Thursday, February 28, 2008
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Global Warming Not So Warm
Temperature Monitors Report Widescale Global Cooling
Twelve-month long drop in world temperatures wipes out a century of warmingOver the past year, anecdotal evidence for a cooling planet has exploded. China has its coldest winter in 100 years. Baghdad sees its first snow in all recorded history. North America has the most snowcover in 50 years, with places like Wisconsin the highest since record-keeping began. Record levels of Antarctic sea ice, record cold in Minnesota, Texas, Florida, Mexico, Australia, Iran, Greece, South Africa, Greenland, Argentina, Chile -- the list goes on and on.
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Graph here [......]
Twelve-month long drop in world temperatures wipes out a century of warmingOver the past year, anecdotal evidence for a cooling planet has exploded. China has its coldest winter in 100 years. Baghdad sees its first snow in all recorded history. North America has the most snowcover in 50 years, with places like Wisconsin the highest since record-keeping began. Record levels of Antarctic sea ice, record cold in Minnesota, Texas, Florida, Mexico, Australia, Iran, Greece, South Africa, Greenland, Argentina, Chile -- the list goes on and on.
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Graph here [......]
Stifle the Debate Global Warming Climate Change
JOHN FUND ON THE TRAIL
Chilling Effect
Global warmists try to stifle debate.
February 25, 2008
John McCain, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton all promise bold action on climate change . All have endorsed a form of cap-and-trade system that would severely limit future carbon emissions. The Democratic Congress is champing at the bit to act. So too is the Climate Action Partnership, a coalition of companies led by General Electric and Duke Energy.
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Chilling Effect
Global warmists try to stifle debate.
February 25, 2008
John McCain, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton all promise bold action on climate change . All have endorsed a form of cap-and-trade system that would severely limit future carbon emissions. The Democratic Congress is champing at the bit to act. So too is the Climate Action Partnership, a coalition of companies led by General Electric and Duke Energy.
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Monday, February 25, 2008
The Fury of Climate Change Fanatics
Friday 22 February 2008
Alexander Cockburn
Intellectual blasphemyAlexander Cockburn tells spiked that when he dared to question the climate change consensus he was met by a tsunami of self-righteous fury.
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Alexander Cockburn
Intellectual blasphemyAlexander Cockburn tells spiked that when he dared to question the climate change consensus he was met by a tsunami of self-righteous fury.
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Sunday, February 24, 2008
Early Warning Radical Islam
'The warning lights are all blinking red'
Ian MacLeod, The Ottawa CitizenPublished: Saturday, February 23, 2008
Like pieces of a puzzle, their snapshots and mugshots fit together and take form; Ahmed Ressam, Mohammed Jabarah, Ahmed Khadr, Momin Khawaja, Mohamed Harkat and other faces of Canada's convicted and accused terrorists.
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Ian MacLeod, The Ottawa CitizenPublished: Saturday, February 23, 2008
Like pieces of a puzzle, their snapshots and mugshots fit together and take form; Ahmed Ressam, Mohammed Jabarah, Ahmed Khadr, Momin Khawaja, Mohamed Harkat and other faces of Canada's convicted and accused terrorists.
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Friday, February 22, 2008
Iran Nukes
Nuclear Agency Confronts Iran With Evidence on Weapons
By DAVID E. SANGER
Published: February 22, 2008
WASHINGTON — The International Atomic Energy Agency said Friday that it had confronted Iran for the first time with evidence supplied by the United States and other countries that strongly suggested the country had experimented with technology to make a nuclear weapon, but that Iranian officials dismissed the documents obtained from an Iranian scientist as “baseless and fabricated.”
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By DAVID E. SANGER
Published: February 22, 2008
WASHINGTON — The International Atomic Energy Agency said Friday that it had confronted Iran for the first time with evidence supplied by the United States and other countries that strongly suggested the country had experimented with technology to make a nuclear weapon, but that Iranian officials dismissed the documents obtained from an Iranian scientist as “baseless and fabricated.”
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Genetic Variation
Most Detailed Global Study Of Genetic Variation Completed
ScienceDaily (Feb. 21, 2008) — University of Michigan scientists and their colleagues at the National Institute on Aging have produced the largest and most detailed worldwide study of human genetic variation, a treasure trove offering new insights into early migrations out of Africa and across the globe.
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ScienceDaily (Feb. 21, 2008) — University of Michigan scientists and their colleagues at the National Institute on Aging have produced the largest and most detailed worldwide study of human genetic variation, a treasure trove offering new insights into early migrations out of Africa and across the globe.
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Free Speech
Haters against hate speech
By Ezra Levant on February 20, 2008 9:32 PM
Here is a letter in the Toronto Star from Ali Mallah of the Canadian Arab Federation, supporting human rights commissions and their arrogation of the powers of political censors. It's signed by the vice-president of the Canadian Arab Federation. Some excerpts:
...Genocides in Bosnia and Rwanda have served as painful reminders of the ramifications of hate speech and the need for effective laws to address it.
Furthermore, our hate-speech laws exist to protect the marginalized and multicultural communities of Canada... It was this provision that the Supreme Court of Canada cited in upholding the constitutionality of our hate-speech laws when they were challenged by Jim Keegstra, a schoolteacher charged for indoctrinating students with Jewish conspiracy theories.
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By Ezra Levant on February 20, 2008 9:32 PM
Here is a letter in the Toronto Star from Ali Mallah of the Canadian Arab Federation, supporting human rights commissions and their arrogation of the powers of political censors. It's signed by the vice-president of the Canadian Arab Federation. Some excerpts:
...Genocides in Bosnia and Rwanda have served as painful reminders of the ramifications of hate speech and the need for effective laws to address it.
Furthermore, our hate-speech laws exist to protect the marginalized and multicultural communities of Canada... It was this provision that the Supreme Court of Canada cited in upholding the constitutionality of our hate-speech laws when they were challenged by Jim Keegstra, a schoolteacher charged for indoctrinating students with Jewish conspiracy theories.
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Thursday, February 21, 2008
Climate Change
Last updated: 17:9 - February 20, 2008
Another cold snap forecast on February 26
Nhan Dan - Another cold snap has been forecast to hit the north on February 26, said the National Hydro-meteorological Centre.
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Another cold snap forecast on February 26
Nhan Dan - Another cold snap has been forecast to hit the north on February 26, said the National Hydro-meteorological Centre.
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ANCIENT BURIALS IN ARGYLL AND BUTE REVEAL FOREIGN LINKS IN PREHISTORIC SCOTLAND
By Richard Moss
19/02/2008
Recent analysis of 4,000-year-old pots recovered during an excavation of two graves at Upper Largie, near Kilmartin in Argyll and Bute, has provided exciting evidence linking prehistoric Scotland with the Netherlands.
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By Richard Moss
19/02/2008
Recent analysis of 4,000-year-old pots recovered during an excavation of two graves at Upper Largie, near Kilmartin in Argyll and Bute, has provided exciting evidence linking prehistoric Scotland with the Netherlands.
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Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Natural Selection
Human culture subject to natural selection, Stanford study shows
The process of natural selection can act on human culture as well as on genes, a new study finds.
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The process of natural selection can act on human culture as well as on genes, a new study finds.
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Being Offended
"I have four children, and I want them to grow up in a country with a WORKING first amendment." Frank Zappa
"It's too bad so many people are offended by things that were not meant to offend." Henry Bell
If your offended too bad. No one should go out of their way to offend someone but if they do.... too bad. All people should GROWUP.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me." This is the motto to live by.
Most people these days think that hearing offensive words or nasty name calling "naturally" hurts people. This type of thinking has caused huge amounts of unhappiness, and this type of thinking is quite erroneous.
"It's too bad so many people are offended by things that were not meant to offend." Henry Bell
If your offended too bad. No one should go out of their way to offend someone but if they do.... too bad. All people should GROWUP.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me." This is the motto to live by.
Most people these days think that hearing offensive words or nasty name calling "naturally" hurts people. This type of thinking has caused huge amounts of unhappiness, and this type of thinking is quite erroneous.
Assault = Radical Islam?
Human rights complainant attacked in her home
Pair used ruse to enter woman's house
Calgary HeraldPublished: Friday, February 15, 2008
Calgary police are investigating an assault on one of three women who recently launched a human rights complaint against a local Muslim leader.
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February 20, 2008
Starbucks mother flouted the law, say religious police in Saudi Arabia
Sonia Verma in Bahrain
A US businesswoman living in Saudi Arabia fears for her life after the religious police issued a rare statement defending her arrest this month for having coffee with a male colleague at a Starbucks coffee shop in Riyadh.
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Pair used ruse to enter woman's house
Calgary HeraldPublished: Friday, February 15, 2008
Calgary police are investigating an assault on one of three women who recently launched a human rights complaint against a local Muslim leader.
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February 20, 2008
Starbucks mother flouted the law, say religious police in Saudi Arabia
Sonia Verma in Bahrain
A US businesswoman living in Saudi Arabia fears for her life after the religious police issued a rare statement defending her arrest this month for having coffee with a male colleague at a Starbucks coffee shop in Riyadh.
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Friday, February 15, 2008
Free Speech
Free Speech and Radical Islam
By FLEMMING ROSE February 15, 2008; Page A14
At a lunch last year celebrating his 25th anniversary with Jyllands-Posten, Kurt Westergaard told an anecdote. During World War II Pablo Picasso met a German officer in southern France, and they got into a conversation. When the German officer figured out whom he was talking to he said:
"Oh, you are the one who created Guernica?" referring to the famous painting of the German bombing of a Basque town by that name in 1937.
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By FLEMMING ROSE February 15, 2008; Page A14
At a lunch last year celebrating his 25th anniversary with Jyllands-Posten, Kurt Westergaard told an anecdote. During World War II Pablo Picasso met a German officer in southern France, and they got into a conversation. When the German officer figured out whom he was talking to he said:
"Oh, you are the one who created Guernica?" referring to the famous painting of the German bombing of a Basque town by that name in 1937.
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Thursday, February 14, 2008
Climate Change Again
Baliunas Says Global Warming Related To Sun
In her lecture series, "Warming Up to the Truth: The Real Story About Climate Change," astrophysicist Dr. Sallie Baliunas shared her findings Tuesday at the University of Texas at Tyler R. Don Cowan Fine and Performing Arts Center.
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In her lecture series, "Warming Up to the Truth: The Real Story About Climate Change," astrophysicist Dr. Sallie Baliunas shared her findings Tuesday at the University of Texas at Tyler R. Don Cowan Fine and Performing Arts Center.
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Climate Change
Falsification of the Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within the Frame of Physics
By OnTheWeb Tuesday, February 12, 2008
It is my sincere wish that climate alarmism has finally hit the buffers with the definitive and scientific deathknell administered by two German physicists, Dr. Gerhard Gerlich, of the Institute of Mathematical Physics at the Technical University Carolo-Wilhelmina in Braunschweig and Dr. Ralf D. Tscheuschner, co-author of a July 7, 2007 paper titled “Falsification of the Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within the Frame of Physics”.
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By OnTheWeb Tuesday, February 12, 2008
It is my sincere wish that climate alarmism has finally hit the buffers with the definitive and scientific deathknell administered by two German physicists, Dr. Gerhard Gerlich, of the Institute of Mathematical Physics at the Technical University Carolo-Wilhelmina in Braunschweig and Dr. Ralf D. Tscheuschner, co-author of a July 7, 2007 paper titled “Falsification of the Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within the Frame of Physics”.
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Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Climate Change - What is the Point?
China's 2030 CO2 Emissions Could Equal the Entire World's Today
By Alexis Madrigal February 08, 2008 12:40:52 PM
If China's carbon usage keeps pace with its economic growth, the country's carbon dioxide emissions will reach 8 gigatons a year by 2030, which is equal to the entire world's CO2 production today. That's just the most stunning in a series of datapoints about the Chinese economy reported in a policy brief in the latest issue of the journal Science.
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By Alexis Madrigal February 08, 2008 12:40:52 PM
If China's carbon usage keeps pace with its economic growth, the country's carbon dioxide emissions will reach 8 gigatons a year by 2030, which is equal to the entire world's CO2 production today. That's just the most stunning in a series of datapoints about the Chinese economy reported in a policy brief in the latest issue of the journal Science.
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Terrorists
The US has every right to be paranoid about this one.
Terrorists tried to enter via Canada: U.S.
Homeland Security; 'Much more than a dozen' suspects, Chertoff says
Ian Macleod, Canwest News Service Published: Wednesday, February 13, 2008
OTTAWA - The top U.S. domestic counterterrorism official says more than a dozen people with suspected terrorist ties have attempted to enter the United States from Canada.
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Terrorists tried to enter via Canada: U.S.
Homeland Security; 'Much more than a dozen' suspects, Chertoff says
Ian Macleod, Canwest News Service Published: Wednesday, February 13, 2008
OTTAWA - The top U.S. domestic counterterrorism official says more than a dozen people with suspected terrorist ties have attempted to enter the United States from Canada.
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Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Russia
Scary Cold War Stuff.
Russian bombers intercepted near US Navy ship
Posted Tue Feb 12, 2008 10:47am AEDT
Russian bomber aircraft approached a US aircraft carrier in the Pacific on Saturday and were intercepted by American fighter jets, a US defence official have said.
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Russia threatens to aim nukes at Ukraine
MIKE ECKEL
Associated Press
February 12, 2008 at 1:13 PM EST
MOSCOW — Russia could aim nuclear weapons at Ukraine if the former Soviet republic joins NATO and accepts the deployment of anti-missile defences on its territory, President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday.
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Russian bombers intercepted near US Navy ship
Posted Tue Feb 12, 2008 10:47am AEDT
Russian bomber aircraft approached a US aircraft carrier in the Pacific on Saturday and were intercepted by American fighter jets, a US defence official have said.
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Russia threatens to aim nukes at Ukraine
MIKE ECKEL
Associated Press
February 12, 2008 at 1:13 PM EST
MOSCOW — Russia could aim nuclear weapons at Ukraine if the former Soviet republic joins NATO and accepts the deployment of anti-missile defences on its territory, President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday.
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Honour Killings
The left are mostly silent on the subject of honour killings.
Popular Leftist websites like The Galloping Beaver and Canadian Cynic for example.
Question: Why do the left continue to look at honour killings as a gender issue, instead of a religious issue. Why don't they seem to care about the subject?
A question of honour: Police say 17,000 women are victims every year
Sunday, 10 February 2008
Up to 17,000 women in Britain are being subjected to "honour" related violence, including murder, every year, according to police chiefs.
And official figures on forced marriages are the tip of the iceberg, says the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO).
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Honor killings: When the ancient and the modern collide
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe, young Muslim women are being targeted for violence. Lest it be thought hate crimes are to blame, it is, in fact, their own relatives who are the perpetrators. So-called honor killings, whereby a Muslim male family member, typically the father, murders his daughter in order to defend the family's honor, is a growing problem.
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Let's end the war against women
Posted By Peggy Flanagan
Posted 11 hours ago
A United Nations report estimates that, on average world- wide, three million women and girls are murdered every year, and at least 113 million women are "missing." This is gendercide.
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Popular Leftist websites like The Galloping Beaver and Canadian Cynic for example.
Question: Why do the left continue to look at honour killings as a gender issue, instead of a religious issue. Why don't they seem to care about the subject?
A question of honour: Police say 17,000 women are victims every year
Sunday, 10 February 2008
Up to 17,000 women in Britain are being subjected to "honour" related violence, including murder, every year, according to police chiefs.
And official figures on forced marriages are the tip of the iceberg, says the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO).
[.......]
Honor killings: When the ancient and the modern collide
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe, young Muslim women are being targeted for violence. Lest it be thought hate crimes are to blame, it is, in fact, their own relatives who are the perpetrators. So-called honor killings, whereby a Muslim male family member, typically the father, murders his daughter in order to defend the family's honor, is a growing problem.
[.......]
Let's end the war against women
Posted By Peggy Flanagan
Posted 11 hours ago
A United Nations report estimates that, on average world- wide, three million women and girls are murdered every year, and at least 113 million women are "missing." This is gendercide.
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Monday, February 11, 2008
Suzuki World
"Sometimes lying is okay, like when you know what's good for people more than they do."
-fake Rob Reiner, South Park, "Butt Out"
That quote always reminds me of Suzuki and Al Gore.
Suzuki's dragnet can't keep real science behind bars
Licia Corbella, Calgary Herald
Published: Saturday, February 09, 2008
David Suzuki wants politicians thrown in jail if they don't act as quickly as he believes they should to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
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David Suzuki: Be skeptical of scientists
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Call to Jail anti-Kyoto politicians: How did environmentalism become this totalitarian?
By EPW Blog Thursday, February 7, 2008
David Suzuki says he wants anti-Kyoto politicians thrown in jail. How did environmentalism become this totalitarian?
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-fake Rob Reiner, South Park, "Butt Out"
That quote always reminds me of Suzuki and Al Gore.
Suzuki's dragnet can't keep real science behind bars
Licia Corbella, Calgary Herald
Published: Saturday, February 09, 2008
David Suzuki wants politicians thrown in jail if they don't act as quickly as he believes they should to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
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David Suzuki: Be skeptical of scientists
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Call to Jail anti-Kyoto politicians: How did environmentalism become this totalitarian?
By EPW Blog Thursday, February 7, 2008
David Suzuki says he wants anti-Kyoto politicians thrown in jail. How did environmentalism become this totalitarian?
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Roman Surgery
The Romans carried out cataract ops
By Jane Elliott Health reporter, BBC News
Think of the Roman legacy to Britain and many things spring to mind - straight roads, under-floor heating, aqueducts and public baths.
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By Jane Elliott Health reporter, BBC News
Think of the Roman legacy to Britain and many things spring to mind - straight roads, under-floor heating, aqueducts and public baths.
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Mullah & Sons
Mullah accidently blows up self, sons
From correspondents in Kandahar
February 11, 2008 06:07pm
A LANDMINE blew up in the home of a religious cleric in southern Afghanistan, killing the mullah, two of his sons and two other men who had been preparing an attack, police said today.
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From correspondents in Kandahar
February 11, 2008 06:07pm
A LANDMINE blew up in the home of a religious cleric in southern Afghanistan, killing the mullah, two of his sons and two other men who had been preparing an attack, police said today.
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Friday, February 8, 2008
TB
Ancient bones may hold key
By Emily Pykett
Ancient human remains held in Portsmouth's museum archives are set to be DNA-tested for signs of tuberculosis.
Click Here for More
By Emily Pykett
Ancient human remains held in Portsmouth's museum archives are set to be DNA-tested for signs of tuberculosis.
Click Here for More
UK PM says NO special laws for Muslims.
The rule of law should apply equally to all, period. We can't live in an Animal Farm world.
ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL
BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS. Animal Farm George Orwell Quotes
CNN Story.
LONDON, England (AP) -- The archbishop of Canterbury has called for a limited application of Islamic law in Britain. Muslims praised the proposal but the government rejected it.
Click Here for More
The Scotsman Story.
By Gerri Peev
Political Correspondent
POLITICIANS have moved to distance themselves from claims by the Archbishop of Canterbury that Sharia law would inevitably be introduced in parts of Britain.
Click Here for More
ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL
BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS. Animal Farm George Orwell Quotes
CNN Story.
LONDON, England (AP) -- The archbishop of Canterbury has called for a limited application of Islamic law in Britain. Muslims praised the proposal but the government rejected it.
Click Here for More
The Scotsman Story.
By Gerri Peev
Political Correspondent
POLITICIANS have moved to distance themselves from claims by the Archbishop of Canterbury that Sharia law would inevitably be introduced in parts of Britain.
Click Here for More
Thursday, February 7, 2008
The Lies of 40 Years Ago - Tet
The Wall Street Journal
The Lies of Tet
By ARTHUR HERMANFebruary 6, 2008; Page A19
On January 30, 1968, more than a quarter million North Vietnamese soldiers and 100,000 Viet Cong irregulars launched a massive attack on South Vietnam. But the public didn't hear about who had won this most decisive battle of the Vietnam War, the so-called Tet offensive, until much too late.
Click Here for More.
The Lies of Tet
By ARTHUR HERMANFebruary 6, 2008; Page A19
On January 30, 1968, more than a quarter million North Vietnamese soldiers and 100,000 Viet Cong irregulars launched a massive attack on South Vietnam. But the public didn't hear about who had won this most decisive battle of the Vietnam War, the so-called Tet offensive, until much too late.
Click Here for More.
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Peter Gabriel - Digging In The Dirt
"Digging In The Dirt"
Something in me, dark and sticky
All the time it's getting strong
No way of dealing with this feeling
Can't go on like this too long
[Chorus:]
This time you've gone too far [x3]
I told you [x4]
This time you've gone too far [x3]
I told you [x4]
Don't talk back
Just drive the car
Shut your mouth
I know what you are
Don't say nothing
Keep your hands on the wheel
Don't turn around
This is for real
Digging in the dirt
Stay with me, I need support
I'm digging in the dirt
To find the places I got hurt
Open up the places I got hurt
The more I look, the more I find
As I close on in, I get so blind
I feel it in my head, I feel it in my toes
I feel it in my sex, that's the place it goes
[Chorus]
I'm digging in the dirt
Stay with me I need support
I'm digging in the dirt
To find the places I got hurt
To open up the places I got hurt
Digging in the dirt
To find the places we got hurt
[x7]
Climate Change
While looking around the web I found these quotes.
"To capture the public imagination, we have to offer up some scary scenarios, make simplified dramatic statements and little mention of any doubts one might have. Each of us has to decide the right balance between being effective and being honest." Stephen Schneider one of the UN IPCC report author. "Climate change (provides) the greatest chance to bring about justice and equality on the world." and "No matter if the science is all phony, there are still collateral environmental benefits (to global warming policies)." Christine Stewart former Canadian Liberal environment minister
The Messengers Al Gore and David Suzuki
Everyone wants a safe clean environment. But lying or exaggerating for the ideology of the Climate Change/Global warming movement and forcing it on people for the better good is immoral. The self-righteousness and immorality of the messengers has corrupted the message.
The funny thing is that the messengers are not living the lifestyle that they want to impose on the rest of us. Blindly following their ideology we will cause more suffering than the problem it aims to correct.
"The more I look, the more I find
As I close on in, I get so blind"
Digging in the Dirt - Peter Gabriel
"To capture the public imagination, we have to offer up some scary scenarios, make simplified dramatic statements and little mention of any doubts one might have. Each of us has to decide the right balance between being effective and being honest." Stephen Schneider one of the UN IPCC report author. "Climate change (provides) the greatest chance to bring about justice and equality on the world." and "No matter if the science is all phony, there are still collateral environmental benefits (to global warming policies)." Christine Stewart former Canadian Liberal environment minister
The Messengers Al Gore and David Suzuki
Everyone wants a safe clean environment. But lying or exaggerating for the ideology of the Climate Change/Global warming movement and forcing it on people for the better good is immoral. The self-righteousness and immorality of the messengers has corrupted the message.
The funny thing is that the messengers are not living the lifestyle that they want to impose on the rest of us. Blindly following their ideology we will cause more suffering than the problem it aims to correct.
"The more I look, the more I find
As I close on in, I get so blind"
Digging in the Dirt - Peter Gabriel
Nuclear Power
This is the Cheapest most effective way to go for green power.
There are claims that Patrick Moore is not a founder of Greenpeace, but he was at the founding meetings. He also participated in the groups activities.
There is always more to facts than who is paying who for what. Whether the message is factual and workable is the key.
Of course ideologs give up their independent thought, and like their thoughts delivered to them. They do not look outside the box and have placed their brains on auto-pilot when it comes to the nuclear power issue.
See this Wasington Post Article for more info.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/14/AR2006041401209_pf.html
See this Wikipedia Article for more info.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_Moore_(environmentalist)#_note-wapo
The Link to the C/Net article I've posted below.
http://www.news.com/From-ecowarrior-to-nuclear-champion/2008-13840_3-6228461.html
C/Net News
From ecowarrior to nuclear champion
By Michael Kanellos
Story last modified Thu Jan 31 08:05:56 PST 2008
Patrick Moore seems to court controversy.
Decades ago, he helped found Greenpeace, which fought nuclear proliferation and promoted environmental causes. But for the last several years, he has been an outspoken advocate of nuclear power as well as a critic of the environmental movement.
He now co-chairs the Clean and Safe Energy Coalition, a nuclear industry group, with former New Jersey Governor Christine Whitman.
Although nuclear power remains highly controversial, it's also making a comeback as concerns about global warming and electricity prices rise. Sixteen organizations are expected to file applications to build 31 new reactors in the U.S. Nuclear was a big topic at the World Economic Forum at Davos.
Moore spoke with CNET News.com's Michael Kanellos about the potential for nuclear power as well as where he thinks environmentalists went wrong.
Q: When people look at your biography and see you're a Greenpeace co-founder and now a nuclear advocate, they don't believe it. Could you give us a synopsis of your personal history on this issue?
Moore: Well, actually I did feel a little lonely in that corner for a while, but I've been joined by the likes of Stewart Brand, Jared Diamond (author of Guns, Germs, and Steel), and (environmental author) Tim Flannery, and now we form a fairly serious phalanx of pro-nuclear environmentalists. In fact, I'm the honorary chair of the Canadian chapter of Environmentalists for Nuclear Energy, which has 9,000 members worldwide.
As a co-founder of Greenpeace, even though I was a scientist, I made the same mistake in those days as all the rest of my colleagues did. We kind of lumped nuclear energy in with nuclear weapons as if all things nuclear were evil. It was an honest mistake. We were totally focused on the threat of nuclear war during the Cold War. Nuclear testing was what Greenpeace started on and we were peaceniks, and I think it's fair to say that the antinuclear-energy movement to some extent was formed out of the peace movement.
The impact of fossil fuel combustion on public health is the single largest impact of any technology we have. But in retrospect, I believe we failed to make an important distinction between the peaceful versus the destructive uses of a technology. There are many technologies that are very good that can be used for destructive purposes. Cars can be made into car bombs as long as you have a little bit of fertilizer and diesel oil. Machetes have killed more people than any other weapon in the last 20 years, over a million, and yet they're the most important tool for farmers in the developing world.
It wasn't until after I'd left Greenpeace and the climate change issue started coming to the forefront that I started rethinking energy policy in general and realized that I had been incorrect in my analysis of nuclear as being some kind of evil plot. The perception at the time that nuclear energy equaled nuclear weapons was to some extent based on the fact that the only exception to the separation of peaceful and military nuclear technology was when India bought a reactor from Canada and then broke their promise and used that peaceful reactor to make plutonium to make their first weapon.
Make the case for nuclear power. It emits far less greenhouse gases than coal, but there are the disposal issues.
Moore: Well, it's not only cleaner, it's almost infinitely cleaner in that it has no regulated air emissions. Coal actually releases far more radiation than nuclear plants. There is some radiation released by the nuclear industry, but it's not considered to be of any significance from a health point of view or an environmental point of view. It is cost-effective and it is proven safe. Safety and waste are the two main concerns.
Greenpeace keeps harping on the terrorist issue, but the fact is the nuclear plants in the United States were designed from the beginning to withstand a 747. They are the hardest targets in the United States from a security point of view. They are very closely watched and monitored and they are built in such a way that they are not really a very desirable target. The World Trade Center was a much more desirable target and so were many other political targets and many other industrial targets. So that isn't an issue.
But the safety issue?
Moore: If people look at the actual record, as opposed to the sensationalist speculation, there has never been a member of the public injured by a nuclear plant in the United States, even during Three Mile Island. It was just a bad mechanical failure. It did not cause harm to the public or to the workers in the plant. There is no evidence that anyone was injured by that accident. That was the worst accident in the history of the West, excluding the Soviet Union's stupid Chernobyl design, which is pretty much phased out now, although there are still 11 of them running.
There are that many Chernobyl-style plants left?
Moore: Yes, there are 10 in Russia and 1 in Lithuania, but they are all scheduled to be phased out. After Chernobyl, they were all upgraded from a safety point of view. The accident at Chernobyl was a combination of ridiculous operator error. Secondly, they built reactors without containment vessels. No one else has done that. What the Soviets did was they took their military plutonium weapons production reactors and cookie-cuttered them all over the countryside. It was an economic shortcut and they learned the hard way, but the safety record in the West is impeccable in terms of not causing any harm to people.
Six thousand people die in coal mines every year in this world. Look how many people die in car accidents and many of those are innocent passengers and pedestrians. The impact of fossil fuel combustion on public health is the single largest impact of any technology we have.
But if we see more plants being built in the West, doesn't that increase the chance for negligence and people cutting corners? I mean, the more people you have, the more chances for people to mess up you have.
Moore: I don't know about that. You cannot build a nuclear plant in this world today without it being world-class in both its design and its operation. It's just not possible to do that. There is too much oversight. There is the International Atomic Energy Agency. There is the fact that these designs are coming out of the United States, France, and Russia. India, too; most people don't realize that India is at the very forefront of nuclear technology, in recycling, in producing thorium fuel, in fast reactors. Their science is as good as anybody else's in the world, and the Chinese are fast becoming a major center for nuclear technology as well. I don't think that that is a risk.
All the money that's going into subsidizing solar is a waste of money... The nuclear industry has the most culture of safety around it of any industry. In the States it's safer to work in a nuclear plant than it is to work in either real estate or financial services, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Is that just because of large numbers, with real estate agents driving around to open houses or...?
Moore: This is per capita. There is lesser the chance of missing work due to an accident on the job in nuclear than there is in real estate or financial services. That's because in the nuclear industry it's safety first ahead of everything else.
So in your view, the safety issue is more of a perception issue right now?
Moore: Yeah. How people manage to perceive that nuclear is dangerous when no one has ever been hurt by it is hard for me to understand, but there it is. It's a scared thing and it's like many of the campaigns today that are based on scaring people about something invisible. In this case, radiation. In agriculture, it's invisible pesticide residues. In climate, it's invisible carbon dioxide. In genetic engineering, it's invisible genes. Actually, a majority of the what are being called environmental campaigns these days are basically scare campaigns based on people not being able to see what it is that they are supposed to be afraid of. You can make up all kinds of stories about things people can't see.
It's like with GMO (genetically modified organism) foods. I don't think there are any deaths associated with GMOs, but they are banned in Europe anyway.
Moore: Exactly. (There are only) positive impacts associated with most, and yet a perceived negative or a projected negative is given a higher weight. In many areas, environmental activists are arguing to ban things where there are obvious benefits and no evidence of harm. Many of their policies are actually resulting in negative actions for the environment rather than positive ones.
That is true in the case of nuclear power, where they are the ones who are screaming that the sky is falling and that the climate catastrophe is coming and it's going to be global and it's going to cause 40 to 50 percent of all the species to become extinct and it's going to be the end of civilization as we know it. And yet, they are against nuclear energy just because there could be an accident somewhere. How could one nuclear accident be worse than the whole world being destroyed?
It's not choosing the lesser of evils. They are basically saying that they are both just as bad as each other. I don't see how you can argue that. I mean, how could nuclear energy cause 50 percent of the world's species to go extinct and civilization as we know it to come to an end?
A lot of people will agree with the state of nuclear technology but will argue that we should put more money into solar thermal or solar photovoltaic first and see if we can make progress there before we go to nuclear. What do you say to that?
Moore: Well, I don't see how they are mutually exclusive. We know how to build nuclear plants. We don't know how to build solar thermal plants that operate cost effectively and we don't even know if we can build a solar thermal plant that will go through 5 or 10 days of cloud cover. I am all in favor of investing in solar thermal, but I think it has to be on a measured R&D basis, and I would like to see it coming under 10 cents a kilowatt-hour.
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.
Many claim that nuclear is actually the only source of power that is going up in price. These aren't environmental advocates. These are Wall Street analysts. The nuclear energy industry says the opposite. Who is right here?
Moore: Well, the price of the plants is going up in terms of the capital costs, but then everything is going up. Concrete is going up; steel is going up. It's true that nuclear has a higher capital cost than the fossil energy plants, but it has a lower operating cost once it is established.
A compact fluorescent light bulb costs five times as much as an incandescent light bulb, but it only costs a fifth as much to run it and it lasts a lot longer. So it is a good investment. The trouble with individuals is that they want to (be paid) back in 2 years. Big institutions don't mind an 8- or 10-year payback and nuclear provides that.
Is the public perception changing? Do you find more people saying they will consider nuclear or people who are actually in favor of it?
Moore: A considerable majority of Americans are in favor of nuclear energy. It's around 70 percent of the general public. (Editor's note: an MIT survey last year said only 35 percent of Americans wanted to see nuclear power increase.) The closer you get to an operating nuclear plant, the higher the support is. The average within 10 miles of a plant is 80 percent in the U.S. In some plants, it's up to 90 percent because the people living near them know that they have operated safely and that they're a huge wealth generator in the community. They are basically a very compact wealth generating machine, producing energy and producing employment in communities. They say the closer you go to a nuclear reactor, the better the schools and the roads are.
As far as Wall Street goes, there are still a lot of jitters. How about "Not in my backyard"-ism? Although people support nuclear, they also say they want to see the plants 500 miles away.
Moore: The good news there is that the first (likely) wave of new plants will all be built on existing sites. There is, in fact, a huge amount of room to expand on the existing sites. Many of these sites were originally designed for eight reactors and only have two on them.
Some people have suggested exploiting the waste heat in these factories to make hydrogen or purify water.
Moore: There are additional benefits beyond just giving electricity. And we will use the electricity to charge all our plug-in hybrids. We are going to need more electricity in the future for that. It doesn't make sense to charge a battery with a coal-fired power plant from an air pollution or climate point of view.
There's no possibility that California can meet its objectives without new nuclear, either in or out of state to supply the electricity. Twenty percent of the state's electricity now comes from coal-fired power plants. If you cut that 20 percent out, you simply cannot replace that with renewables unless they can make solar thermal work. They should go ahead, try it, but in the meantime build some nuclear plants. That is the only way that a full umbilical cord can be cut.
What do you think of wave power?
Moore: It is so pie-in-the-sky that we shouldn't even think about it. Just let people test it. If they can figure out how to make it work, fine. But I don't really see that much promise in all those tidal- and wave-powered programs.
What support do you see among politicians, or the bureaucracies, or even the large financial institutions?
Moore: Most major political parties are squarely in favor of nuclear power. There's stronger support on the Republican side, but there is a good majority on the Democratic side, and most Democrats who were against nuclear power openly before are now either neutral or not talking about it much. (John) Edwards is against coal and nuclear. He wants both of them banned. Hillary (Clinton) is neutral. You can't really read her.
As far as Wall Street goes, there are still a lot of jitters. When the nuclear industry failed in the late '70s, early '80s, it was a combination of Three Mile Island, huge regulatory burdens piled on by the antinuclear movements' influence, and huge interest rates. When you have a huge capital investment, it takes 10 years to start paying back from when you start building it. Interest rates are extremely significant and you remember interest rates went to like 19 percent back then. That's what killed the industry. It wasn't anyone of those; it was the combination of all three of them together.
How about the nuclear waste disposal? Has there been much progress technologically?
Moore: It is not a problem technologically. It's called recycling, or what used to be called reprocessing. The French, the Russians, the Japanese all use it. It is basically separating out the remaining uranium and the plutonium that is manufactured as a byproduct and used as fuel again.
Plutonium is a fuel; we don't need to wait 250,000 years for it to decay. We can use it right away as a fuel and turn it into fission products, which will then only have a 300-year lifespan of being radioactive. Japan just opened a $30 billion fuel fabrication and recycling center in Northern Honshu. Japan figured out a way to take the French technology, which is probably the leading technology, and design a system in which the plutonium never emerges as a pure product anywhere; it's only inside, where nobody could, without dying, get it. The plutonium is separated, then before it comes out it's recombined with uranium into what's called mixed-oxide fuel, which cannot be made into a bomb.
Now on News.com
Real vs. the states Which candidate is tech friendliest? Tesla Roadster ready to hit the streets Surveillance: How much is too much?
How does the supply of fuel look?
Moore: Fifty percent of all the nuclear energy being produced in the United States is from dismantled Soviet warheads. We are turning swords to plowshares, not the other way around. There is enough enriched uranium and plutonium in (missile) stockpiles that is surplus now to (fill) the needs of the military to run our nuclear plants for years. When you start recycling, it magnifies the fuel reserve by 5 to 10 times. So we've actually got a thousand years of nuclear fuel for the existing reactors. The mining industry actually stopped looking for uranium 30 years ago because there already was enough discovered.
Now, they're looking for it again and finding it all over the place in places they didn't know it existed. There's a huge find in Labrador, Canada, for example. Slovakia has now been proven to have the largest uranium reserve in all of Western Europe. Austria still has tons of the stuff, and now Kazakhstan has come on as a major world's supplier.
Before we run out of uranium, there's a lot of people interested in the thorium fuel cycle. Thorium is much more abundant in the earth than uranium, so it's another nuclear fuel that is proven to be workable. India is well advanced in this technology and there is an international group of thorium scientists that is meeting on a regular basis.
One last thing. How about the rogue state question? People worry about states like Iran getting bomb-making capabilities. Is the regulatory framework strong enough to take care of that?
Moore: There is a group of academics from the U.S. and Europe who have come up with the proposal to create a kind of insurance policy for the nuclear fuel supply. The idea is to restrict the amount of enrichment technology because you can use uranium enrichment technology centrifuges to either make nuclear fuel or a nuclear bomb. So there is a big interest in reducing the number of facilities that do enrichment and basically in keeping them in the existing weapon states, which is where they are now except for Iran.
There is also the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership otherwise known as GNEP, which 20-odd countries are part of. It wants control over the front end, which is uranium enrichment, and the back end, or recycling plutonium, to maintain control over those processes in such a way that countries that don't have those technologies are guaranteed a supply of fuel.
It's really interesting, in some ways, how this whole nuclear renaissance is causing a new alignment of interests around the world.
Copyright ©1995-2008 CNET Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
There are claims that Patrick Moore is not a founder of Greenpeace, but he was at the founding meetings. He also participated in the groups activities.
There is always more to facts than who is paying who for what. Whether the message is factual and workable is the key.
Of course ideologs give up their independent thought, and like their thoughts delivered to them. They do not look outside the box and have placed their brains on auto-pilot when it comes to the nuclear power issue.
See this Wasington Post Article for more info.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/14/AR2006041401209_pf.html
See this Wikipedia Article for more info.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_Moore_(environmentalist)#_note-wapo
The Link to the C/Net article I've posted below.
http://www.news.com/From-ecowarrior-to-nuclear-champion/2008-13840_3-6228461.html
C/Net News
From ecowarrior to nuclear champion
By Michael Kanellos
Story last modified Thu Jan 31 08:05:56 PST 2008
Patrick Moore seems to court controversy.
Decades ago, he helped found Greenpeace, which fought nuclear proliferation and promoted environmental causes. But for the last several years, he has been an outspoken advocate of nuclear power as well as a critic of the environmental movement.
He now co-chairs the Clean and Safe Energy Coalition, a nuclear industry group, with former New Jersey Governor Christine Whitman.
Although nuclear power remains highly controversial, it's also making a comeback as concerns about global warming and electricity prices rise. Sixteen organizations are expected to file applications to build 31 new reactors in the U.S. Nuclear was a big topic at the World Economic Forum at Davos.
Moore spoke with CNET News.com's Michael Kanellos about the potential for nuclear power as well as where he thinks environmentalists went wrong.
Q: When people look at your biography and see you're a Greenpeace co-founder and now a nuclear advocate, they don't believe it. Could you give us a synopsis of your personal history on this issue?
Moore: Well, actually I did feel a little lonely in that corner for a while, but I've been joined by the likes of Stewart Brand, Jared Diamond (author of Guns, Germs, and Steel), and (environmental author) Tim Flannery, and now we form a fairly serious phalanx of pro-nuclear environmentalists. In fact, I'm the honorary chair of the Canadian chapter of Environmentalists for Nuclear Energy, which has 9,000 members worldwide.
As a co-founder of Greenpeace, even though I was a scientist, I made the same mistake in those days as all the rest of my colleagues did. We kind of lumped nuclear energy in with nuclear weapons as if all things nuclear were evil. It was an honest mistake. We were totally focused on the threat of nuclear war during the Cold War. Nuclear testing was what Greenpeace started on and we were peaceniks, and I think it's fair to say that the antinuclear-energy movement to some extent was formed out of the peace movement.
The impact of fossil fuel combustion on public health is the single largest impact of any technology we have. But in retrospect, I believe we failed to make an important distinction between the peaceful versus the destructive uses of a technology. There are many technologies that are very good that can be used for destructive purposes. Cars can be made into car bombs as long as you have a little bit of fertilizer and diesel oil. Machetes have killed more people than any other weapon in the last 20 years, over a million, and yet they're the most important tool for farmers in the developing world.
It wasn't until after I'd left Greenpeace and the climate change issue started coming to the forefront that I started rethinking energy policy in general and realized that I had been incorrect in my analysis of nuclear as being some kind of evil plot. The perception at the time that nuclear energy equaled nuclear weapons was to some extent based on the fact that the only exception to the separation of peaceful and military nuclear technology was when India bought a reactor from Canada and then broke their promise and used that peaceful reactor to make plutonium to make their first weapon.
Make the case for nuclear power. It emits far less greenhouse gases than coal, but there are the disposal issues.
Moore: Well, it's not only cleaner, it's almost infinitely cleaner in that it has no regulated air emissions. Coal actually releases far more radiation than nuclear plants. There is some radiation released by the nuclear industry, but it's not considered to be of any significance from a health point of view or an environmental point of view. It is cost-effective and it is proven safe. Safety and waste are the two main concerns.
Greenpeace keeps harping on the terrorist issue, but the fact is the nuclear plants in the United States were designed from the beginning to withstand a 747. They are the hardest targets in the United States from a security point of view. They are very closely watched and monitored and they are built in such a way that they are not really a very desirable target. The World Trade Center was a much more desirable target and so were many other political targets and many other industrial targets. So that isn't an issue.
But the safety issue?
Moore: If people look at the actual record, as opposed to the sensationalist speculation, there has never been a member of the public injured by a nuclear plant in the United States, even during Three Mile Island. It was just a bad mechanical failure. It did not cause harm to the public or to the workers in the plant. There is no evidence that anyone was injured by that accident. That was the worst accident in the history of the West, excluding the Soviet Union's stupid Chernobyl design, which is pretty much phased out now, although there are still 11 of them running.
There are that many Chernobyl-style plants left?
Moore: Yes, there are 10 in Russia and 1 in Lithuania, but they are all scheduled to be phased out. After Chernobyl, they were all upgraded from a safety point of view. The accident at Chernobyl was a combination of ridiculous operator error. Secondly, they built reactors without containment vessels. No one else has done that. What the Soviets did was they took their military plutonium weapons production reactors and cookie-cuttered them all over the countryside. It was an economic shortcut and they learned the hard way, but the safety record in the West is impeccable in terms of not causing any harm to people.
Six thousand people die in coal mines every year in this world. Look how many people die in car accidents and many of those are innocent passengers and pedestrians. The impact of fossil fuel combustion on public health is the single largest impact of any technology we have.
But if we see more plants being built in the West, doesn't that increase the chance for negligence and people cutting corners? I mean, the more people you have, the more chances for people to mess up you have.
Moore: I don't know about that. You cannot build a nuclear plant in this world today without it being world-class in both its design and its operation. It's just not possible to do that. There is too much oversight. There is the International Atomic Energy Agency. There is the fact that these designs are coming out of the United States, France, and Russia. India, too; most people don't realize that India is at the very forefront of nuclear technology, in recycling, in producing thorium fuel, in fast reactors. Their science is as good as anybody else's in the world, and the Chinese are fast becoming a major center for nuclear technology as well. I don't think that that is a risk.
All the money that's going into subsidizing solar is a waste of money... The nuclear industry has the most culture of safety around it of any industry. In the States it's safer to work in a nuclear plant than it is to work in either real estate or financial services, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Is that just because of large numbers, with real estate agents driving around to open houses or...?
Moore: This is per capita. There is lesser the chance of missing work due to an accident on the job in nuclear than there is in real estate or financial services. That's because in the nuclear industry it's safety first ahead of everything else.
So in your view, the safety issue is more of a perception issue right now?
Moore: Yeah. How people manage to perceive that nuclear is dangerous when no one has ever been hurt by it is hard for me to understand, but there it is. It's a scared thing and it's like many of the campaigns today that are based on scaring people about something invisible. In this case, radiation. In agriculture, it's invisible pesticide residues. In climate, it's invisible carbon dioxide. In genetic engineering, it's invisible genes. Actually, a majority of the what are being called environmental campaigns these days are basically scare campaigns based on people not being able to see what it is that they are supposed to be afraid of. You can make up all kinds of stories about things people can't see.
It's like with GMO (genetically modified organism) foods. I don't think there are any deaths associated with GMOs, but they are banned in Europe anyway.
Moore: Exactly. (There are only) positive impacts associated with most, and yet a perceived negative or a projected negative is given a higher weight. In many areas, environmental activists are arguing to ban things where there are obvious benefits and no evidence of harm. Many of their policies are actually resulting in negative actions for the environment rather than positive ones.
That is true in the case of nuclear power, where they are the ones who are screaming that the sky is falling and that the climate catastrophe is coming and it's going to be global and it's going to cause 40 to 50 percent of all the species to become extinct and it's going to be the end of civilization as we know it. And yet, they are against nuclear energy just because there could be an accident somewhere. How could one nuclear accident be worse than the whole world being destroyed?
It's not choosing the lesser of evils. They are basically saying that they are both just as bad as each other. I don't see how you can argue that. I mean, how could nuclear energy cause 50 percent of the world's species to go extinct and civilization as we know it to come to an end?
A lot of people will agree with the state of nuclear technology but will argue that we should put more money into solar thermal or solar photovoltaic first and see if we can make progress there before we go to nuclear. What do you say to that?
Moore: Well, I don't see how they are mutually exclusive. We know how to build nuclear plants. We don't know how to build solar thermal plants that operate cost effectively and we don't even know if we can build a solar thermal plant that will go through 5 or 10 days of cloud cover. I am all in favor of investing in solar thermal, but I think it has to be on a measured R&D basis, and I would like to see it coming under 10 cents a kilowatt-hour.
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.
Many claim that nuclear is actually the only source of power that is going up in price. These aren't environmental advocates. These are Wall Street analysts. The nuclear energy industry says the opposite. Who is right here?
Moore: Well, the price of the plants is going up in terms of the capital costs, but then everything is going up. Concrete is going up; steel is going up. It's true that nuclear has a higher capital cost than the fossil energy plants, but it has a lower operating cost once it is established.
A compact fluorescent light bulb costs five times as much as an incandescent light bulb, but it only costs a fifth as much to run it and it lasts a lot longer. So it is a good investment. The trouble with individuals is that they want to (be paid) back in 2 years. Big institutions don't mind an 8- or 10-year payback and nuclear provides that.
Is the public perception changing? Do you find more people saying they will consider nuclear or people who are actually in favor of it?
Moore: A considerable majority of Americans are in favor of nuclear energy. It's around 70 percent of the general public. (Editor's note: an MIT survey last year said only 35 percent of Americans wanted to see nuclear power increase.) The closer you get to an operating nuclear plant, the higher the support is. The average within 10 miles of a plant is 80 percent in the U.S. In some plants, it's up to 90 percent because the people living near them know that they have operated safely and that they're a huge wealth generator in the community. They are basically a very compact wealth generating machine, producing energy and producing employment in communities. They say the closer you go to a nuclear reactor, the better the schools and the roads are.
As far as Wall Street goes, there are still a lot of jitters. How about "Not in my backyard"-ism? Although people support nuclear, they also say they want to see the plants 500 miles away.
Moore: The good news there is that the first (likely) wave of new plants will all be built on existing sites. There is, in fact, a huge amount of room to expand on the existing sites. Many of these sites were originally designed for eight reactors and only have two on them.
Some people have suggested exploiting the waste heat in these factories to make hydrogen or purify water.
Moore: There are additional benefits beyond just giving electricity. And we will use the electricity to charge all our plug-in hybrids. We are going to need more electricity in the future for that. It doesn't make sense to charge a battery with a coal-fired power plant from an air pollution or climate point of view.
There's no possibility that California can meet its objectives without new nuclear, either in or out of state to supply the electricity. Twenty percent of the state's electricity now comes from coal-fired power plants. If you cut that 20 percent out, you simply cannot replace that with renewables unless they can make solar thermal work. They should go ahead, try it, but in the meantime build some nuclear plants. That is the only way that a full umbilical cord can be cut.
What do you think of wave power?
Moore: It is so pie-in-the-sky that we shouldn't even think about it. Just let people test it. If they can figure out how to make it work, fine. But I don't really see that much promise in all those tidal- and wave-powered programs.
What support do you see among politicians, or the bureaucracies, or even the large financial institutions?
Moore: Most major political parties are squarely in favor of nuclear power. There's stronger support on the Republican side, but there is a good majority on the Democratic side, and most Democrats who were against nuclear power openly before are now either neutral or not talking about it much. (John) Edwards is against coal and nuclear. He wants both of them banned. Hillary (Clinton) is neutral. You can't really read her.
As far as Wall Street goes, there are still a lot of jitters. When the nuclear industry failed in the late '70s, early '80s, it was a combination of Three Mile Island, huge regulatory burdens piled on by the antinuclear movements' influence, and huge interest rates. When you have a huge capital investment, it takes 10 years to start paying back from when you start building it. Interest rates are extremely significant and you remember interest rates went to like 19 percent back then. That's what killed the industry. It wasn't anyone of those; it was the combination of all three of them together.
How about the nuclear waste disposal? Has there been much progress technologically?
Moore: It is not a problem technologically. It's called recycling, or what used to be called reprocessing. The French, the Russians, the Japanese all use it. It is basically separating out the remaining uranium and the plutonium that is manufactured as a byproduct and used as fuel again.
Plutonium is a fuel; we don't need to wait 250,000 years for it to decay. We can use it right away as a fuel and turn it into fission products, which will then only have a 300-year lifespan of being radioactive. Japan just opened a $30 billion fuel fabrication and recycling center in Northern Honshu. Japan figured out a way to take the French technology, which is probably the leading technology, and design a system in which the plutonium never emerges as a pure product anywhere; it's only inside, where nobody could, without dying, get it. The plutonium is separated, then before it comes out it's recombined with uranium into what's called mixed-oxide fuel, which cannot be made into a bomb.
Now on News.com
Real vs. the states Which candidate is tech friendliest? Tesla Roadster ready to hit the streets Surveillance: How much is too much?
How does the supply of fuel look?
Moore: Fifty percent of all the nuclear energy being produced in the United States is from dismantled Soviet warheads. We are turning swords to plowshares, not the other way around. There is enough enriched uranium and plutonium in (missile) stockpiles that is surplus now to (fill) the needs of the military to run our nuclear plants for years. When you start recycling, it magnifies the fuel reserve by 5 to 10 times. So we've actually got a thousand years of nuclear fuel for the existing reactors. The mining industry actually stopped looking for uranium 30 years ago because there already was enough discovered.
Now, they're looking for it again and finding it all over the place in places they didn't know it existed. There's a huge find in Labrador, Canada, for example. Slovakia has now been proven to have the largest uranium reserve in all of Western Europe. Austria still has tons of the stuff, and now Kazakhstan has come on as a major world's supplier.
Before we run out of uranium, there's a lot of people interested in the thorium fuel cycle. Thorium is much more abundant in the earth than uranium, so it's another nuclear fuel that is proven to be workable. India is well advanced in this technology and there is an international group of thorium scientists that is meeting on a regular basis.
One last thing. How about the rogue state question? People worry about states like Iran getting bomb-making capabilities. Is the regulatory framework strong enough to take care of that?
Moore: There is a group of academics from the U.S. and Europe who have come up with the proposal to create a kind of insurance policy for the nuclear fuel supply. The idea is to restrict the amount of enrichment technology because you can use uranium enrichment technology centrifuges to either make nuclear fuel or a nuclear bomb. So there is a big interest in reducing the number of facilities that do enrichment and basically in keeping them in the existing weapon states, which is where they are now except for Iran.
There is also the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership otherwise known as GNEP, which 20-odd countries are part of. It wants control over the front end, which is uranium enrichment, and the back end, or recycling plutonium, to maintain control over those processes in such a way that countries that don't have those technologies are guaranteed a supply of fuel.
It's really interesting, in some ways, how this whole nuclear renaissance is causing a new alignment of interests around the world.
Copyright ©1995-2008 CNET Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
The Worst Cow.
The worst cow in the fold, lows the loudest.
I have noticed this to be true of people who describe themselves as being on the radical left and radical right of things. Always lowing about Bush always lowing about Harper, always lowing about Clinton. But nothing that would be of any true use comes from their traps.
I have noticed this to be true of people who describe themselves as being on the radical left and radical right of things. Always lowing about Bush always lowing about Harper, always lowing about Clinton. But nothing that would be of any true use comes from their traps.
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