home and contemplate some of the possible longer term, very poorly understood, runaway warming doomsday scenarios.

Then, reconsider how environmentally destructive the N-fuel cycle is.

Renewables are fine, but they simply are not going to be enough. Nuclear power needs to be solidly on the table.

what is the big deal? I wouldn't care if we built a thousand more of them. You say "Yeah" but what about the nuclear waste that a reactor generates. What do we do with the waste. It will damage the eco system if it gets into the underground wells. Well the waste is already leaking underground where it's stored in Oregon and within a few miles from polluting the Columbia River and will destroy all underground water wells in 4 western states. Cal. has already shut down more than fifty wells in more than twenty cities, but that was due to the MPTB's that are in the water molocules leaking from underground gas tanks, not from nuclear waste. Why do you think the big companies are trying to make water a commodity to sell to these cities that are polluted. People pay more for store bought water than for gas and most of the water, especially the most expensive, is nothing but tap water. So the damage has been done and more nuclear reactors won't destroy our eco system. it's done been destroyed already. So again i say: What's the big deal?

Corporations Rule.

In a fascist state all welfare is for corporate well-being.

The existing ruling corporate oligarchy is only reaping the benefits from funding US Congressional lackey lickspits to do their bidding.

How many issues that you thought you voted in 2006 to have resolved have been addressed successfully?

We are exposed to one of the most honest Congresses in history - Once bought and paid for, it has stayed bought and paid for.

Curmudgeon ~

OK, we know your political stance, but what's your position on a viable energy policy that will move us forward and not backwards?

Right now, this very second, TONS of coal are being burned for energy across the country, and whether you like it or not coal is WAY more radioactive than any nuclear plant:

http://www.ornl.gov/info/ornlreview/rev26-34/text/colmain.html

Ban coal, and you're headed in the right direction!

PDF -
What makes you think the current political realities you so blithely pass over are not relevant?

To achieve the proper energy environment is contingent on having fair and open discussion of all alternatives. Note the words fair and open which means an unbiased assessment of facts - not some coporate purchase of electees and media to enhance their profits at public and environmental expense.

What makes you think we have that ability in today's political reality?

While I wouldn't be as cynical as laddy. But, it should be pointed out that the ecological and planetary health effects of radioisotopes pale when compared to ordinary pollutants - even and especially plain old CO2, due to the sheer quantities being emitted.

Renewables ARE able to meet all of our needs quite easily particularly photovoltaics and wind. If these sources were given even a small fraction of the subsidy nukes get from their federal indemnification via the Price Anderson Act their development would proceed at blinding speed.
The critical fact in the article is that nukes are unable to compete without govt. subsidy. Another way to put this is that this form of electricity production has FAILED UTTERLY. Wind and solar are being built now with little or no subsidy because they SUCCEED in the marketplace. Duh!
Steve

Nuclear pollution is cancer forever increasing. Most of it's advocates have never had a loved one die from cancer or are blissfully ignorant about the nuclear fuel cycle, nuclear accidents, nuclear detonations and their consequences.

If the insurance companies won't touch it, why should We the People foot it's billionaire liability bill?

Like the man said, safe alternatives are booming and rising gas prices will demand the energy conservation some of us are unwilling to undertake. Energy conservation is the answer to the wasteful consumption rising populations are tricked into.

pdf,

Specifically, about 37 tons a second, which yields about 136 tons per second of CO2.

http://www.nma.org/pdf/c_most_requested.pdf

I believe that radionucleides are one of the smaller contributors to cancer. Ramdom mutation, chemical contaminants (including many common household products), viral and genetic factors probably precipitate most cancers.

Nuclear power doesn't yet pass the honesty test.

Sometimes it helps to look impartially at another country's struggles with telling the truth. The Russian government admits to about 50 deaths due to Chernobyl. However, to be on the safe side, they evacuated whole cities forever. The government never cared that much about its own citizens before. Activists estimate about 50,000 deaths, mostly due to thyroid cancer. The Russian government tends to have a history of not telling the truth, and a lie here would fit their modus operendai.

Back in the states, the industry says that no one at all died in the Three Mile Island meltdown. Nevertheless, they have been settling for large sums with some victims. Activists estimate about 1,000 deaths.

Until nuclear power makes the first baby steps toward coming clean, I don't see how the industry is worth trusting.

In any case, nuclear power is either a net consumer of carbon over its life cycle, or nearly so. Translation, it's nothing but a feed trough, the government's equivalent of a Ponzi scheme where more energy keeps going in than out.

Also, coal burning power plants also emit about 50 tons of mercury into the air every year. This is enough to give a dosage at the lower limit of potential harm to about 43 billion people. Most of it ends up concentrated in acquatic food chain.

www.nescaum.org/documents/rpt031104mercury.pdf/

"The nuclear power industry is back to where it always goes when it wants to build new reactors—the taxpayer trough."

It seems to me it's time for a little welfare reform -- corporate welfare, that is.

PJD said:

"While I wouldn't be as cynical as laddy. But, it should be pointed out that the ecological and planetary health effects of radioisotopes pale when compared to ordinary pollutants - even and especially plain old CO2, due to the sheer quantities being emitted."

Ordinary pollutants and plain old CO2 can be eliminated. We cannot eliminate long lived radioisotopes once they get into the environment. They last forever bio-concentrating in living tissues and causing the incidence of malignant neoplastic disease to soar geometrically into the future.

Something akin to religious fervor makes nuke advocates believe a solution to all of the countless serious problems with nukes will magically appear so we should press on regardless, spending billions in the process, when real solutions in clean alternatives are here and now.

Our children and their children's children could never forgive us for a legacy of pain, cancer and premature death. If any humans could evolve to survive the onslaught of such as plutonium, a molecule of which if inhaled will cause lung cancer, we would become something Kafkaesque.

Why is rejecting NP seen as "going backwards"?

I would like to reframe: rejecting NP is the act of attempting to fix the broken and inefficient energy supply/consumption system.

In any case, nuclear power is either a net consumer of carbon over its life cycle, or nearly so.

What do you mean by this, by "net consumer of carbon"? I would assume you would mean it emits more carbon than the alternates (coal/oil/gas) it replaces. This is obviously untrue. Even if the carbon emissions used for fuel mining and processing, construction and operating an N-plant was several times that of a coal plant, the carbon emissions of generating the Nuclear power itself is zero.

You need to cite a reputable source or provide a calculation to back such claims.

If you're a Kucinich supporter I urge you to go to http://democracyforamerica.com/pulsepoll and vote for DFA to support Kucinich for president. Sorry for the cross posting.

Nuclear energy is the worst concept man ever came up with.

Ordinary pollutants and plain old CO2 can be eliminated...

No they cant. POP's, mercury, and many other pollutants persist in the food chain esentially forever. methods to remove CO2 from the atmosphere are still largely in the speculation stage.

"Something akin to religious fervor makes nuke advocates believe a solution to all of the countless serious problems with nukes will magically appear..."

What "serious probelms"? These "serious" problems are, frankly, just so much mythology, misinformation, and pure speculation. The worker safety, public safety, and environmental record of commercial nuclear power generation worldwide is far, far better than the fossil fuel power industry. Only hydropower has a better safety record.

Who keeps the safety records of the nuclear industry?

There are a few nuclear related points of pollution that the author of the article forgot to mention:
1) The mining of uranium requires fossil fuels to run the machines, and the trains and trucks to transport the uranium, as well.
2) The amount of material that has to be dug up and processed to get the uranium and then purified into usable amounts of U-235 produces large toxic spoils of heavy metals, rock and other radioactive elements. Plus, all of the leftover U-238 has to go somewhere, usually into Depleted Uranium armor and bullets.
3) The waste heat of the reactors also makes more water vapor, and water vapor is a greenhouse gas.
4) Not only does the nuclear waste from the reactor have to be disposed of, but every twenty-five to thirty years the entire reactor core has to be replaced. Which means tons of radioactive metal has to go somewhere.

"Wind and solar are being built now with little or no subsidy because they SUCCEED in the marketplace. "

Subsidized.

Nuclear power is plain not clean, and it is dangerous. Uranium has to be mined, lots of water has to be used, and it gives off radiation into our water, air, ground, food, and creates waste which we don't know how to handle. We still have the first ounce of nuclear waste ever created. What's good is definitely not apparent to me. Solar... now there's an answer. It has been given us energy since the begining of time. All we have to do is capture it more efficently which we are working towards every day. We don't have to mine it, it doesn't pollute, and it produces no waste. NEED I SAY MORE. Wake up people! Nuclear is dirty, dangerous, and expensive - the wrong way to go. As nukefree.org says,...do something.

Aside from the fact that the nuclear power industry is where we get the material for the Bombs and DU weapons which keep growing, does anybody have any figures on the amount of energy and pollution caused by the mining and it must be a hard process that pollutes to extract the Uranium from the ore and then make it suitable for the power plants...

How could the government protect the nuke plants from a suicide plane or just a mortar shell or hand held rocket launcher? or Flood or Earthquake or Tornado?

Where is the National Security in that and who is gonna guarantee the safety of trucking the waste around the country? and who is gonna store it and pay for it being safely stored and constantly guard that and guard the whole process from start to DU weapons and atomic bombs? if the tax payers pay for this, is this a social program?

Or are these dumb questions?

If it ain't good for Iran, why is it good for Us?
If we want to stop weapons proliferating, how is this gonna help?

"Who keeps the safety records of the nuclear industry?"

At the plants, OSHA. At the mines MSHA.

"How could the government protect the nuke plants from a suicide plane or just a mortar shell or hand held rocket launcher? or Flood or Earthquake or Tornado?"

They do it through these things called building codes - on in the case of N-plants, NRC Regulations.

Engineers design N-plants, and every other type of building for all the above natural events routinely. On the N-plant construction site I worked on, the containment building is heavily reinforced concrete 9 feet thick, so I suspect mortar shells or RPG's would just bounce off.

To PaulK: How did people prove the harm was caused by TMI? My uncle, who stayed behind to work nearby, assured that there was no danger, developed and died of cancer in about a year or so. He was in his fifties.

I'd like to repeat jakenewton's comments - "Wind and solar are being built now with little or no subsidy because they SUCCEED in the marketplace. "

nuclear power is not safe or clean or cheap.

Imagine a new paradigm: solar panels on ever rooftop in the country. Not only would you produce enough power for your home (and car) but could SELL excess power back to the Utility Co.

This is even better then wind, wave, thermal and biomass (don't even give me that ethanol crap) because it is decentralized- which is what the utility corporations FEAR MOST OF ALL!

You want to solve things? BECOME AN OWNER

Also on waste saftey- IMO, chances are if you see a train, it is loaded with waste (maybe even nuclear waste, if it's not dumped in a river)

Anyone who believes that nuclear power represents clean energy (or that corporations promoting it have the public interest at heart) must also believe in the following myths:

1. Iraq is responsible for 9-11.

2. Spying on innocent Americans protects National Security.

3. There is no such thing as global warming.

4. The U.S. is the best country in the world.

5. War is Peace

6. Freedom is Slavery

PJD said:

"Ordinary pollutants and plain old CO2 can be eliminated…"

"No they cant. POP's, mercury, and many other pollutants persist in the food chain esentially forever. methods to remove CO2 from the atmosphere are still largely in the speculation stage."

POP's, mercury and many other pollutants can be chemically, biologically and physically bound, altered in composition and detoxified to a great extent. We can stop producing CO2 in unnatural quantities and the earth will heal itself. But long lived radioactive wastes cannot be made safe by any method known. A radioactive waste dump will have to be monitored for seepage and groundwater contamination forever, a monumental task. Radioactive poisons in the environment persist for tens of thousands of years and cannot be cleaned up.

"Something akin to religious fervor makes nuke advocates believe a solution to all of the countless serious problems with nukes will magically appear…"

"What "serious probelms"? These "serious" problems are, frankly, just so much mythology, misinformation, and pure speculation. The worker safety, public safety, and environmental record of commercial nuclear power generation worldwide is far, far better than the fossil fuel power industry. Only hydropower has a better safety record."

Karen Silkwood tried to challenge the nuclear industry's safety record and was murdered for it.

Since radioactivity induced cancers and diseases are very difficult to prove, we'll never know just how many deaths and disease the nuclear industry has caused. But besides those in Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, we do know of 140,000 deaths in Hiroshima and 90,000 more in Nagasaki by the nuclear bombs a reactor provides. Who knows how many will die because of spent uranium shelling in the Middle East?

"Engineers design N-plants, and every other type of building for all the above natural events routinely. On the N-plant construction site I worked on, the containment building is heavily reinforced concrete 9 feet thick, so I suspect mortar shells or RPG's would just bounce off."

Would an airliner just bounce off?

France is nuclear, but France is also democratic, so French nuclear energy is of, by and for the people. The costs are thereby minimal, e.g. the best reactor design was chosen and replicated. The French practice energy conservation, so the number of reactors are kept to a minimum.

In contrast, US capitalists develop their nuke proposals with a deliberate intent to impose the maximum economic cost the American people can bear, a policy founded on "free market" economics, where management is legally obligated to maximize shareholder profits. Never mind that the public interest has been destroyed in the process. Just never mind the public interests, ok?

The citizen's policy is easy to formulate - resist all capitalist proposals until capital voluntarily submits to the authority of the people.

The citizen's sustainable energy policy: Energy conservation and local energy exchange based on renewable sources and sustainable methods.

Renewable sources: solar, wind, tide, geothermal, biofuel...

Sustainable methods: passenger & freight rail, series hybrid diesel-electric motive power, polyculture bio-production, wind turbines, solar-thermal, cogeneration, what else?

There has been very good arguments against nuclear power for environmental and health reasons posted here, but we seem to be missing the primary fault with nuclear power the article set out. It is economically ludicrous.
Take all the taxpayer grants, "stranded" costs subsidies, and matching investments the government makes for connected nuke builders, and put it directly into solar, wind, and geothermal. Imagine how far each of those alternative technologies would be.

This may sound silly, but what if we were to launch rockets with the nuclear waste to the moon. Any terrorist that can go to the moon and get it back has my vote!

Would a bomb dropped on a nuclear reactor really cause nuclear problems? I thought the material had to be close to each other to generate heat. An explosion would just spread the material far apart so there is no reactivity right?

I used to work for an electric company that was part owner of a local nuke plant. The plant was finally shut down well after its slated decomissioning date. After it was shut down and the decomissioning ended (after costing many times more than projected), it was determined that the energy provided by the plant was comparable to other types of energy as far as cost. In short, it was not too cheap to be metered (remember that one?).

This is the fact: When you take into account all the costs, including construction, waste disposal, the potential for accidents, and decomissioning, nuclear power is not cheap.

As others have pointed out, there have been massive subsidies given to nuclear power generation and virtually none to alternative energies like solar and wind. Why? Because large energy plants can be owned and money made off of them. Alternatives? Only the producers of the hardware make money, then, no one. As with everything these days, just follow the money (or lack of potential thereof).

A while ago I came out and said that nuclear energy may need to be on the table. The one thing that led me to say that was that we are seeing wars for energy, and that will only increase. However, I believe that following the same failed route is patently insane. We must all change. We must change how we live and relate to the world around us. We must stop consuming so much power and resources. Easy for me to say as I sit here on my computer (albeit, an energy-saving Mac), but it's the truth, as I see it.

We must have the courage to live as if this party is ending, because it is. We must also have the courage to demand (as futile as it may seem) that those who are supposed to be representing us start investing in the future, which is alternative, clean energies.

As with so much else, it's really up to us.

Nobody with any brains in the investment world will touch nuclear energy without government subsidy. NOBODY

Conservation, solar, wind, and geothermal are all better investments. These are being used even though energy corporations and the government have been subsidizing all their competitors and actively discouraging these better choices.

Conservation should be heavily subsidized as it is the very best of all alternatives. The billions requested for nuclear energy would produce much greater energy if invested in conservation.

It's encouraging to see the number of posters here, presumably from a left perspective, who take a more balanced view of the nuclear power question. It's a good thing if the old anti-nuke left orthodoxy is breaking down.

I think the opposition to nuclear power back in the 1970s, although later validated by TMI and Chernobyl, was mostly fueled by a displaced fear of nuclear weapons, by people who could not bring themselves to confront that existential threat head-on.

As TMI, Chernobyl and other accidents have shown, and as we know from the problems of proliferation and waste disposal, nuclear power poses serious dangers. But so do other technologies, and we have learned to manage many dangerous things. The threat of nuclear war does not arise from nuclear power, despite the insistence of antinuclear ideologues that the two are inseparable. Today, many nations can obtain nuclear weapons if they want them, and shutting down nuclear power plants in the US is not going to do anything to stop them.

It's easy for American environmentalists to say we don't need nukes, we can just conserve and build windmills, shoot for a revolution in solar tech, etc.

However, India, China, and other developing nations are hungry for power and nothing is going to stop them from getting it.

Today, if you are a utility planner anywhere in the world and you need another gigawatt of baseload electrical generating capacity, you have three basic choices: Coal, gas, or nuclear. The amount of gas that is available is limited and prices are rising fast. It comes down to coal vs. nukes, until we get that technological breakthrough that makes solar or other renewable power cheap enough and storable.

To say "No Nukes" means "Go Coal" today, and until that changes, the fixed ideology of the Harvey Wassermans ("WE'RE BAAACK!!!") is just irresponsible.

"I'd like to repeat jakenewton's comments - "Wind and solar are being built now with little or no subsidy because they SUCCEED in the marketplace. ""

That was SteveMick, I was mentioning that those methods are subsidized.

Whose child will we disfigure with all that Depleted Uranium these things produce? The Neo Cons Evilgelical Supporters will need to select a few more undefended nations to obliterate.

1) A terrorist attack on a nuke plant will hardly scratch the surface. The containment vessels are many stronger than the U-boat pens in Europe that cannot be broken and removed. Yes, a plane will bounce off. There is a great video of a 707 that was deliberately crashed. The 707 hit a concrete barrier and was pulverized. The concrete barrier remained uncompromised.

2) People miss the point of the Energy Bill and the drive away from sustainable energy sources like wind and solar. Nuke AND coal-fired plants centralize energy production, which means it is corporatized energy. Wind and solar decentralizes energy production removing a key energy base of the elites.

3) We can produce clean, safe energy to meet our needs, but it does not meet the monetary needs of the elites.

Not to mention the "Mini-Reactors" like the one at Penn State University that accidently spilled a couple hundred gallons of waste water last week. I don't guess it was picked up on the NCAA coverage. I was told they let the public in on it a couple days later in the CDT (local paper).

I guess all the fish will be bright,bright ,florescent green in Spring Creek .Or of course dead.