Do you support the use of nuclear power, which emits zero CO2?

Question

dumdum and peg, the thing with the subsidies is it's a two-way street - nuclear power is highly regulated.

Answer 1

I  pretty much agree with dumdum, nuclear power is fine as long as it is not subsidized, but it shouldn't rely on government handouts.  However, it's not a long-term solution unless we move to breeder reactors, because uranium ore would run out just like petroleum is.

As someone who has been to Yucca mountain and seen the proposed repository, I don't find nuclear waste a compelling problem.  It's seems a much safer method of waste disposal than spewing gigatonnes into the air!

EDIT: I don't think there's any choice but to highly regulate the nuclear industry.  It's not enough to hold a company liable for a nuclear accident, since it may cause thousands of deaths and make a whole region uninhabitable--another Chernobyl can't be allowed to happen, so I think that nuclear power plants need to be watched very carefully. If that's the cost of doing business then so be it, it needs to be factored in to the real costs of the energy produced, not hidden by government subsidies.  The same standards need to be applied to all types of power, though.

Answer 2

No.  Neither should any conservative who opposes costly government subsidized programs.  Nuclear energy is extremely expensive and was started on tax money and will always need lot of tax money if it's going to start up again.  It wouldn't survive in a free market system--and shouldn't.

Edit: Something tells me I should invest in uranium...

Answer 3

Sure.  It's a necessary tool to fight global warming.

Many (most?) environmentalists agree.

Construction of nuclear power plants in the US didn't stop because of environmentalists.  It stopped because they were costing huge sums of money, and had operational problems.

Google [whoops nuclear power] for more about that.

EDIT - In any event, the global warming scientists working on solutions are very definitely pro nuclear.  Radical environmentalists don't speak for everybody, and have very little power.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/worl...

http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/ar4-wg3.h...

You don't have to get on board with Greenpeace to fight global warming.

Answer 4

I will support nuclear energy when we have a viable process to deal with the waste. I believe we can develop a good method to capture any "energy" from this waste thus making it inert and supplying additional power.

Answer 5

I'd say it's a good idea because it certainly causes less pollution than other power sources.

Answer 6

CO2 is not your enemy as it feeds the plants. The teachers have taught this garbage of GW and it is a scam .

Answer 7

There is no doubt, nuclear is the most ecologically sound source of energy that we have. Solar, wind or bio fuels have very little chance of being anything but a minor part of western civilizations energy needs. Even with 100% efficiency solar does not work at night. Battery powered powered automobiles and Nuclear fission are the only zero percent technology possible, unless your a liberal conspiracy theorists and you believe evil corporations are holding back  some mystical energy production capability that defies the laws of physics.

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Answer 8

Yes...Yes...YES!

Answer 9

Yes, short term until we find something better.

As far as government - they should get out of the way and let oil and nuclear do their job.

Libs wanted ethanol from corn. Dumb idea.

Now people are starving while libs impede oil supply with endless litigation and roadblocks.

Liberal environmental socialism will solve nothing but enslave us to the globalist elite.

Answer 10

I certainly do,  as well as oil, coal, biofuels, wind, tidal, hamsters pedelling, etc

Answer 11

Most of my power is derived from the local nuke plant.  People need to realize Home Simpson isn't manning the safety board in these places...it's just a cartoon.

Answer 12

Yes but the democrats will not allow it.  Ironicaly their leftists cousins in France lead the world in nuclear power having started with an American, Westinghouse design in the fifties.

Answer 13

I agree with boo boo, Adam and kenny

Answer 14

Nuclear power is a fantastic source of energy.  The remaining sticking point is to get the lib-tards to quite suing the government over the methods of dealing with the waste.

First you have the repository at Yucca Mountain.  Good place to store nuclear waste.

Second, you have the MOX plant that was supposed to be built at SRS, but was canceled due to lawsuits.  This method was how we planned to take weapons grade nuclear material and permanently alter it so it can only be used for reactor fuel.  This was part of a treaty with the soviets, that since we did not build it, we now have to ship our stuff to France.  Seems like it would have been safer to process it at home.

Answer 15

Till that time a safe disposal mechanism is found for the nuclear wastes, the power generation by atomic plants should not be ventured in a big way. The nuclear wastes are as dangerous to environment as CO2 et al..

Leave alone the installation costs which may be justified by the scientists on the ground of prolonged generation of cheap energy (free from dependence on water in hydel or coal in thermal generation as well).

We still have space to raise the trees to recycle CO2 but none for the nuclear wastes.. Not only CO2 even SO2 (where coal is used in industry) etc can be siphoned off by plants (Citrus spp is said to particularly absorb the toxic SO2).. Even MIC (the toxic gas that killed and maimed many in Bhopal Union Carbide factory accident in India) is said to be absorbed by trees like Neem (Azadiracta indica) and Pongamia (syn. Derris indica)..

So we may depend on nature to fight the pollution unleashed by industry development rather than on risky nuclear alternatives..

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Answer 16

I am... but with great  hesitation; I wish we had better alternatives available immediately but we will probably have to rely on nuclear for some of our energy in the short term, simply because nuclear waste is regional whereas coal or oil waste is global (we pump it into the atmosphere).

The problem here is that the world's leaders have acted too slow in responding to a crisis so we are stuck with a second-best solution. Unfortunately, we are still doing the same thing today with all the talk about GW but no action; twenty years from now, someone else will be saying "I wish they had acted faster 20 years ago - now we will have to do X which is not the best way..."

Answer 17

Nuclear energy is a good way to make power, but nuclear waste and it's long term storage, in some cases 10's of thousands of years is a huge problem, and until that problem is solved, if ever,  we should not look at it as a viable long term solution. I believe we would be much better served by a concerted worldwide renewable energy program, using photovoltaic/ wind/ geothermal/ wave etc., as our first step into the future.