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America's New Nuke Showdown Starts Now!
As Fukushima continues to leak and smolder, what may be the definitive battle over new nukes in America has begun.
(Creative Commons: By 200MoreMontrealStencils James Stencilowsky)
The critical first US House vote on a proposed $36 billion loan guarantee package for reactor construction may come as early as June 2. Green power advocates are already calling and writing the White House and Congress early and often, gearing up for a long, definitive showdown.
Germany and Japan have made their decision---the "Lethal Atom" has no future.
The coffin nail is Fukushima. Substantial radiation still leaks from three or more of its six reactors. Volatile fuel rods are dangerously exposed. Various containment and fuel pool structures are compromised. Heat and radiation still pour into our global eco-systems, with no end in sight.
Thankfully, a global citizens movement helped lower the amount of plutonium-based MOX fuel loaded into Unit Three. Without that, Fukushima's emissions would be far more lethal.
As it is, fallout continues to be detected across Europe and the United States. Fukushima is now rated on par with Chernobyl, by some estimates the killer of more than a million people.
For Prime Minister Naoto Kan, Japan's energy policy must now "start from scratch," with a sharp turn to green technologies. More than a dozen proposed reactors will not be built. Some existing ones---including at least two at Hamaoka---will join the six at Fukushima on the shut-down list, at least for the time being. Three more are still closed from a 2006 earthquake at Kashiwazaki.
Germany's Solartopian turn is even more radical. Long a nuclear advocate, center-right Prime Minister Angela Merkel has ordered seven old German nukes shut immediately. The country's other ten may run until 2021.
But a top Merkel-appointed commission sees this as a global game changer. "A withdrawal from nuclear power will spur growth, offer enormous technical, economic and social opportunities to position Germany even further as an exporter of sustainable products and services," says a 28-page report. "Germany could show that a withdrawal from nuclear energy is the chance to create a high-powered economy."
Both Japan and Germany---the world's third- and fourth-largest economies---have already made substantial investments in green technology. Much of that was developed in the United States, which has paid a heavy price economically and ecologically for its atomic addiction, and now stands to lose even more ground in what will clearly be the energy growth center of the new millennium.
Some $18.5 billion in loan guarantees for new reactor construction was put in place under George W. Bush. In 2007 the nuclear lobby tried to add $50 billion. The industry has spent some $645 million---$64.5 million per year---over the last decade twisting Congressional arms.
But a nationwide grassroots movement rose up to stop them. In every year since 2007 citizen action has beaten a variety of attempts to slip the industry more handouts. Local movements movements throughout the US focused growing demands for the shut-down of old reactors. In Vermont, a March, 2012 drop dead date looms ever larger, forced by a wide range of political pressures that could start an avalanche of closures.
Yet just last year Obama dropped $8.33 billion in loan guarantees on a bitterly contested double-reactor project in Georgia. Two other reactors are scheduled for South Carolina, where ratepayers are expected to foot the bill as construction proceeds.
But $36 billion in proposed new guarantees were stripped out of the Continuing Resolution that's funding the government for 2011. Now Obama wants them for 2012.
Ironically, the leading candidates for the money have collapsed. A Japanese-financed project for Texas and a French one in Maryland are all but dead. Financial, licensing, siting, design and political problems have decimated the remaining list. The pressures on old and new US reactors, and the collapse of the industry in Germany and Japan, appear on the brink of pushing a failed technology into the scrap heap of history.
But the budget is now headed to Congress, guarantees and all. First stop is a House Appropriations sub-committee, where a vote could come as early as June 2.
Fukushima has changed the nuclear map. Italy and Switzerland have put proposed projects on hold. China, the biggest potential future market, has said it is re-evaluating its atomic future, especially with radiation pouring into it from nearby Fukushima.
But Obama has all but ignored the accident. He gave an early national address telling the American public not to worry about Fukushima's radiation. Despite widespread reports of contamination here, the feds have provided no systematic monitoring of fallout and no guidance on what to do about it.
Amidst a heavy budget crunch, the administration must now justify lavishing taxpayer money on an industry that can't get private financing or meaningful liability insurance, can't compete in the marketplace and can't deal with its wastes.
As evidenced by the sharp green turns in Germany and Japan, renewable technologies have come of age. The Solartopian vision of a green-powered Earth has now definitively attracted two of the plant's four largest economies.
In short, we are at the tipping point where renewables are cheaper and more attractive to national-scale investors than nukes.
Without these guarantees, America's nuclear industry has future prospects ranging from slim to none.
The ante is being raised in Vermont, New York, California and in other states where fierce battles rage to shut existing reactors, many of which are on earthquake faults and virtually identical to those now spewing at Fukushima.
So now we are engaged in what may be the final, definitive battle over the future of atomic power in the United States.
Over the next few months, millions of dollars will pour from the industry's lobby into the coffers of Congresspeople willing to vote them billions. The White House shows no signs of turning away from that particular tsunami.
But against all odds, a grassroots green-powered citizens movement has been holding its own. If it does so again this year, a sustainable future may finally be within reach.
YOUR reach!
56 Comments so far
Show AllSo who's doing the lobbying, and who expects to get these billions if the popular candidates have bowed out? We need names and corporate affiliations.
"Amidst a heavy budget crunch, the administration must now justify lavishing taxpayer money on an industry that can't get private financing or meaningful liability insurance, can't compete in the marketplace and can't deal with its wastes."
This makes no financial sense.
We are stuck in 3 wars in the Mideast.
300 people died in the South in a single storm event.
The south is experiencing catastrophic flooding.
Food stockpiles are at record lows.
11 people died on an oil rig last year and another ocean ecosystem was destroyed.
Thousands die from fossil fuel pollution every year.
All of the above and much, much more brought to us by fossil fuels.
What gets ALL the bad press?
The nuclear power plant in Japan.
A little perspective would be great here.
I doubt you'll get very far, calling for perspective. No one else has.
My sense is that Paul (SaboCat) called it: nukes are a favorite white-collar liberal bogey-boo, because they don't really understand the issues so it's scary to think about nukes and both fashionable and painless to oppose them. It's not like boycotting cars.
Shouldn't you actually read what I wrote before you start giving me stick?
There aren't "millions of dead and many more suffering" from nuclear power. At most, those are inflated, statistical probabilities, comparable to the "millions of dead and many more suffering" from the toxic fumes from fossil-fuel combustion, secondary smoke, and other forms of pollution. You can't find death certificates saying "Joe Blow, died of cancer due to radiation from Chernobyl", because nobody knows where the cancer came from that killed Joe.
Contrast that with the literally millions of deaths from black lung, cave-ins, tailing slides, road accidents, petroleum spills, and other artifacts of fossil-fuel extraction and use. We know with certainty what those individuals died of. There's no doubt in their cases. And we also know with certainty that if we continue using fossil fuels, they will be the major contributor to _billions_ of deaths, quite possibly including every multi-celled oxygen-breather on Earth.
You do yourself no credit by angrily criticising someone who's telling the simple truth.
Mairead,
Perhaps you should do yourself a favor and familarise yourself with cost accounting. I know it is fashionable among pro-nuke folks to ascribe irrational, hysterical and over emotional behavior to anyone who dares to question the wonderful world of nuclear power but really, what do you have against talking about costs? Aren't you the one really appealing to emotion here? The fact that nuclear technology produces poisonous isotopes is, granted, an issue of enormous emotional content. But it is so because, as you must admit, nuclear technology produced radionuclides do sicken and kill people on a pretty regular basis.
http://theautomaticearth.blogspot.com/2011/05/may-2-2011-fukushima-fallacies-fallout.html
But lets put aside the whole nuke bogey man death thing aside for a moment. Let's do some cost accounting.
Geothermal energy cost LESS to build the plant and equipment with all the anti-corrosive pipes, plumbing and valves than nuclear power plants. The insurance and financing are simply not available in the private sector for nukes so geothermal beats nukes at the starting gate. The ability to site a nuke anywhere there is water versus the necessity to site a geothermal plant near a hot spot is an argument made based on cost of transmission. You do agree, do you not, that electricity can be transmitted thousands of miles from the source of generation, right? Sure, there are losses in transmission but there is ZERO fuel requirement for a geothermal plant. So really, it's silly to talk about trransmission losses when you aren't using fuel to create steam. Just ONE nuclear fuel rod, according to drolltroll, costs about $8,500 a pop. You need thousands of them for a reactor. They only last about 4.5 years. They then must be stored AND secured so nobody can make a dirty bomb from them for a LONG, LONG TIME. At present, the main Uranium mining reagions providing raw material for fuel rods are in Australia and Canada. With the new "full cycle accountabilty and responsiblity" being required of manufacturers for everything from cell phones to nuclear fuel rods, these two countries will have to agree to take the used fuel rods back for reprocessing or storage. They are balking. They say if they are forced to do so, they will raise the price of raw Uranium. And there goes another pro-nuclear argument. Why? Because, in order make a profit selling Uranium while agreeing to take the waste back, you have to sell it at a price that would translate to 30 to 40 cents a kwh for nuclear power. That's without accidents like Fukushima. Anyone checking current renewable electricity costs from geothermal to solar, wind and wave knows that kwh costs are much lower for these technologies.
So I submit that you, Maiiread, are the one with an emotional attachment to nuclear power that is not anchored in cost.
Finally, geothermal is not limited to hot spots. The other type of geothermal that could knock 30 to 40 percent off of current heat and air conditionioning costs in the WORLD, not just the USA, is passive geothermal. You don't need to boil any water. You just circulate water with a low electrical load pump through a loop below the frost line. It works anywhere on planet earth.
If you do the cost accounting, nuclear power comes in last. Do you like to cheerlead expensive technologies? Fine. But you should admit you are doing so and not resort to attempting to ridicule people doing cost accounting. The only way I could say you are being rational when you use such sophistry is if you are simply being disingenuous.
You are either misinformed about the true cost of nuclear technology or you are simply using mendacity and sophistry to cloud the cost issue in order to defnd nuclear technology.
To Mairead:
You certainly must be a nuclear apologist. The claim that because we do not know precisely what caused someone's cancer (as if toxic compund cannot act in agggregate) is reason to dismiss the carcinogens in our environment is the covenient meme of industry.
Are you serious when you suggest that there is no doubt as to the cause of death and disease in people dying from the dispersnats and volatile compounds form petroleum spills? You have no idea, then. Tell that to the sick and dying around the Gulf of Mexico right now ...
Our world is awash in toxic, synthetic substances - such as radioactive waste and pollution from nuclear plants - and we rarely if ever will be able to know through our reductionist scientific methods just which one of the innumerable toxic substances anyone has been exposed to caused his/her cancer. That is exactly how and why industry is enabled to continue with business as usual. No precaution allowed.
To think that Fukushima and Chernobyl are not catastrophes of epic proportions (as are cave-ins, tailing slides, road accidents, and petroleum spills) to organisms throughout the planet is to be completely under the delusional influence of industry, corporatism, capitialism, and/or neoliberalism.
I think you were answering Mairead, not me. I was countering Mairead's bogus arguments which attempted to deny the reality of the nuclear industry's ongoing poisoning of the human race, as well as the ridiculously expensive nature of nuclear power plants.
Have you noticed how the nuclear apologists always fall back to the coal bogey man as if coal, or any fossil fuel, for that matter, is what we are advocating? Have you noticed how they flat refuse to talk about geothermal (active AND passive)?
Mention heat pumps and loops below the frost line and they go deaf.
Also, they never, ever mention the fact that Uranium is shipped and trucked usiing fossil fuels. Mention that with a large geothermal plant sending electricity over transmission lines, there is no fossil fuel cost of energy transfer and they can't hear you.
Another blind spot is the high security costs of nuclear power plants and waste.
These people are irrational liars.
Yeah. I edited it. Sorry, agelbert ..
pensatrice,
No problem. At any rate, we need more like you here to tell it like it is.
Thank you.
A little perspective:
Chernobyl killed around a million people (so far).
Fukushima is worse than Chernobyl.
But there are lots of profits to be made as long as there are generous government subsidies and freedom from responsibility for accidents and waste disposal.
Burning fossil fuels is destroying our planet, but as long as governments are willing to kill millions for control of the resources as well as provide generous subsidies, there are lots of profits to be made.
Renewable energy and conservation do not have as much profit potential because neither requires centralized control. So these are to be avoided.
I think the perspective that you must be referring to is the perspective of the corporations who couldn’t care less about the planet, but who care dearly about next quarter's bottom line.
BYSTANDER: Thank you. The earlier posters are apologists for the nuclear industry. By conflating the numbers of casualties born of oil use, they somehow think they can deflect the more SERIOUS concerns relative to the fall-out from nuclear power, the issue of what to do with spent fuel rods, and the very direct lethal threats to nearby communities, and the natural world, when things run amok. And they ALWAYS do... sooner or later.
As you related, the sins of one non-renewable energy system do not negate the sins of the other. So long as the corporate world gets to call the shots, profits will come before sustainability. Casualties, be damned!
However, the article is very optimistic because as Harvey pointed out, two of the world's MAJOR economies are seeing this not as a loss-of-profit issue, but rather the converse. By getting into the race for greener, efficient technologies, they'll be that much further ahead of the curve, when all other nations require these tools for their citizens' energy needs. As they will.
Combining the ENLIGHTENED attitude of Germany and Japan with the spiritual precepts being advanced by Evo Morales (of Bolivia), in bringing the requirements of the Natural World to the "table," we're seeing a sea-change that will raise tides in a manner that will force America, along with its recalcitrant and entrenched corporate business "leaders" to go along for the ride.
How nasty of you, Rose. I thought better of you. I've never been an apologist for any industry, and I very much resent you claiming that I am.
Mairead,
You are being irrational.
Perhaps you should tell us what you have to gain by backing the nuclear power dead horse.
The nuclear Hindenburg is going down. I wish it had to do with saving people's lives. The bastards that run the energy systems could care less about human lives. No, the nuclear Hindenburg is crashing because of high costs. Even you should have figured that out by now.
Bystander:
How about a little more perspective on Chernobyl:
"...A landmark United Nations study published in September 2005 estimated that while 4,000 people theoretically could die from radiation-induced cancers, only 56 deaths could be attributed to radiation exposure from the accident. That total includes the 47 emergency workers mentioned above and nine people who died from thyroid cancer—most of whom were either children or adolescents at the time of the accident...."
Personally, I'll take UN data over Greenpeace.
Bill
Open the pod bay doors, Hal.
I'm sorry agelbert, I'm afraid I can't do that.
I see that between your bit parts as one of the birds in the Alfred Hitchcock movie, you also played the Hal 9000 computer in 2001. He was such a polite computer. He was so patient when they made bad chess moves in calmly showing them what move they should have made. He killed one of the astronauts and tried to kill the other with the same reptilian calm.
You know Bill, I give you an A for consistency. I even admire your ability to control your temper. However, since you are, by your own admission, a materials engineer, I have to wonder why the fuck you never took cost accounting.
Also, in regard to your boundless faith in nuclear technology to provide energy for humanity, I observe something I ran into quite often when I was studying for a degree in biology. It's that science is wonderful and great and we are going to try this experiment even if a few nervous nellies are bellyaching about downsides. In other words, once a pack of scientists gets behind a project, they suffer from endowment bias. It totally destroys their ability to think objectively. We have a lot of unscientific scientists as a result. You are unscientific, Bill. As an engineer, you should attempt to shake your endowment bias in nuclear technology by pretending you are not associated with any energy industry, have no stock in energy corporations and have no dog in this fight.
Here is an example of "how it works" in the unscientific scientific mindset plagued by endowment bias:
The UK is going to allow the sale of meat and milk from cloned animals.
Wonderful news for the future of zombies. This is just the kind of behaviour that has been parodied in countless sci-fi stories. The authorities don't really know what will happen if they introduce some exciting new unknowns into the food chain/atmosphere/water supply etc etc. But they figure, 'let's do it anyway, and see what happens.' Then we wait a few years and wahayyy, we've got zombies, mutations, a killer plague.
And always remember the authorities know what they're doing. Because if there's no scientific proof that we're all going to suffer, then it must be ok. And hey, if there is scientifc proof one day that we're all genetically contaminated, I'm sure they'll come up with an affordable medicine.
It's been the same with nuclear technology from day one.
The grandiose idea that problems associated with radionuclides, which were never created naturally by the forces of elemental formation from stars over billions of years, can be sucessfully overcome by reductionist engineering techniques aiming at short sighted monetary profits, will need to be discarded if our species shall engender hopes of a prosperous future for complex life forms on the Earth.
Open the pod bay doors, Bill.
ag,
I'm suprised you didn't use Doctor Strangelove rather than 2001 for a reference.
I actually have taken cost accounting twice. Once in my undergraduate study-it was so long ago I think we used an abacus. The second time was working on my MBA.
Since we are getting all Carl Sagan-y, nature has created most of the radionuclides you are concerned with. The Oklo natural reactor is estimated to have run for over 100,000 years. Among other things of interest, the Oklo reactor provides a great database of fission fragment migration in an uncontained environment. It is also the one known place that traces of natural plutonium can be found.
As a biologist, you probably appreciate that we evolved in an environment that had a much higher natural background radiation level than we currently have and that we may well be optimally adapted to it.
I read a report and have not been able to find it again. It used monkeys if I remember correctly. Both the experimental group and the control were fed identical diets except for the isotopic composition of the potassium in the diet. The experimental group was fed with isotopically pure K-39. The control group received natural potassium including radioactive K-40. The experimental group ended up sickly and short lived compared to the control. As a biologist, how would you comment on this study?
Bill
It should be noted that Bill has acknowledged that he works for the nuke industry in a previous post [I suppose that makes him our resident nuke expert].
I'm not quite sure what Bill's K39 / K40 point is?! - Is he saying that exposure to radiation is perfectly harmless or even healthy?! If he really believes that perhaps he might want to volunteer as a Kamikaze 'Liquidator' at Fukushima!
Nix,
The K-40/K-39 comment was particularly for agelbert for his consideration as a biologist. My field is materials engineering and my understanding of cellular biology is limited.
There are two different schools of thought among health physicists for understanding radiation exposure at low to moderate doses: LNT (Linear No Threshold) model and RH (Radiation Hormesis). LNT assumes, as do most posters at CD, that all radiation, no matter how little, is injurious and that the effects are additive with further exposures. RH hypothesizes that there exists a moderate dose of radiation that is health promoting and that beyond that dose the effects are injurious. RH posits that gamma (or x-ray) radiation functions rather like a vitamin that is good for you in a measured dose but toxic in higher doses. There are several vitamins and minerals that fit that description.
Industrial radiation safety limits are set using the LNT model. This is the more conservative approach and, as a radiation worker, I appreciate and am comfortable with that.
Where this is vital to the accident at Fukushima-1 is the continuance of the evacuation areas. Certainly as long as there is a significant risk of further substantial uncontrolled airborne releases, the evacuation zone is appropriate. Once the reactors are stabilized, however, the evacuation question is limited to the safety of low level radiation exposure. Under RH, the evacuees would be permitted to return to their homes sooner.
At this time I am agnostic about RH.
Bill
This RH Theory can be & I suspect is used real conveniently by the nuke industry & other industrial emitters of so-called 'low level' radiation [IE: cell-phone makers, medical radiation 'therapies', micro-wave ovens, etc]. 'Technically' we know there's something called natural back-ground radiation - heck you can even describe sunlight 'technically' as natural background 'radiation'. BUT once you start adding industrial radiation from sources like those named above - you've gone beyond natural levels & sources of so-called back-ground radiation.
Heck there's now talk of irradiating food to kill microbes [IE: E-Coli, Salmonella]- WHY - because the food industry [& apparently the FDA] prefers that- rather than cleaning up its act [like curtailing & cleaning up -or- shutting down- CAFO animal factory farms]!
AND- Once the nuke industry started mining uranium on an industrial scale [let alone building nuke reactors & bombs] it went past natural levels of back-ground radiation. So its real self-serving that these industrial emitters of radiation would push a theory that blurs the distinction between natural levels & sources of radiation & so-called 'low level' industrial radiation!
And what of the recently released Russian study that says that perhaps a million have already died from Chernobyl & counting?! Or that 80% of Belarus' children born after 1986 are unhealthy?! Or that Official Groups for surviving so-called 'Liquidators' say that between 60,000 - 110,000 'Liquidators' have already died to date & 175,000+ are chronically ill?! I'll take info from people on the ground in the affected areas over any-one else's - Including that IAEA screened UN report!
Huh? Do you imagine there's a rule that says we have to pick either fossil fuels or nuclear energy and talk only about the problems with that energy source? Everyone knows fossil fuels are bad. Fukushima has reminded the world how sinister nuclear energy is.
From my perspective, your call for perspective lacks perspective.
In reality we do have to choose so it's important to prioritize. Coal is the worst, but it supplies the majority of the energy in the US. When TMI squashed nuclear power in the US decades ago, coal took its place. Fossil fuels virtually get a free pass because the public does not associate fossil fuels with apocalyptic disasters.
Nuclear fears get overblown and Harvey Wassermann in particular fans the apocalyptic flames (In every single article)
What happened in Japan was a true disaster but it was not apocalyptic.
What happened in Chernobyl was atrocious, but it was an antiquated plant with few safety features. Chernobyl's issues aren't relevant to the modern nuclear energy industry.
If someone wanted to build a Chernobyl in the US, I would be right up there protesting.
I just watched an interview w Christian Parenti of 'The Nation' w MSNBC's Ed Schultz. Parenti says that what this so-called 'Nuclear Renaissance' is really all about - IS NOT Bringing safer nuke technology on-line [sorry Bill but if he's right - Thorium Salt Reactors ain't happening] - WHAT IT IS ABOUT is the NRC re-licensing the 103 existing nuke reactors FOR ANOTHER 25 YRS - even though most have reached their 40 yr life-time design limit! PLUS they want to run them at 120% power [That's 20% ABOVE THEIR DESIGN SPECIFICATIONS] even though many / most are leaking radiation - due to the fact that the combo of extreme: radiation + pressure + heat- has made MANY CRITICAL METAL PARTS BRITTLE! THIS IS INSANITY ON STEROIDS & A RECIPE FOR DISASTER! Just how many Fukushimas do these folks think we & eco-sphere can survive??!!
PS: They also showed a video of Obama saying earlier this yr [pre Fukushima] how safe Japans Nuke power prog was - 'Something for us to model'... It was a ironic foot-in-the-mouth repeat of his statement last yr of how - 'Current drilling technology makes massive oil spills a thing of the past...' - just a few weeks before BP flooded the Gulf of Mexico in Oil.
nukes get the attention because they are apocalyptic engines of mass killing.
they are also an economic catastrophe of the first order, one of the reasons the 3d & 4th largest economies in the world have definitively decided to move away.
this is not just a health/safety/eco decision on their part. the japanese & germans have ascertained that the future of the global economy is in renewables. a HUGE DEAL. so PAY ATTENTION, FOLKS. this is a moment of great transformation.
Agreed. I'm having a great time watching the "big switch" going on in the Japanese mindset. Because of their culture, they have the ability to quickly and massively change their thinking on an issue. Take, for example, the knowledge of disease and germs that came with the 20th century. What other culture in the world wears masks to filter out germs? How many billions of dollars in health care costs would be saved if everyone in the world wore face masks to filter germs?
Japanese are logical thinkers. Their pack mentality is offensive to some but has a definitive upside in the response to Fukushima. Right now the mayors of many towns in evey many prefectures in Japan are clamoring for sophisticated radionuclide sensors to be installed by the government. Can you say, "We don't trust those lying, greedy sacks of shit at Tepco!"? Remember that the nuclear industry has controlled the instrumentation and sensors up until now. This puts them on the spot because they can't "fudge it" with radiation releases (like they do in the USA regularly) and keep it quiet. The "all in the family" bullshit so prevallent in the nuclear club here and the USA and Japan is not going to fly anymore. We are looking hard at them and they don't like it one bit. That's the reason the EPA is being castrated here. But in Japan, you will see the dawning realization that renewables are cheap and life giving in comparison to the secrets loving, poison spewing, poor and homeless abusing nuclear industry. There will be a massive "Why didn't we think of this before?" moment. After that they are going to totally eliminate the nuclear industry, its' reactors, its' waste and its' overpaid executives and clubby secrecy.
Meanwhile in Vermont, two more advocacy groups against nuclear power have joined with the Vermont government against Entergy in the Entergy law suite.
There is no way to make fossil fuels safe.
Nuclear power can be safe.
These Japanese plants should not have been on a fault line, but it was really the tsunami that caused the problem.
I was shocked to see that this particular plant was right on the coast.
However, even this worst case scenario did not result in the Armageddon that Harvey predicts.
Chernobyl to an even greater extent was completely avoidable. A containment dome would have prevented this catastrophe. Even so, I don't believe everything I read, so I don't know how many people died as a result of Chernobyl. But 1 million people seems to be a completely made up number.
A really bad day in Japan for nuclear power is like every single day for the fossil fuels industry.
You do have to compare one source to the other because that is our reality.
Fossil fuels are so much worse than nuclear power and you can bet that Exxon Mobile is behind a lot of the anti-nuke propaganda.
Choosing between fossil fuels and nuclear power is like choosing between Republicans and Democrats; both are terrible choices but that is where the money is.
If nuclear power could be made safe, then why has not a private company developed a safe reactor that does not require an exemption from insurance and safety standards, and does not require government assistance for the byproducts? Maybe that will be possible someday, but we are a long, long way from that (unless you believe in cold fusion.)
In the meantime, it is a false choice to say that if we don’t mortgage our souls to the nuclear power industry, then we must use fossil fuels instead. The logical choice is renewable sources and conservation. But as I have mentioned before, decentralized power sources are not attractive to GE and Exxon unless they can corner the market which they cannot. So instead, we will have nuclear and fossil fuels presented as the only viable options.
Well said, By-stander. You hit the KEY!
MAIREAD: Anyone arguing FOR nuclear power NOW is the nasty one. My telling the truth in this forum is generally not appreciated by those who harbor agendas based upon deception (of one sort or another). JStevens can be counted on to show up in support of nuclear, ever-ready to muddy the statistics arguing on the side of dangerous corporations, rather than FOR public health. It suggests ODD priorities, likely of the paid-industry shill variety.
Siouxrose, you are so very shrewd. How clever you are to notice that I am a highly paid corporate shill even though all of my comments are anti-corporate and pro-environment. You are wise enough to keep that mind firmly closed even in the face of all the evidence that fossil fuels are destroying the planet. That's just what we need.
I agree with your statements about decentralized power sources. We should be much farther along in clean, safe energy, but these efforts are always thwarted by corrupt, powerful industries. Nuclear energy is not my #1 choice. We should maximize wind, solar and conservation. Then fill in any gaps with nuclear.
But nuclear energy gets thwarted just like wind and solar.
When I read that wind farms are bad for birds or are a noise nuisance, I am pretty sure that Exxon Mobile is behind it.
When the dangers of nuclear energy are blown way out of proportion while fossil fuel pollution is completely ignored, I think Exxon Mobile and similar companies are behind that too.
A wind mill can be very dangerous if you put it above a school playground and don't attach the blades properly.
A nuclear power plant can be dangerous if it doesn't have a containment dome or if you put it in a really careless location.
Or it can be safe and clean.
Fossil fuel is destroying the planet and destabilizing the climate.
Honestly, it's probably too late to stop it anyway.
So if Harvey wants to chant Solartopia, and use hyperbole and fear mongering to prevent any modern nuclear power plants from being built, it probably doesn't matter.
Exxon Mobile is on Harvey's side and it's just too hard to stop them.
If nuclear power could be made safe, then why has not a private company developed a safe reactor that does not require an exemption from insurance and safety standards, and does not require government assistance for the byproducts?
--------------------------------------------------
I don't believe you thought that argument through as carefully as you intended. I can think of many examples other than reactors, and many excuses other than safety where the wealthy have stuck us with the bills while pocketing the profits. It's their default MO.
If such a technology existed, some company would take advantage of it and would be a world leader in energy overnight. Trouble is, the technology does not exist.
And all companies pollute the commons to maximize their own profits. That is one of the weaknesses of our current corporate economic system.
And safety does sell. Remember when car companies fought tooth and nail to keep seat belts out of cars? Now they tout their multiple air bags and crash worthiness of the tanks they sell.
bystander,
IMHO the technology actually does exist and has been demonstrated. The reason it has not been commercially exploited is it requires a deep pocket visionary. My technology of choice is the liquid fluoride salt thorium reactor. This was a serious competitor to the light water reactor but lost out, at least partially, because it was not compatible with the nuclear weapons program.
If you are interested, see www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZR0UKxNPh8 for a good introduction.
Bill Gates is fulfilling the visionary roll for another potential paradigm shifting nuclear reactor, the traveling wave reactor. I would rather he had backed liquid thorium but it is his money, not mine.
OBTW, the Chinese have decided to invest heavily in developing the liquid salt reactor. (This was before Fukushima but I haven't heard of any program change.)
Bill
Bill Gates is fulfilling the visionary role? LOL
He, like you, is just trying to guarranty he has his hand out collecting a piece of the energy pie per secula seculorum. Of course he won't fund renewables. There's no money in them for him. The savings in renewables are for the common people. Renewables will make people independent of large power corporations. Billy goat Gates hates that. So does his pall Buffett. So do reductionist ad absurdum engineers.
Open the pod bay doors, Bill.
"Renewables will make people independent of large power corporations."
Agelbert: As a solar power salesman for nine years I think your statement is true only if people and businesses continue to install solar for themselves. What concerns me--and what is already happening in California--is that the major utilities are investing in solar in what are appropriately called "utility scale" projects. Recently, the CA legislature passed the requirement that all state utilities get 30% of their production from renewables by 2020. This is good in theory and great for the environment as a whole. What's not so good for the utility customer without his own solar system is that he will continue to be dependent on the utility. Of course, utility investment in solar will be passed along to the consumer, too, and once payback is realized, utility profits will skyrocket. That's because sunlight is free and they won't have to produce or pay for conventionally-produced electricity. Indeed solar and wind power are about the only ways us common folks can "get back" at corporate America.
San Diego Dave,
Your point is well taken. There are always people involved in tilting the playing field to favor energy corporations against the consumer. The rate you are reimbursed for energy you produce is an excellent example of string oulling at the corporate level. By rights, they should pay us exactly what they charge us. Of course they claim transmission costs and maintenance. This is, in fact, a baseless claim because many utility corporation costs are footed by the government in the form of tax breaks and other accounting gimmicks. Utilities used to be public. When the privatizition goons came in, they grandfathered in all the benefits the public utilities had. We always have to deal with the one sided (profit for us, costs for you) thinking of power corporations. For this reason, I think we should push for passive geothermal heat pump installations as a basic requirement of housing in the USA. That excludes over 20% of electrical demand over the country right off the bat. Combine that with solar and some storage medium (water tank or battery) at homes and you place the individual in the driver's seat instead of the power corporation. I know it can be done. However, the people with money in this country will fight it tooth and nail
ag,
Gates is a complex person. He was ruthless while building and running Microsoft. He and his wife now fund some of the most exciting experimental education projects in the country with no expectation of financial return.
He is not out to get richer with the traveling wave reactor. Even if it works and pays off big, he will be pushing daisies by then. He thinks it might pay off for society. One of the biggest technical challenge is the materials of construction. As a materials engineer, I see the goal of a fuel clad to last for a hundred year run above 1000F in a fast reactor as being a monster problem.
Bill
The only nuclear power that theoretically can be made safe is fusion power [preferably cold but even hot would be much better than fission nuke power]. But there are no working scale models that have reliably run at or above break-even yet. Further Obama's / Gov't focus is on continued funding of the risky [flawed] design of Pressurized Water Reactors [PWRs] or Boiling Water Reactors [BWRs]. Not even Bill's preference for Thorium Salt Reactors [which might be safer - although I'm skeptical] for which there are working models - are on the Table. One big reason for this- they are less compatible [though not completely so] w a nuke weapons prog than PWR & BWR reactors!!!
The only way to make PWR & BWR reactor plants safe is to build them in hermetically sealed under-ground or mountain caverns away from earth-quake zones & isolated from natural water sources [even though PWRs & BWRs need A LOT OF WATER to operate - which is why they built Fukushima on the ocean, Chernobyl by a lake & 3Mile Island on the Susquehanna River]. That way when another one goes Chernobyl / Fukushima [& it will] the radiation released will be sealed inside the cave [plus that would protected them from a hi-jacked plane attack]! BUT - That would increase their already very expensive costs by 3Xs - 10Xs - which is why its not done!!!
jstevens says: "I was shocked to see that this particular plant was right on the coast."
Get a clue, man!
Both San Onofre and Diablo Canyon nuclear plants in California are right on the coast. Diablo Canyon is on a fault line but both plants are on the Pacific's Ring of Fire that is susceptible to volcanoes, earthquakes and tsunamis. The nuclear industry never came close to its claim in the 50s that its power would be "too cheap to meter." The real dig to me is that the American taxpayer underwrites the nuclear industry which can't get its plants insured by private underwriters. We also get dinked by paying "nuclear decommissioning fees" in our electric bills for when nuke plants phase out and the waste has to be stored. So, we pay higher-than-expected rates for nuclear power; we pay the insurance on nukes; and we pay to shut them down and to dispose/store of their waste, Why would the nuclear industry want to discontinue this no-risk cash cow? It's nothing but upside for them, baby!
Its Telling that NO-ONE KNOWS: How much radiation was released at 3Mile Island thus no-one knows what the real long-term effects were. Why because 3Mile Island's owner [GCU Corp] & the US Gov't's NRC both had reasons to down-play, mislead, & cover-up [seems the US Gov't assumed liability for Fission Nuke Power plant accidents in 1958]. Plus the NRC & Nuke industry knew thorium reactors might have been safer than PWR & BWR reactors - but didn't roll them out BECAUSE They WERE LESS COMPATIBLE W A NUKE WEAPONS PROG than PWRs & BWRs [FYI for those who think / claim fission nuke plants have no real connection w a nuke weapons progs] .
No one knows exactly: How many people have died are dying & chronically sickened, permanently disabled from Chernobyl. Why? Because not only did USSR authorities cover it up, but it turns out the IAEA [which promotes nuke power though that's not well known] holds veto power over WHO's reports when it comes to accidents involving nuke power plants.
Now we've got Fukushima- Its obvious that TEPCO & Japan's Gov't have been in down play / cover-up mode from day one. This also goes for Obama's EPA failure to accurately track Fukushima's fallout over the US. So we may never know the actual number of Japanese casualties [It could exceed Hiroshima & Nagasaki] let alone how many outside of Japan. And its telling that Japan's Gov't jumped the acceptable levels of radiation exposure for children near Fukushima by 20Xs.
We know when a flood, tornado, hurricane, earth-quake, train wreck, plane crash, etc- occurs they always comes to a definitive end. BUT- Just like Chernobyl ain't over [they've got to rebuild that sarcophagus or radiation will pour out of it again]; Fukushima's [which has 3 - 4 reactors in melt-down & 1 or more spent fuel pools having been on fire, blew-up, uncovered, etc] DANGERS MAY NEVER END [at least in the foreseeable future].
That 's what I call putting things in proper perspective.
Re: Three Mile Island
Check out the research of Dr. Steve Wing from UNC such as "A Reevaluation of Cancer Incidence Near the Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant: The Collision of Evidence and Assumptions"
I think he probably qualifies as one of the academic heroes doing research of great value in environmental health and justice - but of course, no one ever hears about it.
""""But Obama has all but ignored the accident. He gave an early national address telling the American public not to worry about Fukushima's radiation. Despite widespread reports of contamination here, the feds have provided no systematic monitoring of fallout and no guidance on what to do about it.""""
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This needs repeating as it shows the non-considerate collusion, contrary to the people, of o and his pet lobbyists who always do everything possible to buy their insidious agendas for those whom they work or should I more correctly say BRIBE congressional coffers with, which to me means the money somehow makes it into those members of congress and government employees' offshore accounts. NO DOUBT, the part of o's 2008 campaign promise to corporations of the full support and fealty of the u.s. government, where the 'united' in the acronym 'u.s.' is about the only place where 'united' does apply in this country.
And of course the feds have and won't provide any systematic monitoring of fallout. That is what the government and the employees are paid to NOT DO. That too is just part of the flippant way the government is paid to act.
But Wasserman's article does bring a certain amount of good news and I hope it continues forthwith. An insidious industry hopefully to be put in its own well deserved grave as there is not any intelligence around to make nuclear sources of power viable on a planet with sooo many people. The closest technology would be the nuclear powered systems sent into space that would hopefully never have a chance of raining back down on the people.
Yeah, o. You're something else and it disgusts me to think that you will be the only 'lesser of 2 evils' that can or will be president in 2012. Now there is a problem of equal if not more importance and concern and in need of remedying by 2012. Imagine, there being a president not tied to any political affiliation. In these days that is a fool's hope.
Isn't this really about kinetics, the rate of change. Now humans last maybe 75 years, and indeed during that time radioactivity and chemical poisoning take their toll. Indeed, the pollution from petroleum is horrid. You all need to view the Los Angeles data. There the places where cancer victims live was plotted and each case was given a red dot. The startling result is that the cancer map totally overlays the freeway map. The data are so clear that even a 7th grader, every 7th grader can "get it". However, let's say that we stop all petroleum use in California. Chemical waste degrades somewhat quickly. In a few months the toxins would be gone.
Not so with the nuclear crap. Hundreds of years from now the Japanese trash will still be in our biosphere. Radioactive damage is being done on millions of kids. Will this make future generations more smart, more likely to thrive? Dream on. I suggest that we humans have absolutely no right to destroy this planet so that we are the last generation. We don't own it. We are required to pass it on for the next act.
Do we really think that we are not responsible? Seems like the "Job #1" is to preserve the garden we live in.
Good comment, vanderborgh. Living in San Diego and close to both I-5 and I-8, I'm sure I'm in that "cancer map" of carbon pollution here, too. But as you say, the problem with nuclear crap is that it does hang around a long time. Three-Mile Island, Chernobyl and now Fukushima were disasters where they occured but also warnings for the rest of us. If these events were decreasingly bad since 1979 it would be somewhat encouraging but this is not the case. Worse yet, from what I've read over the past few weeks is that almost all of the 105 or so nuke plants in the US could NOT sustain the damage that Fukushima got. So when does the insanity end? It's time the U.S. and other industrialized nations take the lead of Germany and Japan. Both see the wisdom of dropping nuclear power and relying more on solar and wind not only for reasons of safety but as boons to their respective economies. They've concluded it has come to more than just the political will to change but a political--and moral--imperative.
mkb29: Solar, wind, geothermal, wave technologies are also very dependable and carbon free. My mentor in the solar industry is a nuclear engineer who is proud to say he still works with the solar system's largest reactor but, fortunately it's 293 million miles away! He also says the best place for uranium is in the ground, un-mined and un-exposed...What's truly sad are the nuclear apologists like you who fail to see the writing on the wall.
"293 million miles"
You got a typo there. It's 93 million miles to the sun.
This generation of people, here in the USA, has been a disaster for the Earth. Our Faustian contract with fossil fuels, with nuclear, with easy money, easy living.. it is everything the religious teachings have warned us about. The spirit may be willing but the flesh is weak.. very weak indeed. If you look at this country now and compare it with what it had been for thousands of years, inhabited by peoples who knew how to limit their numbers, who used sustainable methods to raise their food.. what a mess has been made. Kill the buffalo and build stock yards, kill the prairie and plow for corn and wheat, us lots of chemicals and fertilizers. Drive cars, ride in planes, get no exercise. Get really fat, and sick, and weak, and beg for cheap healthcare. What is needed is a lot less energy being produced, and a lot more human effort at self sustaining lifestyles.. or are people just too lazy to live?
Exactly!
Many would argue that your statements are just impractical or unrealistic, but what is unrealistic is believing that we can go on as we are and that all of these things we produce, all of these energy systems - be they coal, wind, nuclear, or solar - are in any way sustainable. Keep dreaming, humanity.
If their tests are accurate, this would be great.
On an aside, as I understand it, no one has been able to explain where all of the helium in natural gas wells actually comes from. There are reactions, chemical and nuclear, that we do not yet understand.
Thanks for posting the link.
bystander,
The helium in natural gas is not a mystery. It is indicative of uranium and its daughter products being present in the gas source.
Uranium and all of the rest of the elements heavier than bismuth in the periodic table are naturally radioactive. Much of the radioactive decay of these materials is by emitting alpha particles. An alpha particle is really nothing but a helium atom once it cools down.
Bill