President Obama: Yes New Nukes

Alright! Finally something I can supprt Mr. Obama on. There is no excuse why we can’t be like France — 80 percent of power from Nukes. Even better power from Thorium nukes — low waste, high safety —

Finally something I can supprt Mr. Obama on.
Posted by: Quo Warranto | Feb 15, 2010 10:58:21 PM
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You couldn’t support the President on his assistance for veterans?

You couldn’t support the President on his assistance for veterans?
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Would that be where Mr. Biden said the Iraq war was not worth the cost, or where Mr. Obama want’s do do away with DADT?
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Is there a yes or no in there anywhere?

You know he does not mean it .

This is a good thing … if he actually goes through with it.

re: nuke power
lets say a prayer that Haliburton is not involved in any way

Some kind of nuclear technology is apparently coming down the pipes that allows spent nuclear rods be used as fuel. That would be a blessing and greatly reduce the storage of waste problems.

The Energy Policy Act of 2005 authorized the Department of Enegery to issue loan guarantees “for projects that avoid, reduce, or sequester air pollutants or greenhouse gas emissions and employ new or significantly-improved technologies,” the White House official said, adding that it has been one of Energy Secretary Stephen Chu’s top priorities to allocate $18.5 billion under that authority.
Isn’t this just continuing the failed policies from the previous administration that got us in to this mess? Seriously, this is good news – let’s all take a moment and thank the Republican House and Senate for drafting, and GWB’43 for signing The Green Policy Act of 2005…
Gibbs says 3,500 construction jobs, but I have no idea what that means – certainly not 3,500 “new” jobs, certainly not 3,500 “man-year” jobs, it certainly doesn’t mean 3,500 new/saved jobs this year, etc. I would appreciate a better description of what that actually means…

It’s another favor for the unions…if he is serious about nukes then why is he closing down Yuka Mtn – the storage facility that has been designed and paid for to store nuke waste.

FINALLY! Obama proves that he’s capable of making a good decision once in a while!

Good move, Mr. President. Nuclear energy really must be part of our national energy strategy going forward. This is something that I can definitely get behind, even with the union worker angle.
And Tierra, we still have a nuclear waste disposal problem despite technological advances. Next the president needs to rethink opening Yucca Mountain, which we desperately need and which is quite safe and effective as a storage site.

During his presidential campaign, then-Sen. Obama was a qualified supporter of new nukes.
“I think that nuclear power should be in the mix when it comes to energy,” he said as a candidate, adding “I don’t think it’s our optimal energy source because we haven’t figured out how to store the waste safely or recycle the waste.”
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I think its important to remember that this always who the President was (ftr, Illinois has nuclear power plants); and it would be nice if folks like McCain and Graham remain who they are rather than backtracking as McCain has, so that we can move forward on energy initiatives, and energy indpendence that includes some nuclear.

Please come to Entergy’s Vernon nukular facility and taste their water. More nuke plants is a bad idea.

If you don’t like the idea of nuclear power or coal power or oil power…
Turn your computer off, turn your heat off, don’t use electricity.
It takes an individual contribution to make the world a cleaner place, start with yourself.

If I was the President I would stop doing anything, why try to help the worthless American public who complains and talks him down all the time. He can’t do anything that the past Presidents did without controversy. They could have state parties and support two nuclear plants without the racist right coming after him. I see our country in a new light and one day our ignorant stupid behavior will be the destruction of us. As I see it we couldn’t come together if our lives depended on it, we would just be destroyed.

“If I was the President I would stop doing anything, why try to help the worthless American public who complains and talks him down all the time. He can’t do anything that the past Presidents did without controversy.”
Which past president have announced nuclear plants from the IEBW offices?

Which past president have announced nuclear plants from the IEBW offices?
Robert Tulloch | Feb 16, 2010 9:45:49 AM
Or while wearing a red tie? For that matter, which presidents in the past 40 years ever bothered to promote nuclear power plants at all?

why is he closing down Yuka Mtn – the storage facility that has been designed and paid for to store nuke waste.
Amy | Feb 16, 2010 8:07:30 AM
Paid for? The last estimates (2008) were that it would cost $90 billion to build Yucca mountain. What fantasy land do you live in where you have to spend $90 billion on something that is “paid for”?!?!?

I won’t hold my breath that we ACTUALLY get them built. The endless and expensive hoops to jump through required by excessive environmental regulations (which benefit everything at the expense of people)will make the time frame for completion about 10 years out unless they are circumvented (and can be) by the President. My cynical side says that this may be an empty overture where at the end he can say “Well, we tried.” I will be thrilled if my cynical side is wrong.

Or while wearing a red tie? For that matter, which presidents in the past 40 years ever bothered to promote nuclear power plants at all?
Posted by: jhw539
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Bush Calls For New Nuclear Plants – washingtonpost.comBush Calls For New Nuclear Plants President Talks Of … Bush has been an ardent advocate of nuclear power … co-founder of Greenpeace, have changed their minds as well, seeing nuclear …

Bush Calls For New Nuclear Plants – washingtonpost Bush Calls For New Nuclear Plants President Talks Of … Bush has been an ardent advocate of nuclear power … co-founder of Greenpeace, have changed their minds as well, seeing nuclear …
What? | Feb 16, 2010 10:28:49 AM
I did not say no president had promoted nuclear power in the past 40 years, indeed I was hoping someone would mention Bush’s lip service so I could ask the obvious follow up question: With a Republican Rubberstamp Congress, what did Bush DO to promote nuclear power beyond the lip service you cited? (And lest I “look stupid”, he did implement some meager efforts, but Obama is currently working to increase those efforts threefold and introduce new spurs in the form of loan guarantees.)

Obama is supporting Nuclear Power and the fool still complain. Forget those fools. The same fools who bought up all of the guns thinking Obama would pass a law to limit the weapons. I am sure happy they bought all of the guns up so they can keep them out of the cities. The man will not ever promote a gun law bill. So, all the fool with all the guns please make sure you keep them in a safe play so kids can not get to them. I am not like you hateful people. I love you all.

This is a step in the right direction. Our needs dictate that we increase the number of nuclear plants producing power for us. We have plants that have been decommissioned with none slated to take their place; this creates a deficit in the amount of available energy. Couple that to the ever expanding population and its increased consumption of our energy and you get the rolling brown-outs that plaque us here in CA every summer. As for the waste, I suggest the President change his stance on NASA and we add a solar nuclear waste disposal service to the programs we are developing. Launch the waste into the sun, we have the technology and the sun is basically a nuclear furnace. Cost is an issue that can be addressed with engineering advances and by defraying the cost among all of the nuclear nations. Just a thought…

This move should have happened as soon as Obama hit the pavement…but better late than never….this is a very very good move!!!

Nuclear power is the wave of the future, no doubt.
Todd | Feb 16, 2010 10:59:04 AM
I don’t agree with that. Nuclear power is inherently hazardous and maintains reliance on intensely centralized sources with extensive (costly and exposed) distribution system. Higher efficiency is the future (even if insulation and triple element windows don’t look future’esque, the numbers are undeniable), combined with distributed generation. A little solar on rooftops, some distributed cogen plants, a bit of tidal here, a bit of biomass there and then the massive transmission infrastructure is no longer an expensive bottleneck – but it takes a lot of time and more development yet to get there.
We’re not at the future yet. Nuclear is the mature technology that will get us to the future without the massive pollution (including radioactive!) burning our coal stocks would entail. Peak oil won’t be a major disaster precisely because of moves like this taken to mitigate it.

jhw539….I didn’t mean to say it’s (nuclear) is the only source of the future, but as things stand now, it’s the best option and will no doubt be an increasingly important component to our energy portfolio. We need it all, I especially like the gas-fired co-generation idea as well. The more diversified the sources are, the less volatility we will see in prices and a more stable, rational world along the path to less fossil fuel usage. Furthermore, I think your statement about nuclear being “inherently hazardous” is incorrect. Studies have shown fewer people have died from nuclear accidents in the half century it’s been around than almost any other form of production outside renewables. People living around coal-fired plants are actually exposed to more radiation than those living around nukes. Why? The coal ash has trace amounts of radio-active elements that are introduced into the air and water.

Hey Bruce Springsteen, how’s that hope and change working out for you?

So is it to wean our dependence on foriegn oil or to appease the unions? One never can tell these days what the real motives are…
LongT | Feb 16, 2010 12:20:05 PM
It can be both you know. Sorta the definition of bipartisan. Do you play basketball for fun or exercise?

In recent news, hundreds of Georgia folk moved to Florida, due to their irrational paranoia of Nuclear Energy.

The President deserves our wholehearted support for his bold decision to encourage the building of nuclear reactors. This will provide an opportunity for our scientists and engineers to show what they can do. They will enable us to “Leap-Frog” the French by building improved reactors that are far safer than the old Light Water Reactors (LWRs). Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors (LFTRs) have many advantages but there are several other approaches ready for scale up.
The President also drove a stake through the heart of the Yucca mountain project that would have wasted $90 billion while trampling on Nevada’s Constitutional rights. This decision means that we will need a crash program to create reprocessing capacity for high level nuclear waste. Instead of emulating the wet processes that the French have perfected we need to scale up the dry processes that are already proven.
For example Accelerator Driven Reactors (ADRs) recommended by Rubia are already under development at Virginia-Tech (GEM*STAR) and other laboratories. Now that high power neutron sources such as the Spallation Neutron Source (SNS) at Oak Ridge are in operation we can expect dry re-processing to be far safer and cheaper than wet processing (PUREX etc.).

The advantages of thorium nuclear reactors are enormous. Waste storage time is reduced and you can use one to “burn” old nuclear waste. They cannot suffer from China Syndrome, since they need a sustained beam of neutrons to keep the reaction at critical.
They don’t lend themselves easily to building nuclear weapons, whereas conventional uranium reactor technology isn’t too hard to adapt to building of simple atomic weapons (“enrich more and build a donut and plug bomb”).
France gets over 75% of it’s power from nuclear plants.

“Yes, Obama canceled the Yucca Mountain boondoggle”
How can an Obama supporter call something a “boondoggle” when their president signed bills for over a trillion dollars in boondoggles in the first few months he was in office.
There is only one reason Obama shut down the Yucca facility – because he is a charlatan. Shutting down the Yucca project guarantees that the two plants he says he wants built in Georgia will never be able to be brought online. It also guarantees that our existing plants will have to begin shutting down because he still hates nuclear power.
You have to watch this snake every second. Somehow Obama has developed the ability to speak out of three sides of his mouth at the same time. What a farce.

The US will discover that nuclear energy also produces CO2.
And that thebuilders of nuclear powerplant cannot keep up with the productionrate of windturbine factories, and solar panels production plants.
Just check the numbers op generating power in MW for windpower, build in the last few years, 20 GW, Tis was build much quicker that the new nuclear powerplants will be built.