NEI Nuclear Notes

It looks like Adam Blinick's post at TNR has kicked off a little debate. Over at The Atlantic , Matt Yglesias had this to say: We'll be weaned off the dastardly power, perhaps, with nuclear powered cars? What about plug-in hybrids ? The idea here is simple: If you generate electricity with a non-emitting source like nuclear, you can power plug-in hybrids while cutting the emission of carbon and other particulate matter like sulfur dioxide and nitrous oxide, which would deliver the added benefit of helping to avoid acid rain. Yglesias continues: I have no problem with the idea that putting a proper price on carbon might lead to good things for the nuclear power industry, but the issue in practice is that nuclear advocates are busy demanding large subsidies. It makes sense to some extent to subsidize clean sources of electricity, but we should target subsidies on really, truly clean sources of power -- and nuclear's not that. The idea that dastardly anti-nuclear activist...

After hearing John Edwards declare his outright opposition to nuclear energy during Tuesday's Democratic debate in Nevada, Adam Blinick of The New Republic wrote ... Gwyneth Cravens's illuminating Power to Save the World: The Truth about Nuclear Energy dispels many of the myths about nuclear energy that Edwards' position helps prop up. For example, she notes coal plants emit more radiation than nuclear ones. (In fact, humans get more radiation from medical x-rays or flying round-trip from New York to L.A. than living near a nuclear plant). Also, Cravens argues that nuclear energy plants are almost completely risk-free regarding nuclear weapons proliferation (it's a different enrichment process) and potential terrorist attacks (U.S. plants are simply too secure). She also makes the argument that we likely have safe ways of disposing of nuclear waste, even at Yucca Mountain. For all the empty "unity" rhetoric that inevitably is present during an election cycl...

In the midst of promoting her new book, The Power to Save the World: The Truth About Nuclear Energy , Gwyneth Cravens sat down for an interview with Wired News ... WN: You have an interesting statistic comparing the waste levels produced by individuals over a lifetime. Cravens: A family in four in France, where they reprocess nuclear fuel, would produce only enough waste to fit in a coffee cup over a whole lifetime. A lifetime of getting all your electricity from coal-fired plants would make a single person's share of solid waste (in the United States) 68 tons, which would require six 12-ton railroad cars to haul away. Your share of CO2 would be 77 tons. Wow. Very neat. For our entire archive of entries on Cravens, click here .

Over at Atomic Insights , Rod Adams reviews The Power to Save the World: The Truth About Nuclear Energy . What's interesting about the book is that its author, Gwyneth Cravens, is a former anti-nuke who was part of the opposition to the Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant on Long Island. But after spending decades talking to people working in the nuclear industry, she's changed her mind: [A]s a native of Albuquerque, NM, she had the opportunity to develop a social acquaintance with Rip Anderson, one of the leading researchers and practitioners of probabilistic risk assessment of nuclear facilities. Her occasional discussions with Dr. Anderson began to disturb her previously firm belief that nuclear power represented an unreasonably risky endeavor that should not be allowed to flourish. Eventually, she decided that she needed to learn more - I love people like that! Through her connection with Dr. Anderson, she set up visits to mines, a uranium mill, waste storage facilities in Idaho...