With energy demands increasing and legislators pushing for carbon constraining policy, more people are turning their heads to commercial nuclear energy. Although many environmentalists, including Greenpeace founder Patrick Moore, continue to espouse nuclear energy, skeptics and also political candidates are asking, “What about nuclear waste?” There are solutions for nuclear waste, and other countries are carrying out these solutions on a daily basis. For example, France has successfully recycled over 23,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel. As The Heritage Foundation’s Research Fellow Jack Spencer notes, the French, Japanese, Indians, and …
A disturbance on Florida’s power grid caused two nuclear power reactors at the Turkey Point power station to undergo an unscheduled shut down today. Up to six other non-nuclear power plants were shut down as well. Despite the failure having nothing to do with any malfunctions at any of Florida’s nuclear power stations (it was a small fire and a switch failure at an electrical substation near Miami that caused the disturbance), this incident will undoubted be cast by some as validating the inherent danger of nuclear power. The Heritage …
Despite 104 nuclear reactors safely providing 20 percent of America’s electricity, many Americans continue to fear nuclear power. Much of this anxiety results from myths surrounding the 1979 incident at the Three Mile Island nuclear power station. To help educate policy makers about the realities of nuclear power, The Heritage Foundation and Third Way joined forces to tackle the Three Mile Island myth head-on by sponsoring a tour by a bipartisan group of Senate staffers of Three Mile Island. The visit consisted of a comprehensive briefing and a plant tour. …
In Tuesday’s episode of “Boston Legal,” a judge ruled in favor of a citizen suing her town for attempting to build a nuclear power plant. The lawyer used the same anti-nuclear rhetoric that has been used for years, claiming that cancer was prevalent near Three Mile Island, that radiation caused by a nuclear power plant inflicts serious health problems, and that there is no solution to nuclear waste. The fallacies purported in this episode suggest that nuclear power is dangerous and that citizens will react unfavorably to the “threat” of …
A Barton, Md., reader of the Cumberland Times pierces through the doublespeak of environmental groups that advocate conservation as the key to avoiding imminent power shortages in the region. Responding to power company admonitions that the public needs to conserve more, he writes: Lady, I’m retired, on Social Security, over 70 years old and sitting in my house wearing a sweater. We put the efficient bulbs in a good while back. And believe me, sweet heart, by the time I get done paying your soon to be 71% increase in …
Earlier this week, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and the rest of Nevada’s congressional delegation sent a letter to Secretary Elaine Chao asking the Department of Labor to put up the “necessary resources” to help 63 recently laid-off Nevadans transition to new jobs. Sounds reasonable, right? Reid is just trying to help some down-on-their-luck constituents. Except that Reid and his comrades are the reason those 63 scientists, engineers and technicians lost their jobs in the first place. They worked at the Yucca Mountain spent nuclear fuel repository that Reid has …
The 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act set Jan. 31, 1998 as the deadline to opening the Yucca Mountain repository for spent nuclear fuel. Today marks the 10 year anniversary of that mandate. Thanks to a hand full of myopic politicians from Nevada, few would argue that the nation is any closer today than it was a decade ago to opening Yucca Mountain. This is not because of science. The Department of Energy has done numerous studies and Environmental Impact Statements that declare the Yucca repository safe. It is not because …
President Bush should be commended for recognizing the need to expand nuclear energy in the United States. As a CO2-free, safe, affordable source of energy, nuclear power can help reduce atmospheric emissions while meeting America’s growing energy demands. His call to “trust in the creative genius of American researchers and entrepreneurs” to pioneer new energy technologies will be critical to the future success of nuclear power in the United States. Although America has contributed little to the world of commercial nuclear technology in recent decades, the reemergence of nuclear power …
Economists Stephen Dubner and Steven Levitt, renowned for their book “Freakonomics” and New York Times blog, have a certain knack for examining the hidden incentives, opportunity costs and unintended consequences of real-world issues using sound economic logic. They have also advocated the development of commercial nuclear energy on more than one occasion. In today’s Freakonomics post, they note the opportunity costs of forgoing nuclear power, highlighting the obituary of Dr. Herbert J.C. Kouts, a nuclear power safety expert. In a commissioner’s report for the governor of New York in 1983, …
