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130 Comments
- TotalHalibut, on 11/30/2008, -5/+89Well I certainly hope so. Take a few tips from France, who are on their 5th generation of reactors, as well as using breeder reactors to reduce the amount of waste to virtually zero. They're safe, they're effecient, they create plenty of skilled jobs.
- Rapter09, on 11/30/2008, -6/+61The problem in America is that nuclear power has been so demonized over the years, whereas other countries haven't been so woefully shortsighted on the issue. Green, uneducated hippies and the average joe don't know enough about the advances that've been made. They're stuck in the late 60s and 70s when the technology was new and imperfect.
- FasterGun, on 11/30/2008, -1/+29Er, traditionally hasn't nuclear been opposed by liberal environmental groups?
- Cyrus042, on 11/30/2008, -4/+27Right wingers? You realize that nuclear power was huge on the Republican platform this year right?
- dacrazydude, on 11/30/2008, -3/+23What is with this discrimination against nuclear power. It is one of the best options for this country.
- TotalHalibut, on 11/30/2008, -0/+17Comments like ValDeV's demonstrate the just how divided the US has become. People seem so intent on blaming their problems on 'the other group', they don't even think before doing so anymore. It's gotta stop.
- Akairenn, on 11/30/2008, -2/+17Terrorists, who are hiding in your mailbox RIGHT NOW, will leap out and cause nuclear power plants to explode a la Hiroshima and Nagasaki! TERROR! :O
Also, Americans are ***** morons. Apologies for the strong language, but nothing else will suffice to describe my fellow idiots' penchant for crying like... Well, I would say Frenchmen, but even the French comprehend the awesomeness of clean, tasty, cheap nuclear power.
I've lived within glowing distance of a nuclear plant all my life. I've yet to develop any strange diseases; and the plant has never once exploded. Unfortunately, I have yet to develop any super powers either, but you take the bad with the good. - jakebathman, on 11/30/2008, -4/+18I hate the phrase "cheerleader-in-chief"
- chezeberger, on 11/30/2008, -7/+20they all make promises that they don't keep. duh.
- eirek, on 11/30/2008, -4/+16Haha, you do know that more Right Wingers are Pro nuclear then Left Wingers?
- Mylf, on 11/30/2008, -1/+13Nuclear doesn't lead to massive spills at sea. It also doesn't chain us to a part of the world that loves to yank our chain (and a chain it is)
- inactive, on 11/30/2008, -3/+12Bring on the nuclear power.
- Vektuz, on 11/30/2008, -1/+10its not truly "emission free" but it emits nothing into the athmosphere or the groundwater. The waste can in fact be reprocessed to be even less (like most other countries do), and the remainder is still a dense solid that has to be stored away somewhere until we figure out what we can do with it. However, the amount of waste after reprocessing is rather tiny, and is solid and physical, unlike the amount of carbon and soot we pump into the athmosphere and all breathe in.
- JoeVet, on 11/30/2008, -1/+9The truly sad thing is that it is American companies that are designing and building the latest, safest, and most efficient plants, not here in the good 'ol US of A but in China. It is a shame that Obama is not as progressive as John McCain on this issue.
- InfiniteNothing, on 11/30/2008, -0/+8You forgot "won't someone please think of the children"
- brandita, on 11/30/2008, -1/+9Nuclear beats "clean" coal by a longshot.
- Cyrus042, on 11/30/2008, -3/+10You realize that they all try to win elections right? In that sense its all political posturing. Nuclear power was an important of the Republican agenda this year. It just was. If theres any extreme fringe worried about nuclear power its the left. (That's not a criticism, that's just a fact.)
- kaiwai, on 11/30/2008, -1/+8How about starting to get reprocessing up and running; ignore the NIMBY's (Not In My Back Yard), and be honest with the public - you either have a mountain full of nuclear waste or you reprocess it and use it again. When face with two options, anyone with an IQ above room temperature will go for the re-processing option.
- TVarmy, on 11/30/2008, -0/+6Blame the metric system's slow adoption on an economic force called lock in, rather than jingoism. After all, we use plenty of foreign inventions and designs all the time. Just look who's making our cars and TVs. The problem is that at the end of the day we'll still be thinking with Imperial/US units. For example, we have trouble adapting our ideas of speed to the metric system. 65 MPH becomes 104.6 Km/Hr, 35 MPH becomes 56.3 Km/Hr, which is not exactly intuitive, nor are the ratios easy to do in your head. The same goes for temperature. Plus, consider that all of our old designs and recipes are written with US units. Kilograms to pounds is easy enough (2.2 lb per kilogram), but ounces and grams are hard to mix, and milliliters, liters, cups, and gallons don't play that nicely either.
I'd say the issue is really more NIMBY. Most people in this day and age are okay with nuclear once they've heard the facts, but after 3 mile island, people are still really scared to accept nuclear power near them. Any mayor/governor who pushes for such a plant to be built in/near town is making a very risky political move, so it takes a strong, principled move on the leader's part. France has a stronger government, and I don't want to get into a debate as to whether or not that's good, but in this case, it's made it easier to get nuclear power plants built.
What I really like about France's plants are that they offer a real incentive for transparent nuclear disarmament, since they can turn old warheads into civilian fuel. However, Japan's had many accidents at an experimental plant pulling off many similar experiments, so I hope it's not a risky process by nature. I don't like keeping waste underground, but if we get radiation leaks from trying to convert waste, that is problem. - jtbell04, on 11/30/2008, -1/+7"We don't want another Chernobyl!!!!"
God, opposing new reactors is like opposing new, safer cars because the first ones crashed a lot. - inactive, on 11/30/2008, -3/+8Will he build Awesome Vaults a la Fallout?
- rogue780, on 11/30/2008, -1/+6I'd say it's the world's refusal to implement the United States Customary System.
- kaiwai, on 11/30/2008, -0/+5Anything can be turned into a weapon; it is part of the boogyman, and worse, no one is told what is happening now; tonnes of nuclear waste being stored in a mountain on a fault line.
So on one hand there is a risk of weapon's grade nuclear material, and on the other hand, a greater potential for a nuclear environmental catastrophe if the status quo is continued.
Like I said, no one is given two sides to the story - and it shows in government policy. Choosing policies that are stupid, but are easy to market to the uneducated plebs of the world. - FasterGun, on 11/30/2008, -0/+5You come off as not knowing what youre talking about, not as a comedian.
- LonesomeFighter, on 11/30/2008, -5/+10ya if anyone is to be called a cheerleader it should be the current President since he was one :)
- Vektuz, on 11/30/2008, -0/+5The funny thing is, if it was brought to a vote, everyone votes yes, all Nevadans vote no, and get a startling demonstration of why voting is not for solving such issues.
- wubblie, on 11/30/2008, -1/+6Um, many other countries use nuclear energy, not just the United States. Switzerland and Belgium get about 50% of their energy from nuclear. I suppose that they are wrong too, as is Japan, France, Finland, etc. They don't have a problem with nuclear waste, because they reprocess it. I have heard that all the nuclear waste ever produced in France fills one room of a warehouse (and they get 80% of their energy from nuclear). The only problem with nuclear is that Jimmy Carter made it the law that our power plants could not reprocess. This was a huge mistake, and was later overturned. But if it wasn't for that decision, your "Myth 1" would be irrelevant. As for your "Myth 2", the analogous energy costs associated with alternative energy are even greater. And for myth 3, I believe that is impossible for modern pellet designed reactors to melt down. Anyway, no one is arguing that nuclear power is perfect, it is just the best option we have. What is your plan? I'm sure we can all criticize it without offering any alternative. That is easy.
- TVarmy, on 11/30/2008, -0/+5Exactly. In fact, coal has some radioactive components in it, so a coal plant emits more radioactive material into the air and water than a nuclear power plant does! Coal also has mercury, a well known neurotoxin harmful to children and others with developing or compromised immune systems or brains. I believe it's been found in Chinese towns that birth defects go down 30% 3 years after nearby coal plants are closed down.
- TheDougem, on 11/30/2008, -2/+6And radioactive isotopes from coal power plant emissions aren't any worse, for some reason? Nuclear energy is far cleaner because the waste is so easy to control and manage. Done right, it is safe. And if you want to pull the 'it takes emissions to mine it' argument, what about all the fossil fuels and energy we'll be wasting as we maintain thousands of wind mills and solar panels? We need a balanced solution, and a gradual transition to mostly nuclear power backed up by solar, wind, hydro electric power and so forth. We can get an energy surplus, and use that to charge our electric cars we inevitably get. Easy.
- dball48, on 11/30/2008, -3/+7France must be full of mutants by now.
- pw378, on 11/30/2008, -0/+4That is what they said 30 years ago... and 15 years ago.... and apparently some short-sighted dimwits are still saying it, and I suspect they will continue saying it in another 15 years.
- Cyrus042, on 11/30/2008, -0/+3Just got a Fallout 3 ad on the right. Ha!
- bboy1977, on 12/01/2008, -0/+3"The biggest problem with the pools is that absent constant maintenance and security, they could overheat and/or be weaponized without much effort."
That is an outright misinformation and it's idiots like you who keep spreading this type of BS. Nuclear fuel waste can NOT be weaponized easily "without much effort". Nuclear Fuel for power plants is enriched to 3%. Nuclear weapons grade uranium has to be enriched 90%. To enrich uranium you would need advanced centrifuge technology, much of which is classified and held by only a number of countries.
Obama is definitely a proponent of Nuclear Power as employees and executives from Chicago based Exelon Corp. have donated a ton of money to his campaign. Rahm Emanuel, Obama's new Chief of Staff and David Axelrod,, were instrumental in the ComEd/ PECO merger that formed Exelon - the United States largest Nuclear power utility company. Once you stop drinking the koolaid and reading blogs for all your information, maybe you'll actually open your eyes and understand how it all works. - bc289, on 11/30/2008, -0/+3Just adding to TVArmy, it's not that we are stubborn and refuse to switch to the metric system - it's that it would come at huge costs. Just imagine how integrated the US measurement system is in our lives. It's not just on paper, but also in how we think. Switching to the metric system would come at large short-term economic costs, and it's something that none of us want to bear when we can continue on our regular way and not have to deal with it. Of course, the long-term cost is different.
- omegared, on 11/30/2008, -1/+4who is going to pay for the nuclear power plant?
"the loan guarantee program was initially limited to $2 billion, less than the cost of a single reactor. The nuclear industry has been lobbying Congress to expand it to $50 billion or more. A Senate appropriations bill would remove the ceiling altogether. "
http://www.wired.com/techbiz/startups/news/2007/11 ... - psion01, on 11/30/2008, -0/+3DANGER: Possible false dichotomy ahead. Proceed with caution.
- brandita, on 11/30/2008, -0/+3Well there has to be some kind of waste depository and only a few places have good geology so there's not really many options.
- xexx, on 11/30/2008, -1/+4It would have been easier to keep his promises without the major economic ***** left by Bush&Co.
- dacrazydude, on 11/30/2008, -0/+38 wind turbines for an entire factory? Numbers and sources please.
- Vektuz, on 11/30/2008, -2/+5Same thing as discrimination against all sorts of things. Fear, uncertainty, doubt... and lack of education.
- overridemymind, on 11/30/2008, -1/+3I think he's trying to tell you that he thinks you're full of sh*t. He disagrees with you and he's trying to be funny.
Helpful? - inactive, on 11/30/2008, -1/+3How about bicycle powered homes and businesses--it'll also solve America's obesity and heart disease crisis.
- pw378, on 11/30/2008, -0/+2Conservation can't light up a room at night either.
- sulthernao, on 11/30/2008, -1/+3Exactly. But we have laws against using that technology because we're afraid that it could create weapon grade nuclear material.
- psevium, on 12/01/2008, -0/+2Then we came up with the idea to recycle it, and all was well in the lands.
- dmanmax99, on 11/30/2008, -0/+2so? Theres a site that opened recently in Nevada that could house America's supply of nuclear waste for decades (maybe even centuries). It will sit there, not affecting anything, until we can find out a way to get rid of it all, or use the energy that still in there.
- overridemymind, on 11/30/2008, -1/+3"spreading nuclear waste in the atmosphere already happens. They are called coal power plants."
Wait.... what?
The carbon emissions produced by coal-fired plants != highly radiological substances. I'm for nuclear power and for getting rid of coal-fired plants as much as possible... but.... seriously.... - inactive, on 12/01/2008, -1/+3The only, ONLY way that will happen is if he tells his FAR LEFT WACTIVISTIC ENVIORNMENTAL ASS HATS to go F themselves. Will he do that? That my friends is the billion dollar question. One certainly hopes so.
- RogerStrong, on 12/01/2008, -0/+2Humans can generate about 200 W for extended periods. That's a KWHr every 5 hours, for a retail value of around 10 cents.
Most people would rather work for far more than two cents an hour, and then pay for the electricity. -
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