Nuclear Power
The United States needs to again consider nuclear power for our energy needs but we must first get the design, the regulations, and the waste disposal questions resolved before we start. The American public needs to be educated on nuclear power to eliminate some of the unfounded prejudices.
I was a US Navy Nuclear Reactor Operator for about 6 1/2 years and an Electrical Controls Engineer at a civilian nuclear plant for 3 years. I have seen the inside analysis of the failures at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. The US designs and safety systems were, and still are, significantly more advanced than the Russian designs. That was the reason there was only an insignificant release of radioactive contamination from TMI and a wasteland created at Chernobyl even though the meltdowns were somewhat comparable.
After TMI all of the nuclear plants in the US were required to upgrade all systems to account for the lessons learned from the TMI accident and the operator training requirements were also significantly improved so that the problem at TMI is unlikely to occur again and even if it did the public would not be exposed to any significant danger.
When nuclear power became available in the late 50's and early 60's every company in the US that made boilers and power plants jumped into the nuclear business and created many different designs. This made it difficult to transfer lessons learned from a problem at one plant to other plants. If we start building plants again we should agree on two or three standard proven designs that are pre-approved by the NRC (similar to how France approaches nuclear power) and build only these plants. This will reduce costs and safety risks for everyone.
Radioactive waste is not that difficult to store safely after it has "cooled" for a decade and the plants can keep waste on site in secure storage pools for that long. The storage containers that have been developed for high level waste are very safe for transferring and long term storage. The issues at Yucca Mountain are more political than they are technical, the facility should be approved and we should move forward to storing the waste that is sitting in dry casks at nuclear power plants across the country.
The technology is now proven and the safety risks are now well understood, it is time to start building nuclear plants again to meet the needs of the nation for safe and inexpensive electrical energy that will get the economy growing in high gear.
I was a US Navy Nuclear Reactor Operator for about 6 1/2 years and an Electrical Controls Engineer at a civilian nuclear plant for 3 years. I have seen the inside analysis of the failures at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. The US designs and safety systems were, and still are, significantly more advanced than the Russian designs. That was the reason there was only an insignificant release of radioactive contamination from TMI and a wasteland created at Chernobyl even though the meltdowns were somewhat comparable.
After TMI all of the nuclear plants in the US were required to upgrade all systems to account for the lessons learned from the TMI accident and the operator training requirements were also significantly improved so that the problem at TMI is unlikely to occur again and even if it did the public would not be exposed to any significant danger.
When nuclear power became available in the late 50's and early 60's every company in the US that made boilers and power plants jumped into the nuclear business and created many different designs. This made it difficult to transfer lessons learned from a problem at one plant to other plants. If we start building plants again we should agree on two or three standard proven designs that are pre-approved by the NRC (similar to how France approaches nuclear power) and build only these plants. This will reduce costs and safety risks for everyone.
Radioactive waste is not that difficult to store safely after it has "cooled" for a decade and the plants can keep waste on site in secure storage pools for that long. The storage containers that have been developed for high level waste are very safe for transferring and long term storage. The issues at Yucca Mountain are more political than they are technical, the facility should be approved and we should move forward to storing the waste that is sitting in dry casks at nuclear power plants across the country.
The technology is now proven and the safety risks are now well understood, it is time to start building nuclear plants again to meet the needs of the nation for safe and inexpensive electrical energy that will get the economy growing in high gear.
posted by TheOneLaw | 3:35 PM
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