Any comments?
As for me, I don't really care for the left-bashing.
I posted it because of the emotive nature of the presentation. Personally, I've been waiting for this for some time. I wasn't sure if it would be a dramatic disruption of an anti-nuclear rally or someone chaining themselves to Caldicot's car to prevent her delivering an anti-nuclear presentation - but I assumed it would begin.
I can't say I'm disappointed that it has.
Posts
Mississippi PSC 2024 Nuclear Summit
-
I traveled to Jackson to speak to the three members of the Mississippi
Public Service Commission on Tuesday, October 22. After a few technical
hiccups that...
1 month ago
I don't agree with painting all Liberals/Leftists with the same brush, either.
ReplyDeleteStill, it's a good video. I can't help but think, though, that it would be more effective to communicate the facts without the left bashing.
It's quite reminiscent of Penn and Teller's Bullshit series, isn't it?
I am a liberal and I thought it was a great video. Sometimes you have to call a spade a spade. My observation for a large number of people on the leftist side of things is that being anti-nuclear is part of the ideology, the dogma.
ReplyDeleteTT
"World supplies of uranium are limited. Assuming a world supply of 6-10 million tonnes uranium is available and that 70% of the world's electricity were generated by nuclear power, uranium supplies would be exhausted within 20 years." (N. Mortimer, The Ecologist, 1991 and W. Biesiot).
ReplyDeleteNuclear power is not sustainable.
It's a hot topic in Australia at the moment. It would take 17 years for nuclear power to be up and running here, and global warming is escalating way to quickly to wait that long.
Don't forget that although nuclear power plants don't produce much in the way of CO2 emissions, the process of building the plants and mining and transporting uranium is still incredibly CO2 expensive.
And the bashing is completely unnecessary.
Thank you for your comment.
ReplyDelete1991?
Well a lot has happened since then. Recent uranium price increases, based in part by renewed interest as well as the near complete use of weapons grade stockpiles, have renewed uranium exploration efforts that had been dormant for decades. This exploration is yielding positive results and the '20 year' forecast has been extended considerably.
Also a lot is being said about the quality (or grade) of uranium reserves. This is less significant than some are saying because the total cost of power from a nuclear plant is not all that sensitive to the price of fuel supply.
Nuclear power - in the current form in use within the vast majority of plants - is not sustainable. However, if existing technologies are deployed this can be reversed. Technologies include spent fuel reprocessing as well as the adoption of breeder technology. Neither has any technical obstacles. There is also the use of the Thorium fuel cycle.
There is a real risk of assessing nuclear in a vacuum. Yes, there is some carbon in the entire lifecycle. But there's also carbon in the lifecycle of wind turbines (to manufacture, transport, install and maintain the equipment). Ditto for solar thermal and even worse for solar photovoltaics.
One way to cut the CO2 emitted in the nuclear lifecycle is to introduce enrichment technology near uranium mines in countries with demonstrated excellence in nuclear safeguards.
Australia is an excellent example of such an opportunity.
If you are really interested in the detail, check WNA webpage on the subject.