Climate Change - Nuclear Power?

Question

Accepting that we appear to be facing serious climate change issues and taking into account the commercial reality of our societies do you think there is any realistic alternative to nuclear power?

I doubt it ultimately.

Answer 1

Well, man-made climate change is a myth, so nuclear doesn't help there, but it does keep truckloads of ash out of the air that comes from coal plants.

America doesn't build nuclear plants like the Soviets, Russians, or Ukrainians. We have never had a nuclear accident in America.

My friend went to a Nuclear plant for a field trip. (i'm only in 7th grade) They said that you could drive a plane into the reactor without a problem. It had walls of concrete that were many feet thick.

Answer 2

The main problem with nuclear power is that there is no safe way to dispose of nuclear waste, people talk about how there have been no incidents, but if you look at the cancer rates in towns that live downwind from nuclear power plants you will see that is not true. Also there are things like the Columbia river where salmon are found deformed constantly because there are a few nuclear waste holders up in Washington that have little leaks.
Then there is the problem of depleted uranium which is a product of nuclear power and is put into missiles because it is heavy but when the missiles land the radiation (which is comparitively small compared with regular uranium) is released into the environment causing the people who are around it to have birth defects and cancer for years and years after the conflict has stopped.
So for these reasons and many more, it just isn't sustainable in the long term. Wind power and solar power are sustainable, and also turbine power for anyone who lives near a river or the ocean.

Answer 3

During the Carter administration they developed a plan to build 2,000 nuclear power plants by the year 2000.

Unfortunately that plan was derailed by the hysteria over nuclear power plants.

The power plants if they had been built would have provided enough energy to run the entire United States economy and power 100 million electric cars.

Essentially we would not need to import any oil from unreliable foreign powers.

The nuclear power plants would have replaced all of the coal fired power plants.

One thing that people do not realize about coal is that it is contaminated with radioactive Uranium and Thorium. The Uranium and Thorium are concentrated in the ash from coal fired power plants.

the concentration of Uranium is so high in coal ash that it is considered ore grade and a potential source of Uranium for atomic weapons.

The coal ash is stored in the open above ground where it can blow and contaminate the countryside.

Most people do not know that coal fired power plants produce more nuclear waste than nuclear power plants and that the waste from coal fired plants is not properly disposed of, it is just left out in the open on the ground.

Other alternatives, such as solar panels are ridiculously expensive. It costs over 50 cents per kilowatt hour to generate electricity with solar panels.

People would be rioting in the streets if the utilities ever increased electric rates to 50 cents per kilowatt hour.

The cost of electricity generated by a nuclear power plant is less than 4 cents per kilowatt hour, and that is including the cost of storing the waste and decomissioning the nuclear power plant..

It is about time that we dusted off the plans for those nuclear power plants from the Carter administration and built those nuclear power plants.

Answer 4

Proponents of solar and wind derived electricity always leave out the real estate factor. If they could only keep in mind the costs associated with covering their own roofs with solar panels which would only be sufficient to power their own property, as well as the broad expanses of open land necesseary to convert to wind energy would they realize the tremendous potential of nuclear fission.

And in one final example of uninformed thinking, they forget that the last accidental release of nuke plant radioactivity in the USA occurred almost 30 years ago, and even that was confined to field mice in the area and subsided within weeks. The USA nuke industry has had no significant incidents since.

Answer 5

We should develop more nuclear power. Over 50% of all ghg's are produced by power generation. Nuclear power produces no ghg's for power generation and can substantially reduce our ghg output.

People are afraid of technology they don't understand. If people understood how wonderful, safe, and efficient nuclear power was, we would have more demand for it.

Nuclear power has been used safely for over 50 years, the waste has been moved through this country for the same amount of time, and fewer people are injured by nuclear than mining coal each year.

Too bad people fear modern technology.

Answer 6

Nucelar power plants?

We(U.S.) have not built another single Nucelar Power plant in decades.
#1, Nuclear power plants are expensive
#2, How would we place the containmentated Nucelar Wast, that isn't disposable
#3, Nucelar Power plant wasts have dead consecquences in wrong hands of terror organizations.

Answer 7

I really like the idea of nuclear as long as waste is disposed of properly. In some regions geothermal is also possible. In certain regions solar and wind can be used though in most areas its not consistent enough.

Answer 8

The only reason we have not taken better advantage of nuclear power is that there will always be some Homer Simpson buffoon who will eventually screw up and drop a donut on some guage while sleeping on the job. This will cause a core meltdown. It happened at Chernobyl.

Answer 9

i also wish there was a serious alternative but unfortunately i don't think there is one, apart from using nuclear in conjunction with renewable energy.There is no suitable way of getting rid of the waste produced and they also pose a threat from terrorism so there is no easy solution :(

Answer 10

90% of France runs on Nuclear .SO the ANSWER to YOUR QUESTION IS THEY WANT a CARBON TAX to tax evil OIL Corporations DEM Senator DODD. that means trickle down to you $8.00 a gallon Gas Higher food prices TRUCKS deliver food run on FUEL,higher electric they will build NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS its a low carbon foot print .Carbon Tax will go to build these also if you donate to Blue Sky thru power company the $ goes to build new nuclear plants they say its clean low carbon foot print,Be careful what we wish for