Haeight, yes I believe in acid rain, which is caused primarily by SO2 and NOx emissions not CO2. However, since nuclear power does not emit CO2 anyway, then there's no need to argue about it; nuclear is a viable option in either case.

Yucca mountain is no longer a proposed project being researched; it is a real project. The president and congress have given it a go and work was finally begun on actually designing the details of construction and licensing (all the work up till then had been limited to geological studies, etc). The last I knew the construction permit had been submitted to the NRC who should conclude their review and (likely) issue the construction license within a couple years. Acceptable transportation routes are easily available, in fact I recall some plants were already shipping fuel to a private coop which is holding fuel in the vicinity of Yucca awaiting construction to be complete. Not to mention the many Navy shipments of irradiated fuel. Unless a new administration AND congress make it their mission to put a halt to Yucca, it is going to happen in the near future. Whether it becomes a permanent dumping ground (the current plan, unfortunately) or a temporary storage location for eventual reprocessing, of course won't be decided for many decades.

I am impressed by the informed opinions in this blog. Different sides of the same problem have been expressed very well by various people. Yes, the usual “Governor bashers” are here too, and they are totally free to express their opinions, but for the most part, this is a great discussion. Thanks.
Just my opinion.

Unfortunately your wrong about CO2, it is a pollutant. I pointed that out in another post about global warming. Sadly you did not understand the relationship between increased CO2 and increased acidity due to increased absorption in all water, even water vapor effecting rain. Do you believe acid rain is a myth?

Changing the composition of water changes boiling and freezing temperatures. Going from snow covered to water or even land changes surface albedo and changes the amount of energy absorbed in a geographical area. Leading to temperature changes in that region. This is the fundamentals of physical science and chemistry as taught in school.

As far as birds vs. windfarms, isn't that akin to crying about the rights of chickens? unless your invading their breeding grounds the overall damage would be limited. If the wind farms are far enough away from human presence then you can also equip them with noise generators that would drive away birds that fly through.

The yucca mountain complex your talking about is a solution. But its not and will not be viable for quite some time. There are major concerns about the transport of radioactive materials, their containers, and their routes. Most communities have laws preventing the transport of nuclear materials/waste so its not like you can just load it and ship it there.

The refining of nuclear material was very inefficient and the abundance of deposits will never make refining the waste viable. Unless the government shapes up and implements a zero waste 100% recycling policy.

This may be an excersise in futility, but here's an attempt at addressing nuclear waste.

Nuclear fuel is made of uranium-oxide ceramic, which has a very high melting temperature and will retain nearly all of the radioactivity in its solid form, even when submerged in water. This is the first barrier. These ceramic pellets are contained in a metal air-tight tube called the fuel rod (or fuel pin). This is the second barrier. "spent" fuel rods are stored in casks made of various materials, mostly concrete, which protect against weather and corroion. This is another barrier. The casks are stored (or will soon be stored) in Yucca Mountain, where there are additional engineered components to protect against water infiltration and corrosion; yet another barrier. Under Yucca mountain itself is extremely dry, but even IF water somehow got in and corroded radioactivity into the ground water, it would take some ungodly number of years just for any potential radioactive atoms to make it to the ground water table far far below. Finally, this water table is not used for any drinking water, and it is not connected to any other water table (it is isolated). This is just a summary of all the defensive barriers being used, and all of this cost is being paid for entirly by the nuclear utilities, so the cost of nuclear electricity truely is a complete fuel cylce cost (compared with the comparable cost of coal which does not account for deaths/illneses related to coal pollution, etc).

What's even more incredible is that the "spent" fuel isn't even spent, it's just used. There is plenty of fuel left unburned in the used fuel which could be recovered if we had a reprocessing facility (which we once did, and several other countries still do have). Once that day comes, the best news is that the long term radioactivity is due to the unburned fuel; the actual fission products which are the only true waste, would only need to be stored for a few hundred years, not millions. It's only a matter of time before the economic situation changes and it will be cost-effective to reprocess spent fuel rather than mine uranium and fabricate fresh fuel.

I'm with whybesad, I have yet to figure out, based on his history, what Doyle actually believes (if anything) regarding nuclear power.

janesvillian is right, I don't think this country has generated more than 1-2% of electricity from oil since before the '70s, because coal is much cheaper to operate (and now natural gas is much cheaper to build).

Regarding coal pollution, modern clean coal technologies practically eliminate all the pollutants (and no, CO2 is not a pollutant). The problem is, the cost is higher than continuing to operate/maintain existing coal plants so utilities are going that route.

I love how Doyle and most Democrats now suddenly support nuclear, now that energy prices are sky rocketing. If the nuclear lobby pays Doyle enough in campaign contributions, no doubt he will cater to whatever they want, much as he has with Indians, and everyone else who wrote him a 7 figure check.
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Your hard core environmentalist are the ones who oppose not only nuclear, but literally all forms of energy production. Wind power has been opposed because the blades are killing birds (no joke). Solar, Geo-thermo, hydro electric, and on and on; all have "environmental reasons" of opposition, every time they are opposed. Of course it has nothing to do with environmentalism, and these groups are nothing but anti-capitalist/neo-marxists, and of course big supporters of the hard left candidates of the Democratic party.

Jim is only saying this now because Obamas stance has changed. In yesterdays paper it was reported he supports it but not for Wisconsin.

what is wrong with wind power? Do we have to wait for the Republicans to buy wind machines from the Chinese before they are allowed in the United States?

wtp, petroleum is responsible for no more than 2% of our electrical supply.
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As stated many times before, the largest new source of energy in the future is going to be conservation. Using what we have that much more efficiently. Gas hybrid vehicles are one such example and in no way are they a net contributor to oil imports. (Which oil exporting countries officially "support terrorists", anyway? I'd love to see a list.)
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I can support the idea of nuclear power in theory, but I cannot morally support handing down the waste problem for the next 500 generations. They will not be able to benefit from our short-term use of the power, but they will have to deal with the health risks, and they won't have any choice but to hand down what we gave them to their children. It's a disgusting expediency.

While nuclear power produces less greenhouse gasses it still creates a larger waste problem. No state wants a nuclear waste storage facility. That has been the largest issue with nuclear plants to date most have held onto their waste since there was nowhere to ship it.

If you want clean power then you need to go with something that creates less waste, not just a different potentially more dangerous form of waste.

As it sits you could allow wind farms in the great lakes, and use existing power lines to distribute the power. I am not talking about spreading them out I am talking about a compact area. it would be a large area but small in comparison to the rest of the coastlines.

They even have wave power generators and underwater turbines that are powered by currents such as in rivers. Those underwater turbines are ideal to be placed below existing dams or even above with the strong currents. Take advantage of the cleaner power generators near existing electric infrastructure.

With everything going green these days, auto makers are asked to build cars that is rechargeable meaning that every day we have to plug our cars into electrical plug. All this did was use more gas to generate electricity to support terrorist. We can't use coal because they claim that is to dirty. So the next step is nuclear power instead of gas to create this power. I do believe our government is on the right road this time. It is nice to see both sides agree on something for a change.

Diamond Jim wish washy as ever!!!