Nuclear Power, Global Warming and the Environment

More nuclear power less money for terrorists

2008-06-30T06:24:00.003-05:00

It's been said before but it bears repeating, we don't want to buy oil from countries that support terrorism. The faster we can move away from oil and build nuclear power plants, the faster funding sources for terrorism will dry up. From today's Wall Street Journal. Great article on the pros (and cons) of nuclear power

One final point about security: One of the biggest dangers to our security is from oil nations providing support to anti-U.S. terrorist groups. The faster we can move away from carbon-based energy, the faster we take away that funding source. Nuclear energy offers the fastest and most direct path to that safer future.

When will clarity rise through the mud?

2008-02-08T06:34:00.000-05:00

Life is a machine. It takes energy to run it. The living cells in plants synthesize chemicals from sunlight. We eat plants, and a few animals. Only nuclear power draws energy from a power source that life does not build upon. Of course growing plants for fuel (biofuels) impacts the environment, and in a way that non-scientist promoters fail to understand. Today's New York Times reports again on how energy choices impact the environment. It's called entropy for those who have studied thermodynamics.

The benefits of biofuels have come under increasing attack in recent months, as scientists took a closer look at the global environmental cost of their production. These latest studies, published in the prestigious journal Science, are likely to add to the controversy.

These studies for the first time take a detailed, comprehensive look at the emissions effects of the huge amount of natural land that is being converted to cropland globally to support biofuels development.

When will we wake up, get educated (or listen to those who are), and conclude as a society that nuclear power can displace the use of chemical fuels (fossil or bio) and liberate our planet from the burden that chemical fuels demand?

Nuclear Power delivers low cost, 24 hours a day

2008-02-06T19:58:00.000-05:00

In the no news is good news category, US nuclear power plants are running at a record capacity of 91.8%. In other words, they keep on ticking no matter the time of day or year. The article goes on to state that the average production cost of power was 1.68 cents per kilowatt hour. Now I wonder what the best solar power plants can do (of course only when the sun is shining, so at night you'll still be able to turn on the lights in your home, whereas the solar power systems won't be producing anything. So at best solar has a capacity factor of 50%, far less than +90% for nuclear. Now where are those solar power cost numbers, oh yes, here they are: Solarbuzz.com says 30 cents per/kwh, and they go on to say that is 2 to 3 times the average RESIDENTIAL bill. What they don't say is that it is 18 times the cost of nuclear power. I really don't want my electric bill to go up by almost 20 times, and of course there won't be any electricity at night from solar power.

U.S. nuclear power plants posted all-time record highs in electricity production and efficiency in 2007, according to preliminary figures released today by the Nuclear Energy Institute. U.S. nuclear plants generated approximately 807 billion kilowatt-hours (kwh) of electricity last year, exceeding by more than two percent the previous record-high of 788.5 billion kwh of electricity set in 2004.

The wikipedia entry on economics of nuclear power plants, claims that new nuclear power plan construction will cost $1,984 per kWe. So thats $2/watt, but that watt flows continuously while solar does not. Nanosolar claims $1/watt is that cost of coal, and they will match that. Is that in direct sunlight at noon? Do you have to track the sun? What do you do at night? Who dusts the collector panels?

Patrick Moore on Nuclear Power

2008-01-31T16:57:00.001-05:00

A great interview on CNET News.com. Patrick Moore is the founder of Greenpeace (what a name! ranks right up there with calling the world's biggest frozen island, Greenland). Patrick has some quite quotable answers in the Q&A on CNET. My favorite is his take on solar power:

Solar photovoltaic simply has no place on the grid. All the money that's going into subsiding solar is a waste of money because it could be being used on more effective technologies that we already have that are not unreliable and intermittent. The $3.2 billion that California is subsidizing in solar would build a 1,000-MW nuclear plant and provide 10 times as much power into the system and on a reliable basis.

Wow! so to equal a nuclear power plant, California taxpayers would have to spend $32 billion. Maybe that will get their attention. Also he notes that we have 1000 years of power available from existing mined uranium that is currently in the U.S. reactors. Not sure if he is multiplying 100 power plants by 1000 years. I think we should have 1000 nuclear power plants in the U.S. so that we can completely eliminate coal and save the 6,000 people per year he quotes. I think most of these coal miners are in China, but having spent a few months in Hong Kong, I can tell you those chinese people would really welcome some blue skies!

Biodiesel vs Food

2008-01-19T15:07:00.000-05:00

Interesting article in the New York Times today on fuel oil vs food oil. Basic economics. If one devotes cropland for growing biodiesel, food crops will be more scarce and prices for food will rise. Nuclear power does not divert resources (land, fertilizer, etc.) to produce energy. The best thing we can do for the world's poor is build nuclear power plants on a scale that lowers the per kilowatt cost way below that for fossil fuels.

If only science writers knew the three laws of thermodynamics, and basic economics. Then no one would be surprised by rising food prices in an era of expensive oil and crops being diverted for fuel!

Productive Climate Discourse

2008-01-14T06:25:00.000-05:00

Yeah! Finally. A focus on what to do, big thoughts, not stuck in the mud details.

A great summary by Andrew Revkin at the New York Times. Please stop by his blog page and add your thoughts on how nuclear power can be a positive force for global change! Andrew lists a number of actions to take, and this one focuses on the renewable option for energy. If only he had listed nuclear as one the options that does not come with significant environmental or security risks or social costs!

Finding renewable sources of energy that are cheap and do not come with significant environmental or security risks or social costs is a good thing, particularly in a world adding roughly 80 million people a year, and where two billion people today only have firewood or dried dung as an energy choice.

The Great Global Warming Swindle

2007-04-08T04:58:00.000-05:00

Channel 4 News and the BBC in Britain have published a fantastic video about what really drives climate change, our role, and a lesson in how to have a proper debate about scientific issues.

I highly recommend this to all. Please watch before engaging again in the debate on global warming.

Also take a look at the summary on the Gliving.TV web site

and at The Great Global Warming Swindle"On the Channel 4 Website

Thorium Reactors - A New Type of Nuclear Reactor

2006-07-12T14:30:00.000-05:00

Hmmmm.. Thorium. Sounds Buck Rogersish. Now how do we get this going in the U.S.?

Being a more ‘gentle’ material, thorium also leaves less waste than conventional uranium based reactors whose half-life is tens of thousands of years. Thorium reactor waste has a half-life of a mere 500 years, much less dangerous and much much simpler to store. To sweeten things even further, thorium reactors actually incinerate other nuclear waste, solving the problem of the growing stocks of current nuclear waste.

Boy, I'd love to make this a reality. Maybe the next Presidential election will provide the political will to get serious about creating energy choices other than despotic oil.

Hitcahi and GE to build new nuclear plant in the US

2006-06-28T16:11:00.000-05:00

Well, this is welcome news. If we can get ten more announcements like this, we might be on to something.

China, Coal, and our Lungs

2006-06-10T11:23:00.000-05:00

And if you really need a kick in the pants to understand why the world need nuclear power read the article in the New York Times titled "Clouds From Chinese Coal Cast a Long Shadow"

A snippet:

Unless China finds a way to clean up its coal plants and the thousands of factories that burn coal, pollution will soar both at home and abroad. The increase in global-warming gases from China's coal use will probably exceed that for all industrialized countries combined over the next 25 years, surpassing by five times the reduction in such emissions that the Kyoto Protocol seeks

Nuclear Power works, Politics is the probelm

2006-06-10T10:19:00.000-05:00

Thorium fueled power stations, a little discussed concept, can provide energy for manking for the next 6,000 years. No air pollution. No coal miners dieing. No global warming. And no rich oil shieks.

The fuel is abundant in Australia, India, the United States, and Canada. Hmmmm these are all democracies! What a concept. The defining characteristic of the last century was the industrial use of oil, coal, and hydropower to lift millions out of poverty worlwide. We can build the future we all desire but it requires an investment in technical solutions such as Thorium reactors, not calls for impossible changes in fundamental human behaivor. Conservation of energy is the antithesis to growth and lifting our fellow citizens out of poverty. Only reductions in the cost of power generation can deliver wide spread wealth for all.

Our calculations shows that the known thorium reserves of Australia are sufficient for clean nuclear energy production for six thousand years at a rate equivalent of two million barrels of oil per day,' said Dr Hashemi-Nezhad.

France leads the way in new nuclear power plant construction

2006-03-26T13:46:00.000-05:00

And now, something nice to say about the French...

Great Summary of Global Warming Issues

2006-03-25T10:21:00.000-05:00

Scientific American has presented a wonderful summary of arguments around global warming. Everything form we don't know enough to predict the future to even if its true, it will be a good thing.

Highly suggested reading for those who wish to debate based upon fact not hysteria on this topical issue. My personal take is that life will go on, no matter what the future climate is, and we just need to be flexible. Stop worrying so much. Besides, in my personal micro-climate at home, I keep moving that thermostat up not down. If the Earth had a thermostat, which direction would you push it?

Reduce CO2? Build more nuclear power plants!

2006-03-23T21:12:00.000-05:00

So, now the scientists are saying we need to "Substantially reduce emissions of greenhouse gases". OK, but how? How about build power plants on a massive scale that emit no CO2? We could replace all the coal plants, all the natural gas plants, generate electricity for plug-in hybrids, if we built nuclear power plants again. We need to do it before it is too late!

The teams say their studies provide the first hints that during the last interglacial period, ice sheets in both hemispheres worked together to raise sea levels, rather than the Northern Hemisphere's ice alone. This raises concerns that Antarctic melting might be more severe this time, because additional melt mechanisms may be at work.

"It sounds bad," acknowledges Jonathan Overpeck, a University of Arizona researcher who led one of the two studies. He notes that rising temperatures are approaching a threshold. But "we know about it far enough in advance to avoid crossing it." The challenge, he and others say, is to take advantage of the remaining window by reducing emissions of greenhouse gases substantially.

What to do with nuclear waste?

2006-03-17T15:35:00.000-05:00

Burn it!

In a transmutator. :-)

The link above provides a nice summary and list of how to get rid of the long lived isotopes in nuclear waste so that it becomes far easier to deal with the waste. A nice part is that some of these solutions actually generate more electricity than they consume!

Medievel European Farmers and Climate Change

2006-02-27T13:07:00.000-05:00

It streteches the believable that farmers in Europe had a global impact on climate. Just because tree pollen and carbon dioxide fluctations are correlated does not even come close to creating a causal link. Ice cream sales and drownings are both correlated, but we don't outlaw ice cream sales. And oh, I believe ice cream sales and drownings both go up during the summer.

Back to climate change, the reality of the Little Ice Age is that the Earth's climate is variable. Humans in Europe did not change the global climate despite the following:

"Between AD 1200 to 1300, we see a decrease in stomata and a sharp rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide, due to deforestation we think," says Dr van Hoof, whose findings are published in the journal Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology.

But after AD 1350, the team found the pattern reversed, suggesting that atmospheric carbon dioxide fell, perhaps due to reforestation following the plague.

The researchers think that this drop in carbon dioxide levels could help to explain a cooling in the climate over the following centuries.

Ocean damper

From around 1500, Europe appears to have been gripped by a chill lasting some 300 years.

There are many theories as to what caused these bitter years, but popular ideas include a decrease in solar activity, an increase in volcanic activity or a change in ocean circulation.

No civilian nuclear program can explain the Iranian nuclear program

2006-02-16T09:11:00.000-05:00

Wow! Even the French are turning to American style, blunt diplomacy. Calling a spade a spade.

France's foreign minister said Thursday that Iran's nuclear program was a cover for clandestine military activity, in an unusually direct attack on Tehran for a European diplomat.

So the question is, will Iran fold?. If it won't, will the West force the issue and disarm Iran?

Awesome! Senator Lugar

2006-02-13T07:56:00.000-05:00

I just had to add this. What a nice summary of the true costs of reliance on oil. From the Letters to the editors of the Wall Street Journal:

When Peter Huber wrote, "The question . . . whether corn and wood will ever be as cheap and easy starting points as fossils . . ." he repeated a common fallacy. Oil is neither cheap nor easy. The price of gasoline does not reflect its true cost. Properly calculated, fossil fuels are far more expensive than they appear. At least three externalities must be added to gasoline's current $2.50-a-gallon price. The first is the military expenditures we pay to safeguard the Mideast oil fields. There is a wide range of estimates: one of the lower ones, by the conservative National Defense Council Foundation, puts the figure at $50 billion a year (not counting one-time expenses like wars).

The second external expense, far harder to calculate, is the damage to our national interests and our security by petro-states made rich by the world's overreliance on petroleum. Iraq was one such troublemaker, causing two costly wars. Iran and Venezuela are just two of several governments engaging in anti-American behavior that is enabled by the more than $24 billion we paid for imported oil in November alone. The third externality is the pollution and greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels.

This fully accounted real cost of oil is already much higher than that of home-grown cellulosic ethanol, which will soon be commercially competitive with $2.50 gas. Unlike oil or natural gas, it is renewable, burns cleanly and makes virtually no net contribution to global warming. Switching to an ethanol-based transportation system, by adapting new cars to run on an ethanol-gasoline blend with inexpensive, off-the-shelf flexible fuel technology and piggy-backing on the existing gas station network, would be good policy and a great bargain for consumers.

Sen. Richard G. Lugar (R., Ind.)
Chairman
Senate Foreign Relations Committee
Washington

Melting Arctic Ice

2006-02-07T15:40:00.000-05:00

Someone needs to tell Dan at the Associated Press that when floating ice (e.g. the arctic ice cap) melts, it can't possible cause the ocean to rise. Ice that is on the land (e.g. Greenland, and Antarctica) needs to melt to cause the oceans to rise. So far the evidence shows that Greenland and Antarctica are gaining ice mass, not losing it.

Scientists Warn of Melting Ice in Arctic
By DAN JOLING, Associated Press Writer Mon Feb 6, 10:49 PM ET
ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Scientists on Monday painted a gloomy picture of the effects of global warming on the Arctic, warning of melting ocean ice, rising oceans, thawed permafrost and forests susceptible to bugs and fire.

America warms up to nuclear power

2006-02-06T07:59:00.000-05:00

OK. I am an admitted number jumkie. But sometimes, numbers are clearcut, without political agendas of their own. U.S. Coal alone produces 10% of the entire world's greenhouse gasses. To wit:

To Patrick Moore, who cofounded Greenpeace, nuclear power is the only realistic solution to future power needs.

"You can't solve this problem with windmills and photo panels alone," says the chairman of Greenspirit Strategies Ltd., a Vancouver, B.C., environmental consulting firm. These two power sources tend to be expensive. More important, they are "intermittent." They work only when the wind blows or the sun shines. Economies need "baseload" power that operates all the time.

Coal can provide an around-the-clock power stream. But the 1,300 coal-fired plants in the US already belch out 10 percent of the world's greenhouse gases. Do we want more climate-changing gas?

Now, I am not yet convinced on whether we want or don't want more climate-changing gas, but I know that I don't want to burn coal, have coal miners die, and pollute the atmosphere. I like to breathe clean air, and drink clean water. And I want the same for my kids.

Go nukes!

Exxon Valdez and the Seabulk Pride

2006-02-05T12:37:00.000-05:00

The untold story of the Seabulk Pride running aground in Alaska this week is that it did not create a crude oil spill like the Exxon Valdez. Why? Because the Seabulk Pride is a double hulled ship unlike the Valdez which was single hulled. Take a look at Seabulk Tankers and you'll see a DH next to the Seabulk Pride's listing. DH means Double Hulled and more than twice as safe for the environment. In the mid 1990s double hulled ships became a requirement. Here's a case where the regulation actually worked. Too bad the reporters aren't telling us.

from the Seabulk International website:

Seabulk International owns five new double-hull petroleum and chemical tankers. With their double hull construction, state-of-the-art electronics and safety systems, and skilled crews, the new tankers provide the safest form of waterborne transportation in U.S. waters. Under the terms of the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 (OPA 90), all single-hull vessels must be phased out of the domestic Jones Act trade by 2015. Because of their double-hull construction, the new vessels have no retirement date under OPA 90.

Removing Mountaintops for Energy

2006-02-05T12:31:00.000-05:00

This editorial in the New York Times about removing mountaintops to get at the coal is enough to make me wish that all of our electrical power was from nuclear power plants. This is just way too sad.

It takes just a dozen guys with giant D-9 bulldozers about a year to wreck a mountain. They dynamite it, then shove the shattered vegetation and topsoil (called spoil or overburden) down into the valleys, followed by chunks of bedrock.

Everything in this horrific pile dies. Even the streams are buried. Every rain is a flood. Slurry ponds spill black sludge. People living near mine sites hear the cacophony of dynamite, dozers and coal trucks 24-7. Their houses flood and crack. Their children come home from school sick, covered with coal dust. The well water is black.

Nuclear Power Reduces Greenhouse Gasses

2006-01-29T09:49:00.000-05:00

The Kyoto protocol calls for an 8% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. Interestingly this is exactly the amount of greenhouse gas reduction that nuclear power already accounts for.

Nuclear energy also offers an alleviation of the global carbon dioxide (CO2) problem that the world can do without. About 1,600 million tons of CO2 annual emissions would have resulted if 16 percent of the world's electricity now generated by nuclear power were to have been generated using coal. This is a significant amount. In fact, it is 8 percent of CO2 now emitted annually from the burning of fossil fuels.

I'd support an international treaty for greenhouse emission reduction if it called for a meaningful reduction (e.g. 90%) and the means for achieving this, nuclear power, were explicitly agreed upon. To call for reductions without agreeing on a path to get there is just whistling in the wind.

Plugin Hybrids

2006-01-25T07:43:00.000-05:00

Today's Wall Street Journal has a great page one story on electric gasoline hybrids that plug in at night to your house power to recharge the batteries. 100 miles per gallon! 70 cents per gallon equivalent on electricity. 90% of power from your house electricity.

It is the last two numbers that gets me excited. Who wouldn't want to pay 70 cents per gallon? And who wouldn't want to rely on U.S. power rather than foreign oil for our transportation needs. Go Dr. Frank.... a quote from the article. I hope you have access to the Wall Street Journal to read more.

Dr. Frank estimates that if drivers regularly recharge their batteries at home, plug-ins may get well over 100 miles per gallon. By comparison, conventional hybrids must rely on gasoline-powered engines to recharge their batteries and get between 40 and 60 mpg.

While running on electricity, the plug-in's fuel cost drops to 70 cents a gallon, or lower, Dr. Frank estimates.

Energy Politics Will Do Us In Yet

2006-01-24T09:51:00.000-05:00

Great editorial in the Wall Street Journal by Goerge Melloan on energy policy today. Draws the connection between the lack of investment in oil, gas, and nuclear power and the emerging nuclear turmoil in Iran. If you've got a subscription to the Wall Street Journal, take a look. Here's the best quote:

One of the present-day ironies is that the same groups that stopped nuclear-power development years ago are suddenly warming to the atom. Those same seven Northeastern states that are trying to put caps on carbon-dioxide emissions have placed nuclear power in the same category as renewable sources of energy, acknowledging that nukes don't give off "greenhouse gases." The Progressive Policy Initiative, a Democrat think tank, has said nukes should be part of a clean air energy strategy for the U.S. Greenpeace founder Patrick Moore has signed on.

This easing of opposition to nuclear power enabled George Bush to win an energy bill last year that, for all its faults, opens the door for renewed construction of nuclear plants in the U.S. He predicted that the U.S. would start building such plants again before the end of the decade.

Other countries have the same idea. Eight new atomic power plants were completed last year, including three in Japan, and 24 are under construction. At the end of last year, there were 443 in operation world-wide, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency, and a hundred or so are on the drawing boards in places like China and India that are short on hydrocarbon fuels. Practically every nuclear plant in the U.S., which gets 20% of its power from nukes, has been or is being recommissioned to keep operating for another 20 years.

Understanding Petroleum

2006-01-23T20:44:00.000-05:00

Here's an article from the era of $15 per barrel oil, not $70. The interesting part of the article is when it speaks of the alternative to fossil fuels:

Second: In the near term, alternative energy (e.g., solar and wind) can't compete with fossil fuels. The Energy Information Agency predicts that by 2020 all renewables will account for less than 4 percent of U.S. energy supply. In 1999 they contributed 3.37 percent. Toward the end of the century they are likely to be significant. But for the next few decades, almost all new energy demand will be met by fossil fuels or nuclear power.

Note the last sentence. Our choice is between fossil fuels or nuclear power. Hmmmm... Polluting fossil fuels, coal which relies on dangerous mining or green nuclear power. No air pollution. No green house gasses.

Vote Nuclear Power!

Safe Nuclear Power and Green Hydrogen Fuel

2006-01-22T12:14:00.000-05:00

This article, while somewhat technical, makes a good case that nuclear power is the only available option we have to generate power without impacting the environment (Global warming, etc.).

The article quotes James Lovelock, a well known green activist and creator of the Gaia hypothesis that Earth is a single self-regulating organism. Mr. Lovelock published a plea to phase out fossil fuels. Nuclear power, he argued, is the best short term hope for averting climatic catastrophe:

"Opposition to nuclear energy is based on irrational fear fed by Hollywood-style fiction, the Green lobbies, and the media. … Even if they were right about its dangers - and they are not - its worldwide use as our main source of energy would pose an insignificant threat compared with the dangers of intolerable and lethal heat waves and sea levels rising to drown every coastal city of the world. We have no time to experiment with visionary energy sources; civilization is in imminent danger and has to use nuclear, the one safe, available energy source, now, or suffer the pain soon to be inflicted by our outraged planet." - From the London Independent – May, 2004

Take a look...

Friedman: The New 'Sputnik' Challenges: They All Run on Oil

2006-01-20T12:52:00.000-05:00

Well, Thomas Friedman is trying to keep the spotlight on oil and the problems it causes. He calls for a tax to keep the price of gasoline at the pump from falling too much. His quote:

The one thing we can do now to cope with all four of these trends is to create a tax that fixes the pump price at $3.50 to $4 a gallon - no matter where the OPEC price goes. Because if consumers know that the price of oil is never coming down, they will change their behavior. And when consumers change their behavior in a big way, G.M., Ford and DaimlerChrysler will change their cars in a big way, and it is cars and trucks that consume a vast majority of the world's oil.

The more Detroit goes green, the faster it will be propelled down the innovation curve, making it more likely that Detroit - and not Toyota or Honda or the Chinese - will dominate the green technologies of the 21st century. A permanent gasoline tax will also make solar, wind and biofuels so competitive with oil that it will drive their innovations as well.

I agree with his logic for his stated reasons, plus one important other factor he fails to mention. External costs.

External costs are the additional price we pay for something, just not at the time we intially buy it. We pay for gas at the pump, and then we pay again when we have to secure our oil in the Middle East (see Iraq and Afghanistan war costs). It is useful to price gasoline at the pump so that the external costs are included - a tax. Then these funds can be used ot pay for the wars to secure the oil. Alternatively, if a nuclear power plan can produce hydrogen to feed fuel cell cars, all with no air pollution, and at a cheaper price than oil, we win. Friedman's right on pricing the true costs of oil at the pump. He just oversells his case when he says the answer is solar, wind, and biofuels. Let the brilliant engergy engineers bring new fuels to market, but level the playing field by putting a war tax on gasoline at the pump.

New York Times gets the problem right, solution wrong

2006-01-15T12:37:00.000-05:00

My recommendation today is to read the referenced editorial in the New York Times. The editors are completely right. Their concluding paragraph is

America cannot win President Bush's much-vaunted war on terrorism as long as it is sending billions of dollars abroad for oil purchases every day. It cannot establish democracy in the Middle East because governments rich in oil revenue do not want democracy. And it will never have the geopolitical leverage it needs as long as it is dependent on unstable foreign sources for fuel.

This paragraph summarizes the challenge we face succintly. The rest of the editorial trots out tired solutions for energy like more efficient vehicles and biolfuels. Get serious folks. Efficiency is only an input into the calculation of how much it will cost to make your car go farther. Efficiency, by itself, says nothing about the underlying cost of the fuel, whether it be oil, biodiesel, hydrogen, or cow flatulence.

This country has one of the largest reserves of Thorium of any country. The other leading proven reserves are Australia, Canada, India, and Norway. Not listed are Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Russia, or Venezuela. How great it would be if we used Thorium for our energy supply. Now, what the heck is Thorium? It is one of the most abundant nuclear fuel sources (three times more abundant than Uranium, and it can not be used to make nuclear weapons. What a deal. Learn more about Thorium by clicking on this sentence.

The anti-nuclear weapon proliferation technology

2006-01-14T20:00:00.000-05:00

I've been thinking about this one for a long time, but now I've become convinced this is the only path to follow.

Iran, using its cash from $60 per barrel oil, is developing nuclear weapons. The Europeans have been trying to use economic incentives to get Iran to stop its nuclear weapon program. Europe's approach has failed because Europe and the U.S. are economically dependent on oil. Even at $60/barrel.

If we really wish to be in a position of saying NO to those who would build and use nuclear weapons, then we must develop our own nulcear power plants and become independent of middle eastern oil.

There is no other option.

New York Times Perpetuates Myth of Sea Level Rise

2006-01-09T07:35:00.000-05:00

The New York Times has a pretty piece by Nicholas Kristoff in the Maldives subtitled " Nicholas Kristof visits the first country that might disappear as the oceans rise." Note the use of the word 'might' but no recogniition that the oceans might not rise. I did a quick Google search on search terms 'maldives' and 'sea level rise' and found the following well written piece on the UK Parliament website:

FACTS AND FICTION ABOUT SEA LEVEL CHANGE...

Great summary of actual evidence for sea level change. Basically the evidence, including from an American research satellite called TOPEX/POSEIDON shows that the sea is NOT rising. I wish Mr. Kristoff would be a bit more balanced in his reporting. At least he does acknowledge that nuclear power produces no carbon dioxide.

Note: the link to the UK House of Parliment doesn't work for some reason. You can also find this by goggling "Maldives sea level rise Parliament"

Petrolism

2006-01-07T21:32:00.000-05:00

Thomas Friedman has coined an interesting term. Petrolism. I like it. I think when historians look back at the first fifty years of the 21st century, petrolism will be the defining term. Here's Friedman's definition:

"Petrolism is ... the corrupting, antidemocratic governing practices - in oil states from Russia to Nigeria and Iran - that result from a long run of $60-a-barrel oil. Petrolism is the politics of using oil income to buy off one's citizens with subsidies and government jobs, using oil and gas exports to intimidate or buy off one's enemies, and using oil profits to build up one's internal security forces and army to keep oneself ensconced in power, without any transparency or checks and balances.

Nuclear power is going to be the counterblancing force. China knows it. It is why they are building 30 new nuclear power plants (for comparison the United States has 110 operating nuclear power plants).

Wake up America. Let's secure our future, build new nuclear power plants, and tell the petrol countries to shove it.

Europe warms to nuclear power

2006-01-07T21:25:00.000-05:00

Yippee! The Christian Science Monitor is reporting on the emerging debate on nuclear power in Europe. While the recent turmoil in Russian natural gas supplies have hilighted the need to have a rational debate on nuclear power, the really exciting part of the article is the interplay between the Green's committment to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, and the fact that nuclear power emits zero carbon dioxide.

Five years ago, who would have thought that nuclear power is green?

High Oil Prices Coupled to Nuclear Weapons Development

2006-01-04T06:40:00.000-05:00

Thomas Friedman writes in the New York Times today that $60 per barrel oil is financing Iran's nuclear weapons program. How ironic, we stopped building new nuclear power plans in the 1980s in part out of fear that the expanded use of nuclear power would lead the general availability of plutonium for nuclear weapons production. Now we're more dependent upon imported oil than ever and countries such as Iran are using OUR money to build nuclear weapons production capability. Libya was doing it up until the end of 2002, but Quadaffi decided he didin't want to end up like Saddam so he fessed up.

Finland Turns to Nuclear Power Just in Time

2006-01-03T08:09:00.000-05:00

The first new nuclear power plant in Europe is under construction in Finland. While the news is old it is relevant today because the New York Times is reporting that Russia is bullying Ukraine and the rest of Europe over supplies of its natural gas, which is used in Europe for electricity production. The website describing the project underway takes specific note that Russian natural gas was the altenative to building this new nuclear plant. I bet the Finns are happy they choose nuclear back in 2002!

Nuclear expansion

In May 2002 Finland's parliament voted 107-92 to approve building a fifth nuclear power plant, to be in operation about 2009. There was intense debate leading up to the decision. The vote is seen as very significant in that it is the first such decision to build a new nuclear power plant in Western Europe for more than a decade.

After considering an application made in November 2000 by Finnish utility TVO, the government in January 2002 approved it. Parliament had rejected a similar proposal in 1993, but the political climate throughout Europe had since become much more favourable to nuclear energy.

Record-tying storm goes for a spin in Atlantic

2005-12-31T13:03:00.000-05:00

OK, now the Pensacola News Journal writers are at it. They have some local in Florida to blame the formation of Tropical Storm Zeta on Global Warming. Amazing. I wonder what Chris Driscoll's qualifications are to draw such a conclusion.

Good climate research articles

2005-12-31T10:02:00.000-05:00

A tip of the hat to geosciblog! Nice articles.

New York Times Says Antarctica is Warming When it is Cooling!

2005-12-31T07:57:00.000-05:00

"Antarctica, Warming, Looks Ever More Vulnerable"
By LARRY ROHTER (New York Times)
Published: January 25, 2005

OK. The New York Times is generally a well written paper with great editing, but they blew it on this one.

The headline is quite clear. And presumably the headline was written by an editor, not Larry Rohter. The problem with the headline is, it is QUITE WRONG! The article itself has the hints that the headline is wrong. To wit, the following is a caption from the illustration which showed the extent of the cooling across Antarctica:

"Although most of Antarctica has experienced cooling in the last 20 years, satellite data show warming along the coasts, which is believed to be weakening and thinning the ice."

Since I can't republish the article (and unfortunately you have to either be a subscriber to TimesSelect or purchase the article, my words will have to suffice. The illustration that was published above this caption showed a colored temperature change of the entire Antarctic continent over the past 20 years. I'd guess that something north of 95%, maybe as high as 99% of Antarctica had cooled. Only the small tip of the western peninsula that juts out into WARMER waters had experienced warming.

Sorry, but when the data in the research shows that vast majority of a continent cooling, a headline that says it is warming is absolutely outrageous. Even worse, when I pointed this out to the New York Times they refused to correct it. Fortunately, they had the courtesy to respond, and you can judge their response for yourself. For all of you interested in how ingrained the global warming ideology is in the liberal press, read on.

From: David Corcoran
Date: February 1, 2005 1:42:44 PM EST
To: Matt Schor
Cc: bovino@nytimes.com
Subject: Fwd: 1/25 Reader Concern re: Antarctica, Warming, Looks Ever More Vulnerable

Thanks for your letter, which the public editor's office passed along to me.

I'm afraid I have to disagree with your characterization of our headline. In context, it clearly refers to the shrinking ice in West Antarctica, where temperatures are indeed warming. That is what has scientists alarmed, and it is the subject of the article -- which does note, as you do, that temperatures elsewhere on the continent are cooling (though not as markedly).

I do appreciate your writing and keeping us on our toes.

David Corcoran
Assistant Science Editor
New York Times
(212) 556-1826

Date: Tue, 25 Jan 2005 23:31:36 -0500
To: public@nytimes.com
From: Matthew Schor (by way of Public )
Subject: Inaccurate Global Warming Reported

Dear Sir,

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/25/science/earth/25ice.html

I am amazed that a reputable paper such as the New York Times can publish an inaccurate and misleading article as "Antarctica, Warming, Looks Ever More Vulnerable" in the January 25, 2005 edition of the Science Times. The fact of the matter is that Antarctica has been cooling for decades, not warming. In fact THE VERY ARTICLE ITSELF explains this in the caption on the accompanying graphic titled "Glaciers in Retreat". The subtitle to the graphic (on the right) says "...And Rising Temperatures" and then in the VERY NEXT SENTENCE says "although most of Antarctica has experienced cooling in the last twenty years..." The map immediately below the caption shows VERY LARGE areas of Antarctica colored white - indicating that the continent has been cooling. Only a small area, colored dark, off the west coast of Antarctica has warmed.

The fact is that all of the data collected on Antarctica shows a cooling trend for the past twenty to thirty years. 98% (i.e. "most") of Antarctica has been cooling. A very small slice on the west coast of Antarctica is exposed to warm ocean waters which is causing local glaciers to melt.

I do not understand how the New York Times can allow an editor to headline an article "Antarctica, Warming..." when the reality is the exact opposite.

I hope that you will publish a correction to this error.

Matthew Schor

OK, so now that you've read this far, dear blog reader, what do you think? The New York Times stated to me that "In context, it [the headline] clearly refers to the shrinking ice in West Antarctica, where temperatures are indeed warming". The headline does no such thing. It doesn't say "West Antarctica is Warming" it says "Antarctica is Warming". Antarctica's size is 13,200,000 km² (for comparison Australia's size is 7,700,000 km² - Antarctica is pretty darn big). To conflate the warming of a tiny peninsula to an entire continent is ludicrous. The editors at the New York Times need to take a science refresher course.

Scientific American editor displays anti-nuclear power bias

2005-12-30T17:36:00.000-05:00

I found the explanation on how the editorial process at Scientific American quite illuminating in the referenced blog entry. John Rennie's comment seems quite political rather than scientific. Here's the comment:

"Many months ago, when Hannum et al. proposed their article to Scientific American, the other editors and I debated whether to invite it. Was it realistic to suggest that a new nuclear fission technology might contribute significantly to the world's energy future when the technical and economic forces freighted against it seemed so daunting? Might this not be just another in a long series of attempts by nuclear power enthusiasts to draw attention to their favorite technology? The argument that eventually prevailed was that, for better or worse, these fast-neutron reactors and electrorefining ideas did seem to be getting taken seriously by some physicists and policymakers, and as such, it was worth making sure that our readers were fully aware of them."

Nuclear energy is a power source that, like others, has its advantages and disadvantages. Frankly I am surprised by the comment "...the technical and economic forces freighted against it seemed so daunting." The technical forces are what we make of them and our willingness to solve them. The technical challenge of generating energy needed for modern civilization while minimizing our impact on the environment is just as great, if not greater, for fossil based energy, hydro, or solar as it is for nuclear.

The economic forces are what we make of them as well. Fossil fuels are priced without regard to the economic impact of external factors such as securing oil fields in the Middle East, Russia, and Nigeria, or the cost to society of the pollution generated by the burning of fossil fuels. If we priced fossil fuels in the same way the nuclear fuel is priced, one might be surprised at the outcome.