Time for Nuclear Power… again?

Ars Technica has a nice discussion about nuclear power discussions that took place at the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Chicago.  The short of it is that several prominate scientists are arguing that nuclear power has a place in our future power needs.  Coming from a coal state, I’ve often wondered about which is the lesser of two evils – nuclear power or coal energy.  I’m certain strong and informed opinions can be made both in the pro and con column for each technology.  What I believe this strongly underscores is the notion that we will most likely use a mix of technologies to power ourselves in the future.


One Reply to “Time for Nuclear Power… again?”

  1. Edward Sullivan

    Many moons ago, I worked for (in the capacity of a technical research library’s information specialist) this fella:

    vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv
    Roy Greenlee was born near Charleston, WV where the technology of the “chemical valley” influenced his decision to pursue a chemistry profession. After preliminary studies at Kanawha and Morris Harvey colleges, and a year as a DuPont analyst, he graduated from Ohio State and spent 2 years as a Graduate Research Fellow there before being recommended (Dec. 1943) to and accepted by Dr. Seaborg for work at the Met Lab. At the Met Lab, he worked primarily on plutonium separation and was credited with being the first to establish the half-life of Pu-240. A few months later, Roy put on his engineer uniform and worked at Oak Ridge redesigning the columns for the liquid thermal separation of U-235.
    ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

    Roy Greenlee wound up doing petroleum related research at the Petrolite/Tretolite research center in Maplewood, MO. When I asked him why he had decided to devote his Nuclear Whiz-Kid cred and mind to ‘old fuels’, he told me (nonclassified) stories about what steady neutron bombardment does to the molecular structures of every structural component of nuclear reactors, and why he concluded dealing with nuclear waste was an effectively insurmountable problem….

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