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Solving ‘Fission Impossible’
There's also still the huge problem of where to put the waste. But as Rudy Giuliani suggested recently, if a bunch of European socialists can figure out what to do with the radioactive leftovers, why can't we? "France is ahead of us in nuclear power," he said recently, with the same sort of disgust he might use in reporting that the Red Sox were ahead of his beloved Yankees. "Eighty percent of the electricity in France comes from nuclear power."
But when it comes to reaching a definitive solution on how to deal with nuclear waste, our vieux allies are stuck in the same quandary as we are. For years, Congress has been debating a proposal to store nuclear waste in Nevada's Yucca Mountain. In France, where plans to bury waste in rural areas raised similar hackles, the response has been to change the conversation. France has developed a program to store waste temporarily, while researchers figure out what to do with it. It's hardly an elegant solution. Which explains why nuclear energy, which has been the energy of the future for the last 50 years, may continue to be so.
© 2007
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Member Comments
Posted By: Bleezz @ 12/24/2007 3:24:04 AM
Comment: The waste wouldn't be a problem if we would invest in Fast Breeder Reactors. Currently, only about 10% of the potential energy of Uranium 235 is harnessed, leaving dangerous waste behind (a minuscule amount mind you compared to coal and gas). Using Helium cooled Fast Breeder Reactors, we could harness nearly 99% of the potential energy, cutting down the radioactive life dramatically and creating much less of it (one ton per year per plant). Even though Plutonim 239 is used in the process, it is extreamly undesirable to those who seek it because of the impurity and the protection already in place to protect it, they'd be better off making their own reactor to breed it from naturaly occuring uranium in desert sand :).
Currently one of the largest problems facing the implimentation of nuclear technology is the large amount of unwarented public protest. It amazes me how much complaining people will do when a nuclear plant is proposed but how everyone seems to see a coal plant as more job opportunites, especially when coal plants emit over 100 times the amount of nuclear waste that nuclear plants release. And what will take its place? solar? wind? both are immensely inneficiant and very expensive, it would bankrupt the United States economy to try to implement either one to supply only 10% of the energy demand. Americans need to get their heads on straight and stop being so hypocritical, nuclear is the solution whether we realize it tomorrow or a hundred years from now.
Posted By: laundrylister @ 11/07/2007 10:35:59 PM
Comment: Thirty years of safe operation? Give me break. TO BE SURE, Americans don't want Yucca and the National Academy of Sciences has just said that investing in reprocessing is a bad idea. This is not an article, but an op-ed.
I guess we need to start planting maize from sea to shing seas, because the author has neither enough imgaination nor enough diligence to read about the ways that we can have a nuclear free and carbon-free future. It is time to do some reading. Try looking at the work of Amory Lovins, Arjun Makhijani, the Union of Concerned Scientists, former Nuclear Regulatory Commissioner Peter Bradford, or any of the numerous other experts who recognize that nuclear is the wrong direction.
All of the Republican candidates, bolstered by Christie Todd Whitman, are parrotting this line about France. Sarkhozy may be the new darling of Washinton, but their energy policy would be a poor thing to mimic.
Posted By: laundrylister @ 11/07/2007 10:18:15 PM
Comment: Thirty years of safe operation? Give me break. TO BE SURE, Americans don't want Yucca and the NAS has just said that investing in reprocessing is a bad idea. This is not an article, but an op-ed.
I guess we need to start planting maize from sea to shing seas, because the author has neither enough imgaination nor enough diligence to read about the ways that we can have a nuclear free and carbon-free future. Ken Bossong and Arjun Makhijani offer two visions.
Christie Todd Whitman, whom I used to respect, is a shill for the nuclear industry these days, even a stooge. Every Republican candidate parrots this line about France. The French have a major waste problem on their hands, but at least they use clotheslines and know how to conserve energy in other ways that Americans belive to be unthinkable. Sarkhozy is the new darling of Washington with his obsequiousnes, but we would be foolish to mimic his nation's energy policy. The Union of Concerned Scientists, Amory Lovins of RMI, former NRC Commisioner Peter Bradford, and many others have done a good job of explaing why nuclear power is not the answer. Maybe it is time to do some reading.