NEI Nuclear Notes

A tip of the hat to an anonymous NNN reader for passing along Energy Secretary Chu's appearance on the Charlie Rose Show last night. (See what you miss when you go to bed early?) The nuclear-related nugget appears at the 18:10-19:34 mark of the interview . (I do recommend watching the video, as the rush transcript below doesn't fully capture Rose's inimitable interrupting interview technique.) Rose : Nuclear. Where are you on nuclear? Chu : I think that nuclear energy should be a part of our energy portfolio in the United States this century. It’s carbon-free. It, we... Rose : This century? It is now 2009. Chu : Well, that's right. It's the beginning of this century. So, the reason I say that it is because it's going to take time to develop the transmission, and to develop the renewable energies, resources that it gets to be 50, 80% of our electrical power generation. And so... Rose : In France, it's what, 80%? Chu : France is a little bit less than 80% ...

Credible, dispassionate, informed: Dan Yergin on The Charlie Rose Show , Friday, June 27, 2008. Dr. Daniel Yergin is the Chairman of Cambridge Energy Research Associates ( CERA ), a preeminent source of independent analysis and information on the global energy picture. In Friday's appearance on Charlie Rose, Dr. Yergin gave a nearly hour-long interview on the current energy situation. Dr. Yergin explained the combination of factors that have given us $140/bbl oil. He described the urgency of expanding our use of energy efficiency to help in the short-term. He suggested the most important energy problem our leaders should focus on is natural gas. With so much natural gas used to produce electricity, we are growing dependent on imported natural gas, which suffers from the same pricing and political risks we see in our dependence on imported oil. Our prodigious consumption of natural gas for electricity generation links electricity prices to the vagaries of natural gas, spreading the ...