Texas Mulls More Nuclear Reactors
Seventeen years ago, Texas turned on its last nuclear reactor, about 50 miles southwest of Fort Worth. In another decade, several more reactors could get built here — if events in Washington go the power companies' way.
Nuclear power now accounts for 14 percent of Texas's electricity usage (below the national average, 20 percent). The case for adding more reactors rests on a rising appetite for electricity sparked by a growing population and ever-proliferating gadgetry. And proponents point out that nuclear power, unlike coal or natural gas, is virtually free of the greenhouse gas emissions associated with global warming during ...
Comments (4)
kirk holden
The carbon footprint of mining and enriching uranium for light water reactors is comparable to the carbon footprint for mining gypsum and turning it into cement or quarrying granite and turning into counter-tops. Anti-nuke activists are global warming deniers.
John Robert BEHRMAN
Nuclear power is <i>potentially</i> economic and environmentally responsible:
There are three <i>democratic</i> ways of handing long-lived radionuclietides, (i) tectonic subduction, (ii) fast-neutron breeder reactors, and (iii) human custody. They are complements one of the other. So, we can use (iii) to mediate (ii), and end with (i). That is how to think of this clearly and decisively.
The problem we have is vendor-financed, turn-key,,"deals". Presently, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Toshiba are both trying to "dump" reactors they cannot sell in Japan on corrupt, mostly but not exclusively Republican, Texas politicians.
This is just another debt-driven swindle. Actually, Texas has vast potential for conserving rather than generating energy. We are, for instance, addicted to grid-intensive mechanical air-conditioning that could be displaced by simple modifications to building-codes and lending constraints on commercial real estate.
Owing to the gross incompetence and corruption of both parties, Texas already has the lowest marginal cost of electrical power generation and the highest retail price of electricity.
This reflects GOP ideology and Democratic stupidity.
That would be State Representatives, Senators, and even party hacks who will do just about anything for a fee.
I strongly favor construction of nuclear reactors for boiling water and for reducing radionuclides in volume and half-life. Since "cooling ponds" and "cooling towers" do not work well in our tropical climate, we should be using process steam to convert coal or biomass into diesel fuel, specifically, <i>di-methyl ether</i> or, as we say in East Texas, "wood ether".
The question is whether thermo-dynamics trumps the cornpone poltics of "doctors, lawyers, and preachers."
Nukemann
In order to make an informed decision on nuclear power plants you should look at the Nuclear Fission Pros and Cons
PROS
1. Fission is the most energy for the least fuel with current technology.
2. Less fuel means less waste, and the waste is all accounted for, not released into the atmosphere to become someone else's problem.
3. Uranium is readily available, very common in the earth's crust (about the same as tin)
4. Economical - operating cost about the same as coal, fuel cost is a much smaller percentage of the total, therefore less susceptible to price fluctuations.
5. Reliable - Nuclear power plants have very high capacity factors, Much higher than solar or wind
6. No combustion, no Co, CO2 or SO2 released.
7. Creates high paying, skilled jobs.
8. Reduce dependence on foreign oil/ fuel. Uranium available domestically and in oceans.
9. High temperature reactors could produce Hydrogen as well as electricity.
10. Fantastic safety record.
11, Does not require back-up and storage facilities like solar and wind.
12. More economical than solar per Mw produced.
13. Much smaller footprint, takes up less land than Solar or wind.
14. May be located almost anywhere on earth, most efficient near a cooling water source.
15. Can be made to desalinate water.
16. Generation IV reactors can use "high level waste" as fuel
CONS
1. Irrational fear of all things nuclear.
2. High cost to build and license, large initial investment for long term pay back.
3. Publicly accepted high level storage facility not domestically available.
4. Reprocessing facility not domestically available. (we should build one)
4. High cost of personnel.(high paying jobs in my community)
5. Security concerns, proliferation and terrorism. (minimal risk, easier to refine ore)
Nuclear power, I believe is the best, safest, most reliable, current technology to provide energy. The plants operating now are safe and the new designs are even safer.
Building 100's of new nuclear power plants would improve the economy, reduce or eliminate dependence on foreign oil, create jobs, reduce pollution, and provide for future technological advancement.
I have been working with nuclear power for about 30 years, I would be glad to have a new Nuclear power plant or "high level waste" storage facility in my community. My family and I live in a home within 10 miles of a nuclear power plant. (where I work) I have a great understanding of the risks involved and I'm completely comfortable with a plant "in my backyard".
I have confidence that my grandchildren’s grandchildren will be smart enough to treat the nuclear "waste" as a valuable resource or at least smart enough to handle it safely. If the cavemen thought their children would be too stupid to use fire safely, where would we be now?
Using Chernobyl as a reason not to build is like saying because of the Hindenburg I will never fly in a commercial airliner.
Nuclear power has the smallest environmental impact of any current energy production method per unit of energy produced. One fuel pellet about the size of a pencil eraser produces the same energy as about 1 ton of coal, and if reprocessed, most of what’s left can be reclaimed. Nuclear power is our best option for reliable, environmentally friendly, base-load electrical power.
Gary Oliver
Rather amazing that this story doesn't mention Japan, Fukushima, or the meltdown in progress and the evacuated population. When an Ike storm surge devastates STNP (which Japan isn't so hot on financing anymore, by the way) or a Tuscaloosa-style, mile-wide tornado visits Comanche Peak, how smoothly will those evacuations of Houston and DFW proceed? Now that the Lege is voting to import radwaste from everywhere, will every community along all the routes receive radiation disaster training and equipment to prep for the eventual accidents, wherever they may occur? Nuclear power is so expensive that investors won't touch it without massive federal subsidies, and insurance companies won't insure it without the Price-Anderson Act, which dumps the costs of eventual disasters on the taxpayer. Anyone who calls nuclear power "clean and green" goes beyond denial, into delusion. When an explosion occurs at a coal-fired power plant, that's an unfortunate accident. When an explosion occurs at a gas-fired power plant, that's also an unfortunate accident. When an explosion occurs at a nuclear power plant, that's international news, and around the globe people sit on the edge of their seats waiting to see which way the winds blow.