"Max Carbon" sounds like a nightmare scenario for greenhouse gas emissions,
too pessimistic even for the IPCC report. To the contrary, Max Carbon is
optimistic: he is Emeritus Professor of Nuclear Engineering at the
University of Wisconsin-Madison and author of _Nuclear Power: Villain or
Victim? Our Most Misunderstood Source of Electricity_ (Second Edition 2006;
Pebble Beach Publishers, Madison, WI: 108pp.)
>From the cover -- "Little-known facts about nuclear power:"
- 16% of the world's electricity came from 442 nuclear power plants in 2005.
Reactors supply about 19% of electricity in the U.S. and 78.5% of that in
France.
- In 2006, twenty-nine new nuclear plants were under construction in 12
countries. New reactors began commercial operation in India, Japan, Russia,
South Korea, and Ukraine in 2005.
- The safety record of nuclear power is outstanding. Radiation from nuclear
plants has not caused any known deaths among the public worldwide, except at
the Chernobyl plant in the Ukraine. The known death toll from the Chernobyl
accident is less than 50.
- Chernobyl-type plants cannot be built or operated in the United States.
- Less radiation is given off by a nuclear plant than a coal plant.
- Nuclear power plants emit no CO2 (which contributes to global warming) nor
sulfur and nitrogen oxides (which cause acid rain).
- There is an excellent solution to disposing of our nuclear wastes - to
bury them deep underground where they will be harmless. In contrast, there
is no solution to handling the billions of tons of carbon dioxide which coal
and natural gas plants release yearly, except to discharge them into the
atmosphere.
- Nuclear power plants are believed to be saving thousands of lives yearly
in the United States. This is because nuclear plants replace many coal
plants, which emit tiny particulates into the atmosphere. These
particulates are believed to kill thousands of Americans each year. Nuclear
plants emit no particulates.
- New, second-generation nuclear plants have been constructed in Japan in
less than four years and below budget. These plants were designed by a team
of American and Japanese companies.
-dl
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