Nuclear energy is yesterday’s answer

Discussion: 14 comments so far…

1. By Houstonjac

   3/29/09 at 4:31 a.m.

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   Renewable energy is a great option when it's available. Problem is sunshine, wind and geothermal resources are not always available.
   Let's be practical first. There is always a vocal input to limit the use of those energy resources that are most abundant in the US--coal, for example. I say let's do our best to clean it up but let's be realistic. Environmental concerns should not trump human needs, and energy independence. The Sierra Club and others like them are a barnacle on the rear end of progress. They always have been always will. On the other hand until we get a better handle on nuclear disposal solutions, I am opposed to nuclear power. We are not France. The French have their own reasons for pursuing the nuclear option--they have limited alternative resources, and the government has convinced French society that the disposal option they are using is only "temporary". The French have swallowed this story "hook,line, and sinker." Google "France, nuclear industry" for some telling information.

2. By abevanluik

   3/29/09 at 9:32 a.m.

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   The article itself is nonsensical. It is like saying we have used falling water for power for centuries hence let's not use it anymore. Nuclear is now safer and more efficient than ever. But it requires water for cooling.

   The discussion by Houstonjac takes me by surprise since I have been in the underground laboratory at Bure a few hundred kilometers east of Paris where the prototyping is being done for the French geologic repository:
   http://www.thoughtsandplaces.org/HeavenW...
   The locals seem to be generally favorable to having a repository near them, so it will likely happen. Their present storage facilities were never advertised to be permanent. The French "Dossier 2005" (English summary free on web)makes a well-argued case for the safety of a permanent repository in clay in the Bure area.

3. By mrb

   3/29/09 at 10:22 a.m.

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   It must be comforting to Ms. Crawford and others in the Sierra Club that Harry Reid's efforts have led to the loss of over a 1000 well paid professionals (engineers and scientists - the very type of people the Sun purportedly would like to lure to Las Vegas to offset the ups and downs of the "gaming" economy) who will never return to this area. With the tourist economy in a tailspin, it is truly adding insult to injury to lose these jobs, and all at the hands of our state's own politicians.

   All of this for the perceived threat of waste storage in the middle of the desert on a controlled government reservation where in excess of 1000 nuclear weapons have been exploded. The EPA criteria for Yucca Mountain is a dose rate of about 1 chest x-ray a year at 20km from the site. I am so happy that the Sierra Club and Harry Reid are more concerned about a mythical desert rancher about 10,000 years from now than they are about the economy of the Las Vegas area now.

4. By Harley

   3/29/09 at 11:14 a.m.

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   Nuclear is the most practical answer to electrical power generation today and into the foreseeable future.

   Not only does nuclear power generate electricity, it generates highly skilled good paying jobs as well as enormous tax revenues to the surrounding communities.

5. By Launce

   3/29/09 at 2:21 p.m.

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   Teresa - Don't let these pro-nuke nuts get you down! They're canned comments from folks who haven't considered the incredible cost to Nevada - and indeed, the world - of generating and stockpiling the most toxic materials we've been able to produce as a byproduct of an unsafe, incredibly expensive and carbon-loading technology.
   They're basically living on George Jetson fantasies that are 50 years out-of-date. And the argument that we should just go ahead and poison Nevada for all time in order to draw a limited number of jobs is pretty indicative of the mindset.

6. By Howard

   3/29/09 at 2:54 p.m.

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   To Houstonjac:
   I believe you were referring to the fact that solar, wind, and geothermal power are not available everywhere, all the time. That is true. However, it is sunny in Las Vegas almost every day. By employing people to develop a smart energy grid, we could generate excess power and save it for use on our rare cloudy days. Additionally, coal may be abundant now, but it sure isn't being produced as fast as it's being used, and its economic costs will catch up with its environmental costs. In the immediate future I think conservation and renewable sources should be used as alternatives to new coal and nuclear plants. Also, we should look at how we can create a reliable clean energy grid and take old power plants offline. These transitions promise to create as many or more jobs than would be lost. The environment can and should be balanced with human needs, because I'd like future generations to live on a hunk of rock that is NOT a wasteland. The Sierra Club promotes progress by suggesting responsible shifts from dangerous statuses quo.

   To abevanluik:
   Falling water isn't dangerous unless you're being drowned in it. Nuclear power may be safer than ever, but it still creates highly radioactive waste. We've got safer options, let's use them.

   To mrb and harvey:
   Let's look at another big picture: What about when the dump would fill up? The waste itself has a dose level far higher than that of a chest x-ray. Why not create thousands of jobs around truly clean energy instead of around creating waste that requires hollowed out mountains far from society for storage? It seems to me that the second option is a gamble that someone somewhere is bound to lose. Green energy, with proper investment and cooperation, is a sure thing.

7. By mrb

   3/29/09 at 4:19 p.m.

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   Howard:

   Check out this editorial today from the Denver Post regarding the near-term viability of your energy sources.

   http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_120...

   I suggest before you comment on how "dangerous" nuclear waste storage is, that you study the issue. Then again, I am guessing you don't have the science background to understand any of it anyway.

8. By Harley

   3/29/09 at 6:02 p.m.

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   To Teresa Crawford:

   "Hearings hosted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission this week in Las Vegas will resemble an autopsy more than analysis of a viable project."

   Will these NRC hearings be open to the public and where and when will they be taking place?

9. By abevanluik

   3/29/09 at 6:05 p.m.

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   Howard, the world in your vision, with windmills and solar panels and high-tension lines obscuring views everywhere. It would be rather ugly with expensive electricity and lots of chemically dangerous and nasty batteries everywhere.

   If you shut down all nuclear power, well, then advanced spent fuel reprocessing makes no sense to even consider and we need to dispose of all the existing spent fuel permanently, as in a geologic repository. So even what I am sensing to be your world-view, there is a need for something that provies million-year assurances of safety, like Yucca Mountain would.

   In my rose-colored world view we in nevada would say to the US, give me your spent fuel and we will make sure it hurts no one, ever, for a price that will allow us to build our infrastructure, trading a hypothetical risk thousands of years in the future for a real risk of having a two-lane highway for much of the distance between our two largest cities, a real death-trap for our real citizens of the present.

   My world view is so rosy that I would also say to Mexico, send us the spent fuel from your two reactors, and for a small fee we will also dispose of it. Let's not forget that few environmental problems respect borders.

   My ideal world would be one where we all get along and are nice to each other regardless of borders. My ideal world would be racing toward a fusion-powered world, then we could get rid of fission power as you suggest we should. The ideal world would have electricity be a basic human right in all the world, to be made available at a reasonable price for all, like clean air, water, food and health(care)[should be]. Obviously, this is not an ideal world.

10. By Harley

    3/29/09 at 10:04 p.m.

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    Basic explanation of why nuclear power is practical and America's BEST option:

    The laws of physics tell us that one has to put energy into a system to get energy out.

    Consider the energy efficiencies of the steam turbine our energy converter which converts the thermal energy of high pressure, high temperature steam into a rotating force to be applied to an electrical generator to produce free moving electrons i.e. electricity.

    The steam turbine process common in nearly 100% of America's electrical power generation is physically an inefficient process, in that, the energy put in to the system to produce the required high quality steam (thermal energy) which is converted into electrical energy is 300% more than what comes out of the system in equivalent (electrical) energy. Meaning the mechanism we utilize to in the production of electrical energy in America is only 33% efficient.

    It is because of the tremendous amount of energy lost (66% wasted?) relative to what is produced during our processes, that we must find the most efficient means of supply our initial energy source, which is nuclear.

    The amount of energy in one pound of uranium is equivalent to 33 TONS of coal.

    Gas and diesel are our next electrical producing options but are not viable due to costs relative to our alternatives (coal and nuclear).

    Toxic waste should be the concern when our processes don't contain them, not when they do, of which nuclear also prevails over coal.

    Solar energy should continually be pursued in roof-top applications but it currently isn't viable and most certainly isn't our long term answer in the foreseeable future.

    We should be discussing the advantages of breeder verse converter reactors and enhanced fuel enrichments in making our electrical production processes more efficient (less wasteful) rather than poisoning ourselves with toxic politics.

    Thankfully, America hasn't always allowed the prohibitive ignorance of public feared perceptions to prevail otherwise we likely wouldn't have a nuclear BEST option at all.

    Unfortunately, some will always disagree with OUR nuclear BEST option, while it is in OUR BEST INTEREST not to allow the anti-nukes to prevail; they've already become too costly with a 10-Billion dollar hole in Yucca being a notable example, while the politicians continue to waste more of our money on studies which reveal nothing more than our collective social ignorance.

11. By Harley

    3/29/09 at 10:32 p.m.

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    Repost: (grammar corrections)

    Basic explanation of why nuclear power is practical and America's BEST option:

    The laws of physics tell us that one has to put energy into a system to get energy out.

    Consider the energy efficiencies of the steam turbine our energy converter which converts the thermal energy of high pressure, high temperature steam into a rotating force to be applied to an electrical generator to produce free moving electrons i.e. electricity.

    The steam turbine process common in nearly 100% of America's electrical power generation applications is physically an inefficient process, in that, the energy put in to the system to produce the required high quality steam (thermal energy) which is converted into electrical energy is 300% more than what comes out of the system in equivalent (electrical) energy. Meaning the mechanism we utilize in the production of electrical energy in America is only 33% efficient.

    It is because of the tremendous amount of energy lost (66% wasted?) relative to what is produced during our processes, is why our most efficient energy source must initially be applied to our processing systems, which is nuclear.

    The amount of energy in one pound of uranium is equivalent to 33 TONS of coal.

    Gas and diesel are our next electrical producing options but are not viable due to costs relative to our alternatives (coal and nuclear).

    Toxic waste should be the concern when our processes don't contain them, not when they do, of which nuclear also prevails over coal.

    Solar energy should continually be pursued in roof-top applications but it currently isn't viable and most certainly isn't our long term answer in the foreseeable future.

    We should be discussing the advantages of breeder verse converter reactors and enhanced fuel enrichments in making our electrical production processes more efficient (less wasteful) rather than poisoning ourselves with toxic politics.

    Thankfully, America hasn't always allowed the prohibitive ignorance of public feared perceptions to prevail otherwise we likely wouldn't have a nuclear BEST option at all.

    Unfortunately, some will always disagree with OUR nuclear BEST option, while it is in OUR BEST INTEREST not to allow the anti-nukes to prevail; they've already become too costly with a 10-Billion dollar hole in Yucca being a notable example, while the politicians continue to waste more of our money on studies which dig up nothing more than our collective social ignorance.

    Considering where America's spent nuclear fuel is currently being stored, Yucca Mountain is really our BEST option as well.

12. By nkls3713

    3/29/09 at 10:35 p.m.

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    Nuclear power advocates would have you believe that Chernobyl and Three Mile Island could never have happened. The recently disclosed SERIOUS safety lapses at San Onofre - LA TIMES - should be cause for concern for everyone. The NRC's lack of control and inspection is frightening. Unlike the propaganda of the nuclear industry, fission based nuclear power has and will always be a dirty, unsafe, and costly enterprise. With recent positive developments, Fusion would be a different story although it is decades away from ever being a reality.

    We don't need a 1000 scab jobs that threaten the health and livelihood of millions of Nevadans. I say good riddance to Yucca Mountain, may you die and swift and painful death. Yucca Mountain has never been the BEST option.

13. By MerrySunshine

    3/29/09 at 11:25 p.m.

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    I agree whole heartedly with Teresa. Well put. I'd rather have a Launce, Howard & nkls Jetson future with clean energy & green jobs; all creating a better place to live and better economy than a George Jetson close minded, nuclear brainwashed past.

14. By Patrick_R_Gibbons

    3/31/09 at 3:59 p.m.

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    The problem with this line of thinking is discarding the notion that humans are highly innovative. By discouraging nuclear power through expensive regulation we have effectively blocked our ability to innovate ways to recycle nuclear waste. So while we could be getting clean burning nuclear power that recycles waste and reuses it to create more energy, we will be spending billions of dollars to acquire caveman technology -- wind and solar -- that will provide a fraction of the energy output as nuclear power. Basically, fighting against nuclear power is regressive backwards 19 century thinking, hardly progressive.

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