Terry Blanton wrote:
On 3/11/07, Kyle R. Mcallister <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Who pays the hidden costs of extracting that nuclear fuel, and cleaning up
the radioactive crap belched out by these facilities? None of them are
clean, they leak radioactive water into the environment all the time.
Actually, for a given amount of energy, coal produces more radioactive
waste than nuclear power
I mentioned this in Chapter 2 of my book.
We should note that Kyle Mcallister is quite right that there have
been serious problems with radioactive water leaking from nuclear
reactors. The worst case in recent years in the U.S. was the
Connecticut Yankee fiasco. However, properly designed and maintained
nuclear reactors do not leak radioactive water, whereas even a
properly designed coal plant spews radioactive garbage everywhere,
along with carbon dioxide. The radioactive garbage has been reduced,
but it cannot be eliminated with present-day technology, or reduced
to levels as low as that of a properly designed and maintained fission reactor.
Perhaps it is possible to design a coal plant that does not do this,
and there are even designs for plants that capture and sequester the
CO2, but I do not think these coal plants could be made
cost-effective. I expect fission reactors would be cheaper per kWH.
In geographical areas where wind or intense sunlight are available,
these sources are already cheaper than fission reactors, and far
cheaper than coal when you take into account hidden costs.
Unfortunately, as I said, we do not have wind or cheap solar
resources in Georgia.
A nagging problem with fission reactors is that when something does
go drastically wrong -- as happened with TMI, Connecticut
Yankee, Rancho Seco, Brown's Ferry and so on -- the consequences can
be severe. These incidents each cost billions of dollars to clean up.
Years ago there was a lot of debate about whether the nuclear power
surcharge will be enough to decommission and clean-up nuclear plants.
I think this debate has subsided, because several plants were
decommissioned and satisfactorily cleaned up, so we now have a better
handle on how much it costs. We can be fairly confident that the
trust fund is large enough. Also, some of the old mines were cleaned
up. However, some experts still dispute this. The cost of long-term
storage of nuclear waste is a huge question mark, but I believe this
problem is mainly politics rather than a fiscal problem. Once the
political and scientific issues are settled I do not think it will
cost much to bury the waste. (I mean it will be cheap per kWH. The
actual sums will be tremendous.)
- Jed
