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McCain Backs Nuclear Power
bagsc writes "Senator John McCain set out another branch of his energy policy agenda today, with a key point: 45 new nuclear power plants by 2030." So it finally appears that this discussion is back on the table. I'm curious how Nevada feels about this, as well as the Obama campaign. All it took was $4/gallon gas I guess. When it hits $5, I figure one of the campaigns will start to promote Perpetual Motion.
Nuclear is the best option. Equating it with perpetual motion shows YOUR ignorance. Hate makes you stupid.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
are 45 backyards in which to build them.
Seriously, the NIMBY (not in my nackyard) and BANANA (build absolutely nothing anywhere near anything) mentalities have held back nuclear power as much as anything else, especially after TMI. Getting local communities to agree to construction will be no small task.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Nuclear seems to be working pretty well for various foreign countries. It takes a while to get a reactor on-line, and it's not a perfect solution... But it's better in many ways than the fossil fuel options.
Wind and solar are great, and I support them also. But, $4 gas or not, all energy options should be on the table. And they should've been for about the last 30 years.
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -Albert Einstein
You can not think global warming is both human caused and a genuine threat and not be for nuclear power. Yes nuclear power has its own problems, but far better than the purported consequences of global warming. Keep your eyes open for "environmentalists" that are against nuclear power. Those people have other interests in mind. "Environmentalism" is just their tool.
Seriously, one of the more classic political tricks is to promise something way ahead in time, something that would have to be achieved by someone other than you.
It is just more obvious because of McCain's age. Don't get me wrong, nuclear is currently the safest, greenest option that is economically viable, but promising things 20+ years into the future is pretty bad.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Yeah what a great guy. Interesting that he is pushing for a "solution" that only works with massive amounts of very centralized investment. I mean why would anyone want to encourage a wide range of smaller but much safer and more sustainable solutions? Solar, Wind, Geo, are only held back by the standard economic factors. Government intervention that leads to increased usage and production could solve that problem and reduce those costs almost overnight and the consumer wouldn't then have to be slave to yet another(or the same) energy masters.
Yea, because Carter, the only president to have ever had any formal training in any sort of nuclear technology, and also the only president ever involved in the cleanup after a nuclear accident, is all irrational and uninformed where nuclear power is concerned.
The 70's were a different world. Nuclear power meant nuclear weapons, and the public opposition then to nuclear power is hard to even imagine today. Don't blame Carter for the hysteria of the day.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
...to start reversing the DEPLORABLE conditions started by Jimmy "I'm a fucking moron" Carter.
You know - the guy who thought that if the US didn't RECYCLE nuclear waste back into fuel (which would SOLVE the "nuclear waste storage" issue) it would be an "example" to tin-pot dictatorships and insane genocidal religious nations like North Korea, Pakistan, India, Iran, Syria, China... and they wouldn't try to get nuclear weapons. Yeah, how'd that work out for us?
The guy who coddled so-called "environmentalists" to the point where we haven't built SAFE, CLEAN electrical power generation anywhere because nobody can get past the permits process and NIMBY enviro-wacko whining.
Think about it - even the founder of Greenpeace (who long ago left the organization when it became obvious the commies and inmates were running the asylum and not interested in real, rational discussion) says we need nuclear energy because so-called "renewable" sources are inherently (a) unreliable and (b) limited in the scope of what we can do with them.
Don't think that all Americans are as naive as CmdrTaco. I, for one, realize both that $4 for a gallon of gas isn't extravagant, and that the cost of a gallon of gas has little to do with global nuclear energy politics. McCain is simply following the Bush stance on 'alternative energy' which is to say, any alternative to oil that will net equally high profits for equally large, heavy lobbying companies.
I also oppose drilling for our own oil resources. Why the hell should we? Let's use up the oil resources of the people who hate us while it's still relatively cheap, then tap our own resources at $300 a barrel and make them come crawling.
Let's use up the oil resources of the people who hate us while it's still relatively cheap, then tap our own resources at $300 a barrel and make them come crawling.
s/crawling/attacking/
http://blog.nexusuk.org
This is mixing two separate issues. Oil is not the problem as far as producing electricity, its coal. Coal produces an enormous carbon foot print and is just all around nasty (from other residual waste to the damage to the environment that occurs just getting at it). I grew up in north east Pennsylvania, and I have seen first hand the impact of coal mining, its pretty horrific.
Back to my point. Pushing nuclear energy has relatively very little do with our dependence on gasoline via crude oil. Please lets not confuse the two. There is no chance that there will be cars powered by "under the hood" nuclear reactors in the near future. Wind power will also do nothing for our dependence on oil for gasoline.
Another case of policitians using unrelated events to push policy. Albiet, in poor taste, he is at least using this opportunity to point us to a real solution. I hate to say it, but Wind, Solar, Geothermal, etc. are not ready for deployment today. They eventually will be, but by that time (10+ years), it will take another 20+ years before they even make up a few % of global energy production. By that time Nuclear plants can be rolled out en mass and go a long way to reduce our carbon footprint (but not demand on foreign oil, sorry, thats just a different topic).
20th century Marxism is not progress...
I don't understand why people can not get it through their heads that no one single item is the answer.
Look, we (US) have enjoyed our luxury of cheap single source energy. Now it is time to get with the program. We need ALL options for energy started now. Think of it as a diversified portfolio. So, I say the following:
YES! Drill for more oil and make some more darn refineries
YES! Build some nuclear power plants.
YES! Explore better ways to use coal in existing power plants.
YES! Build huge solar arrays and start larger solar power plants
YES! Build wave generated power plants
YES! Build wind generated power plants
YES! Build electric-based "commuter" vehicles
YES! Explore better ways to make bio-fuel
The government needs to subsidize some of the projects and needs to throw some money at these problems. If we deploy all of these strategies we may not get cheaper energy but we will get stable energy and maybe, just maybe avert major crisis as population and demand increases exponentially over the next 10 years.
Republicans: build 45 new reactors.
Democrats: nationalize the oil industry, price controls on gas.
I'm not going to post which I think is which, but one seems rational and reasonable, the other is pandering to the masses with a policy that is not only short sighted, but dangerous.
-Styopa
I'm always amazed to hear Europeans try and compare Europe to the United States. Do you have any idea of the scale of the United States? Mass transit simply isn't an option for a vast majority of this country. Most Americans (particularly those in rural areas) have to commute to work, to buy groceries, etc, etc.
For starters, get your fat *ss out of your SUV when going places less than a mile away...Nice way to stereotype but at least half of this country doesn't have ANYTHING within a mile of where they live. Where I grew up it was a four mile drive into town.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Look how long it has taken for any state to accept the toxic nuclear waste. How long before we have to start looking for more dumping grounds for these new active power plants?
One of our biggest poblems, particularly in the US, is the lack of long-range planning when it comes to energy policy. Our entire society has been built on the presumption that oil is and will always be cheap, which considering Hubbert's peak oil predictions in the 50's is remarkably foolish and short-sighted. We really need to look at the long-term implications of nuclear or any other energy source, and start planning now instead of waiting for another crisis to develop.
2. Where there's vast amounts of money, there is fraud.
Near my home in the 1980's a nuclear plant began construction, and it turned out that the contractor was skimming money off the top and not building the plant to spec. When the state finally inspected it, the walls were honeycombed because the contractor was skimping on the concrete! Imagine if that plant had gone online.
It's not so much the technology I'm worried about - it's the greedy motherfuckers who are willing to cut corners for a profit that concern me. I have no interest in helping some CEO finally get that island in the Pacific while my state turns into a Chernobyl site.
I agree with almost everything you say. Coal is much worse; nuclear doesn't replace much of our oil dependence. Transportation makes up about half of our use of oil, mostly going to cars (SUVs!), trucks, desiel semis, etc. The only way I can see nuclear making a difference in our oil consumption is with the combination of electric cars. Right now, I wouldn't consider buying so much as an electric scooter as long as the power plant is coal. But if the grid is nuclear (or some other green power), buying an electric car, motorcycle, etc suddenly makes sense.
Ideally, I'd like to put up enough solar panels and wind turbines to power my house, charge my car, and sell back to the utilities.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Yes, but cars *can* be powered by elecricity. So nuclear energy *does* have something to do with our dependence on gasoline.
Ideally, I'd like to put up enough solar panels and wind turbines to power my house, charge my car, and sell back to the utilities. What's stopping you, then? Unless you live in a neighborhood with covenants restricting such devices, you have all the freedom in the world to do exactly what you suggest. The technology exists. The products exist. What's stopping you?
Ahh...perhaps it's that little thing called "cost?" Independence from the power grid really sounds like a neat idea until you consider how much it costs to do it. Sort of like electric cars, which sound neat until you consider the cost to acquire one versus the utility and flexibility you can extract from it vis-as-vis a gasoline-powered vehicle of similar cost.
I'm not trying to be a downer on such ideas, though. I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy of so many of the wealthy "treehuggers" out there who have the means to do something about their energy consumption yet continue to shuttle around in limos, private jets, and occupy 15,000 sq. ft. mansions with an energy consumption the size of a small town. Environmentalism seems great to folks until you ask them to put their money where their mouth is.
In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
For starters, get your fat *ss out of your SUV when going places less than a mile away...
What you may not realize is that America is, in general, much more spread out and less densely populated than Europe.
There literally isn't a single business within a mile of my house. I purposely chose my home location to minimize my distance to shopping/work, and we're still talking multiple miles to get to any of the above in different directions. 20-30 mile commutes each way are typical in my area, not exceptional, and I know more than a few people with much longer commutes. Public transportation is poor at best. (It's better in some cities.)
I'm not saying any of this isn't our fault as a country, but the situation in general is a lot different than yours with respect to driving.
...and the other two points. Sure, those are true but they didn't just magically happen either. It wasn't just because these countries are 'small' - much as Americans are so very fond of thinking of Europe (while they themselves tend to move very small distances from where they were born, as a statistic) - it's because the governments of Europe imposed tax penalties on fuel.
This was done to hit demand and create a market for fuel efficient vehicles and other practises that curb demand. It's worked too, oil burned per capita of people in Europe is a fraction of what Americans use and the CO2 output per capita is even more stark.
America retained the love of huge fuel inefficient cars, SUVs etc while the lobby-driven politics ensured it was political suicide for anyone to grow a spin and impose fuel taxation or indeed any other significant measures to break the American love affair with burning oil.
Most cars people drive in Europe are smaller, designed primarily for running costs and not the sound that a large capacity engine makes (you've got to listen to the round-tabel panel on Ward's Top Ten engines for a clue as to just how important they believe this junk to be), but instead the engines are more expensive and technically advanced to improve economy.
So baring this in mind, it's pretty unfair to suggest that Europe just got handed all of these advantages. They were hard fought and hard won. We've been paying decades of tax on fuel.
While you're whining about $4 a gallon, we're paying $5 a gallon JUST IN TAX. We're already driving around fuel efficient vehicles and paying through the nose with road/green taxes, CO2-based taxes, expensive emissions standards driving up costs of vehicles and servicing costs and have been for YEARS. So you'll have to excuse us if we don't have vast amounts of sympathy for the complaints coming from the other side of the Atlantic right now.
Water heated by a nuclear plant won't be radioactive it will just be hot.
Liberty you never use is liberty you lose.
>They all have at least one good point though: what do we do with the waste?
Power plant equality, now!
Why not hold all power plants to the same standard?
The mercury from a coal plant doesn't decay. It stays toxic forever.
Vitrifying nuclear waste is already a better solution than the one used for coal plants, which is to dispose of the waste in the downwinders's lungs.