Soapbox Monday: Yea or nay on future nukes?
Debuting today: A weekly forum where YOU get to sound off on environmental topics.
Soapbox Monday: Yea or nay on future nukes?
Sandy Bauers, Inquirer GreenSpace Columnist
Filed Under: Soapbox Monday
First came the earthquake that knocked out the power to Japan's Fukushima nuclear power plant. Then came the tsunami.
Now comes the inevitable questioning of the entire industry: Should the U.S. continue to pursue nuclear power?
That's the question today for the debut of a new feature of this blog: Soapbox Monday.
My plan is that it will be forum where anyone who wants to can sound off simply by posting a comment at the end of this blog.
But I won't make this week's question as easy as a simple yes or no. I'm looking for something more.
So:
If the U.S. SHOULDN'T build new nuclear power plants, how do you think the nation should meet its future energy needs?
If the U.S. SHOULD pursue building new plants, where should the money come from? And should there be safety precautions above and beyond what we have now?
I am eager to learn your thoughts.
P.S. Coming Friday, another new weekly feature: Green Gauntlet. I'll describe a purported "green" product that's on the market, and you get to say whether it's hogwash.
Comments (20)
It's not something I haven't been thinking about.
And the more I think about it the more I realize how little I actually know.
The first thing I did in terms of trying to become better informed was to Google "Three Mile Island" which got me to the Wikipedia entry. I came away from reading that material more aware of what was not done after-the-fact in terms of investigating the whys and wherefores as opposed to coming away convinced that we had learned everything possible about the event and that we were more fully prepared for an accident on the magnitude of what just happened in Japan. Yes, the likelihood of an earthquake and/or tsunami occurring in Pennsylvania is pretty much zilch - but the same cannot be said of other areas in the continental United States.
So, from the initial experience of trying to become better informed I guess my reply is: I don't know and am hoping other people will post comments that will help me become better informed. (I also hope that - for the most part - people go beyond reducing the whole subject to over-simplified political epithets and accusations.)— He Visto Todo
I think it makes a lot of sense to go nuke. Overall, it's very clean and gives off less radiation (typically) than a coal plant. Based on experiences in Japan, I think we should be very concerned where we put one and what natural disasters should we keep in mind (earthquake, volcano, tornado, hurricanes) and what can be done to mitigate those risks. We need a more reasonable plan with respect to fuel rod replacement (we single use ours instead of recharging them like every other place in the world.)- The United States should absolutely keep investing in Nuclear Power. The benefits are simple, nuclear power provides the best low carbon electricity all while providing a high level of output. The energy produced by the limerick nuclear plant in Montgomery county produced roughly 2400 times the electricity of the Hoover Dam.
If people are worried about disasters keep in mind that every power plant nuclear or otherwise needs constant maintenance to help prevent disaster. If a massive earthquake hit any major power plant it would cause devastation. Safe guards are great but they must be kept up to date in order to be completely protected (which Japan's plant was not).
If we were truly looking for a safe but powerful alternative to traditional nuclear energy the US might want to look into Thorium based fission rather than Uranium which has much less harmful side effects and can be operated in a smaller area.— kr1spy84 - Earthquakes and tsunami notwithstanding, I've never been a fan of nuclear power. It's too risky and most of all, what do we do with the waste product?
We should be investing in energy that has no waste products. There are two sources of energy that we should be using, and it seems to me that they were given to us for that purpose, yet we have largely ignored it until recently.
The sun and the wind.
While I realize that it might not be possible to cure all of our energy problems with those, they are cleaner, safer and more viable alternatives than spending billions on plants that put people's lives at risk.
Is that what we should be doing with our energy?— apreziosi - Talk to someone who lives near a windmill farm.
They will tell you that the noise is unbearable. There have not been anty solar panels developed that store energy for extended periods.
Finally, in this capitalist, entrepreneurial country....if someone could figure it out, a fortune could be made! So far, no one has.
Your position is admirable, if not naive.— johnnymon - I've been on wind farms, and I can tell you the newer turbines (ten years and newer, at least) do not make that kind of noise. I don't think most of the older turbines do either, but I know there are always exceptions, with poor design or citing.
But that's the point: poorly built wind farms are a noise hazard. Poorly built nukes are deadly.— andrewacs - No, we should not be subsidising ("investing in") nuclear power plants! The risk is too high for the benifit. Natural or manmade disaster can be catastrophic for any type of power generation, but for a nuke plant, the cost is quantum leaps higher than for any other kind. Fatal doses of the radiation can last for generations, and can poison water and food for miles around. No other power plant can do so much damage. On top of all that, there is NO scientific solution to the radioactive waste that is created. This is a horror show, cradle to grave. Obviously we have to pursue renewables and for now lower emission energy sources. These are subsidies I can support. But why is efficiency not part of this conversation? We need a push for smarter use: getting more from less. A 'negawatt' is the cleanest source of energy we have; it's good for the economy, and it's clean.— andrewacs
- I live in Miami, about 20 or so miles north of the Turkey Point nuclear plant. Turkey Point took a direct, in your face hit from Cat 5 Hurricane Andrew in 1992. All the adjacent buildings were flattened, but the reactors made it with either no or minimal damage and no leaks. So it looks like with proper preparation nuclear power can be safe. I think maybe the problem in Japan was not THAT they buit it, it's WHERE they built it!
I'm not a scientist, but I would think that a modern plant could be built a considerable distance from what needs to be powered.
But since Japan is just one big earthquake waiting to happen, nuclear power may not be feasable there.
But I am in favor of the U.S. pursuing nuclear power.
As much as I admire andrewacs for his position, what does he mean by "efficiency"? Efficiency costs money. When it takes more energy to make a gallon of ethanol than the energy that comes from it, there is a problem.
France was always used as the example of nuclear efficiency, and it seems that they still are. I don't see them shutting down their plants any time soon.— johnnymon - What I mean by 'efficiency' is powering our economy - transport, buildings HVAC, homes, etc. - with less energy. Energy-efficient factories, appliances, building shells. They all cost more to build or buy but less to operate. And they cost society less in terms of natural resources and public health since there is less energy produced. — andrewacs
- Nuclear is both dirty and dangerous. Dirty because it creates waste - in fact, highly radioactive waste - that then has to be stored safely forever.
Dangerous speaks for itself, as the horrific situation in Japan underscores yet again. But while Japan is the most visible failure right now, nuclear plants in the US experienced 14 "near misses" last year, ie "serious failures in which safety was jeopardized." And then there are issues such as Oyster Creek in NJ which recently leaked radioactive Tritum into the ground water. The list, unfortunately, goes on.
The nuclear industry has enjoyed billions and billions of dollars in subsidies, and yet after decades of trying, the industry has failed to solve its most serious problems.
Renewable energy can meet our needs - and it's truly clean and truly safe. We need to develop storage and need to make our grid "smarter." We have the technology to do both. We need the political will. We've tackled much, much bigger problems before in this country. Time to use our innovative spirit to do it again and move toward a truly clean, truly safe energy future once and for all - and move away from nukes.
Matt Elliott, Environment New Jersey— Matt Elliott - Nuclear power looks great on paper and seems relatively safe too but a closer look reveals a few things.
a) It is questionably "cleaner" since the process produces the most toxic substance on the planet which is plutonium. A few little bits in the environment can cripple cities. It's also a huge concern that bad guys migh easily get their hands on this stuff from countries like Chechnya. Plutonium is full strength toxic for 10,000 years and NO ONE knows how to store it for such a period of time.
b) It may also not be so cost effective because the utility companies are mandated to cut up and bury and guard ed commissioned power plant facilities when the plants start to react with the fuel after a few decades. For at least 10,000 years! Someone give me a cost estimate on that, please.
There's lot's more but I hate reading long blogs so I'll just leave you with this thought: The nations that make up the middle east oil cartel has been sending us billions of barrels of oil for decades, regardless of the politics. To fuel nuclear plants, we must import ALL of the uranium materials from countries in Africa which are usually at war with one another but they are all pretty much united in hating the USA. All they need to do is to have us 40 or 50% dependent on uranium and they would love nothing better than to squeeze us so hard, they would make us think those middle eastern countries were the best friends we ever had. If we can make cars that meet sensible mpg standards and not have such an oil greedy economy based on disposable everything, the USA can be awash in energy for a thousand years with our present supplies of coal and oil.— harrier000 - While I am not completely against nuclear power I think the risks far outweigh the benefits. I think there needs to be more investment in R&D for cleaner energy alternatives. The progress in wind and solar over the past quarter century has been impressive and would be more so with the proper investment.
— NJ_Engineer - The major exporters of uranium are Canada & Australia, with Russia and Kazakhstan behind them, very little if any comes from Africa. The US has ample supplies of uranium but not much of it hits the power generation market, it is held in reserve and for strategic defense purposes. I am in complete agreement however about the hidden cost of nuclear power being the decommision costs. Very little accurate accounting is given for these colossal expenses making cost/ benefit analysis difficult or impossible. I do think nuclear is a necessary option for the next 25-100 years however, since the decision was made long ago to build nuclear plants and we are going to have to incur these decommision costs and safe storage costs for all existing sites anyway. Currently nuclear waste is stored at these sites all around the country waiting for authorization to transfer to Yucca Mtn., additional facilities will not add a level of risk that I would consider unnacceptable when compared to alternatives since we are already on the hook for the long term care and transport of all of the existing materials. Responsible placement and use of nuclear facilities can be a substantial piece of the energy puzzle that we will need as we develop renewable and less harmful power generation facilities that don't do long term damage to the planet, as the earth can't take this abuse forever. But we can't meet our energy demands with renewables at this time, not even close, and need to plan for the lowest total cost energy production methods to bridge the gap of time until we can and then work, plan, and execute an energy policy that gets us there as quickly as we possibly can.— Twocents
- Hi Twocents...Thanks for the clarification on our major exporters of u 238.0289. If you think the Russians are great trading partners, just take a quick glance at what Russian suppliers did in freezing out Ukraine of natural gas supplies until the UKR was in an emergency situation and caved in to whatever Gasprom dictated. And as far as Kazakhstan, all I can say is I wouldn't like our national energy policy to be depending on supply from any "stan". Our national energy policy should lean much more on conservative consumption and higher efficiency of energy. — harrier000
- This is all interesting! Keep 'em coming folks.
Here's one thought I debated with friends over the weekend: Whatever we do with nuclear, we're going to need more renewables. For now, they're expensive and not as reliable a source of energy and they hardly have the same capacity, even if built large-scale. Then again, we could act on those pretty quickly, offshore wind notwithstanding.
Here's an idea on how to add muscle to the financial equation. If it seems simplistic, well, why not? What if we established a baseline for monthly residential electric bills -- an average use? And every month that a household used more electricity than the average, a fee would be assessed. One dollar, ten dollars, whatever.
The mere existence of the fee would prompt more conservation, which would be a good thing. And my assumption -- perhaps flawed -- is that the fee would not be a burden on poor families because they presumably do not have as many grid-sucking machines as other wealthier households.
The actual money collected by the fee could go into a fund that would subsidize renewable energy projects.
— Sandy Bauers
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Sandy Bauers is the environment reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer, where she has worked for more than 20 years as a reporter and editor. She lives in northern Chester County with her husband, two cats, a large vegetable garden and a flock of pet chickens.
Sandy Bauers
Inquirer GreenSpace Columnist
GreenSpace - her column about how to reduce your carbon footprint in everyday life - appears every other Monday in Health & Science. Reach Sandy at sbauers@phillynews.com.
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