Another thing to note about nuclear power is that the world’s two leading producers of uranium are Canada and Australia, so the supply should be dependable and free of war inducing politics at least. Of course if that American Peso of yours devalues any more you might not be able to afford it, I suppose.
So you wouldnt mind living next to a nuclear power plant at all? Or would it still make you feel uneasy? I agree what you are saying is true, but I wouldn't feel 100% comfortable living next to one.
Maybe I assume too much about the war inducing politics. We do have other deterrents, though. About 20% of our population of 33 million have French as their first language, and a good chunk of them have French as pretty well their only language, and about 20% of our total population votes for a socialist political party. So, is it still worth it to you?
Well, in the US at least there is plenty of space so that new facilities can be built away from populated areas. Btw -- I was reading up on the South Texas Project and they are planning to double its capacity in the next decade.
The good thing about nuclear power is that, sure the waste is dangerous, but it eventually reduces itself to a safe level, it does not need any artificial meddling. Of course, there are two sides to it. From wikipedia: However, if a lot of power and electricity can be produced, I don't see why we can't start turning the power gained from it (and especially excess power) to start promoting electric cars. I know this would be year, decades, possibly half a century to actually get to that point, but this would be a nice turn.
By the way, I really admire that french women's ability to speak 2 languages, I've been learning french for 3 years and I can hardly understand the little french in that 60 minutes show.
Yes...your English population seem to have slowly gathered an immunity to the Franch. Solar power might not be such a bad idea...
can't you just pack up all the nuke waste in a rocket and shoot it off to the sun? let the sun burn them to pieces
nuclear FTW! and yeah, isnt there a plant near here called the STP plant? id rather have one of those 7 miles away from my house than the largest coal/gas plant in the US from my house(which is my current situation; it looks beastly and just emits a negative aura, i dont know lol)
http://www.breakingnews.ie/world/mhmheymhauoj/ Bush nuclear power plans may fail, experts warn An influential panel of scientists urged US president George Bush to abandon plans for a billion-dollar push to expand nuclear power. It said the scheme to resume nuclear waste reprocessing had not been adequately checked and depended on unproven technology which would not be ready in time. The National Academy of Sciences’ National Research Council said research into Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) was taking money and interest away from other nuclear programmes. “All committee members agree that the GNEP programme should not go forward and that it should be replaced by a less aggressive research programme,” said the panel. It said if the administration went ahead there would be “significant technical and financial risks”. The US has not reprocessed nuclear waste since the 1970s. Mr Bush announced the new programme last year and has repeatedly said it is the key to US efforts to deal with growing reactor waste and still allow a large expansion of commercial nuclear power. Advertisement Internationally, the plan envisages a small number of countries including the US and Russia supplying other nations with reactor fuel and reprocessing their used fuel. Only last week Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman underlined the importance of the programme saying it “represents the future of global nuclear power cooperation” and will “allow for a greater global reliance on civilian nuclear power to produce the electricity needed” while safeguarding against proliferation. The GNEP plan has been criticised by activists opposing the spread of nuclear technology and Congress has refused to provide the short-term funding the Energy Department has requested. Although nuclear fuel reprocessing continues in Europe and Japan, the US abandoned it in the 1970s because of concerns that the stream of pure plutonium that is created poses a nuclear risk. But the GNEP programme is based on a different reprocessing method that its supporters argue would not create pure plutonium. But the Academy panel of scientists said that “significant technical problems remain to be solved” in development of the new approach. The programme is expected to cost billions of dollars over several decades and includes construction of reprocessing plants and next-generation “fast-burn” reactors to burn some of the processed waste. The US Energy Department maintains that the programme in the long run will reduce the cost of commercial reactor waste disposal and remove the need for additional underground waste repositories beyond the proposed waste dump in Nevada.
Yucca Mountain is as close to dead as it can be. Both sides (repub and dem) have motiviation to never make it work. In light of that, even though I love the idea of nuclear power, I cannot get behind any proposed programs that do not include some methodology for waste storage beyond "big ass pools scattered all over the US full of naughty stuff".
Even if Yucca Mtn. was this perfect box made by God, we still would have to transport waste from thousands of sites to the place. I wouldn't trust government workers to break open nuclear seals, safely put them in travel containers, and then let truck drivers drive thousands of miles transporting nuclear waste on our local highways. That's even assuming crazies and fanatics become blind to it. I think breeder reactors are a cool way to efficiently use nuclear, but pebble bed reactors might be the more sensible and practical approach to the human problem.
The transportation angle is actually rather well engineered. I recall seeing a video of them ramming a tanker designed for the stuff with a locomotive. Container was bent and twisted and pulverized, but not cracked. It's the mountain itself (longevity, stability, water seepage, NIMBY) that remains problematic.
