# Global Warming and the Necessity for Nuclear Power **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 5, 2016, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910 "2016-12-05T06:17:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/1 "2016-12-05T06:17:27Z")
I’d like to talk about a very fundamental disconnect in the debate over global warming: The chosen solution of renewable power is fundamentally incompatible with the claim that time is short and something must be done now. Have a look at the state of the solar and wind industries across the world. It is not looking good. Germany started moving strongly towards renewables in 2000, including a heavy emphasis on solar. Germany’s energy costs are about twice the EU average. There are enough solar panels in Germany that it can generate close to 100% power on bright sunny days. And yet… Germany only gets about 6.5% of its energy from solar power. The power just isn’t there when you need it. And worse, all this investment in solar and wind has hardly made a dent in Germany’s CO2 emissions. The U.S. has reduced CO2 by about twice that of Germany since the start of Germany’s big push to solar. The problem is that if you can’t provide power for long periods of time, you still need to have a fossil-fuel based grid to supply baseload power. There’s just no getting around that. A major push towards solar power in Ontario has yielded similar results. Huge expenditures with very little to show for it and the highest electricity prices in Canada by a good margin. And for all that, solar power provided less than 0.4% of Ontario’s energy needs in 2013. Globally, according to [REN21](http://www.ren21.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/REN21_GSR2016_FullReport_en_11.pdf), Wind/Solar/biomass and geothermal combined only supplied 1.4% of global energy in 2014. Now, take off your political and ideological hats, and just think about this as an engineering problem. Understand that the first few percent are going to pick up the low hanging fruit, and there will be diminishing returns as the choice locations are used up. Now, how long do you really think it will take before we get to a point where we can knock off fossil fuels (which supplied 78.3% of global energy)? If your answer is “on the order of many decades”, you’re probably in the right ballpark. And yet we are told that the need for speedy action is imperative, because time is short. If you believe that, then the current focus on renewables is a recipe for failure. The only answer then is nuclear power. This is the only non-CO2 emitting power source we know of that could feasibly replace a significant portion of our fossil fuel consumption in a period of a decade or two. The ONLY one. Wishful thinking about a sudden mass conversion to solar power is not helpful when there is a real problem to be solved. People’s lives depend on it. If we wait for solar and wind, a decade from now we’re going to be looking at maybe a couple of doublings in capacity if we’re lucky, which will bring it up to a whopping 7.2% of our electricity needs. And I believe that is a very optimistic scenario. Large solar plants take a long time to construct, and there are often years of legal entanglements before they even start. They require so much space and so much material that we could run into resource limitations if we tried to do it much quicker. But nuclear plants can be built quickly if we change some of the regulatory rules. For example, a rule that says once a design and pilot plant has been approved safe, identical plants should be subject to much more rapid regulatory review. In addition, a law preventing lawsuits once a site has been approved would remove a lot of the capital risk that goes into a nuclear plant. Add in carbon taxes, with a promise that the carbon tax revenue will go straight into nuclear research and production, and you could ramp up nuclear power very quickly. Small Modular Reactors may make that process even faster. If you’re an activist in the environmental movement, I hope you give this some serious thought, and then start working to change minds within your organization or social group. There will be no political will to do this unless politicians see that the public is ready for it. That’s what the global climate movement should be pushing for. Because it’s the only thing that will work. Comments? ---
**Author:** ![Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/aca169/32.png) [@Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inbred_Mm_domesticus)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 6:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/2 "2016-12-05T06:50:26Z")
I agree with much of the point you are making. Two things. One - reduction in carbon emissions is planned for on a decades long time scale. It’s evident from the stated carbon emissions goals of several countries. Two - criticizing Germany’s efforts to switch to renewables while focusing on their solar seems disingenuous because the other renewable sources of energy are ignored. It’s enough to show how much more energy generation can be accomplished in a given amount of time by relaxing regulations on nuclear versus the most optimistic renewable scenarios. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 7:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/3 "2016-12-05T07:05:56Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > I’d like to talk about a very fundamental disconnect in the debate over global warming: The chosen solution of renewable power is fundamentally incompatible with the claim that time is short and something must be done now. > > Have a look at the state of the solar and wind industries across the world. It is not looking good. Germany started moving strongly towards renewables in 2000, including a heavy emphasis on solar. Germany’s energy costs are about twice the EU average. There are enough solar panels in Germany that it can generate close to 100% power on bright sunny days. And yet… Germany only gets about 6.5% of its energy from solar power. The power just isn’t there when you need it. I have to say that I do agree with a lot, but this is too pessimistic and ignores that Germany and many other countries and even California are willing to continue with the efforts in this front (California is planing to get renewals to power the state up to 33% by 2010), what you point out as the issue of the power not being there when you need it does refer to the issue of not being able to storage the energy, but the reason why Germany is still bullish on wind and Solar is that they are also working on the storage issue. > **[90MW Battery Storage Project Inaugurated In Germany](https://www.energymatters.com.au/renewable-news/germany-battery-storage-em5779/)** > > A 90MW battery energy storage system project was officially put into operation in Germany last week, the largest implementation of its kind in the country. > [@](#): > > A 90MW battery energy storage system (BESS) project was officially put into operation in Germany last week, the largest implementation of its kind in the country. > > Six 15MW lithium-ion battery-based systems have been deployed; one each in Bexbach, Fenne and Weiher and another three in North Rhine-Westphalia. > > Germany’s transition to sustainable energy, the Energiewende, is resulting in increasing fluctuations in energy supply due to the intermittent nature of wind and solar power. Fluctuations can also be caused by unexpectedly higher or lower energy consumption, errors in electricity forecasts and power plant failure. > > Fluctuations of ten millihertz or more must be immediately evened out; otherwise they could cause damage to electrical systems and result in blackouts. > > This load regulation has traditionally been carried out by conventional generation based on fossil fuels. > > The new battery systems will provide load balancing services with operating reserve. Each BESS will even out frequency fluctuations within seconds; by feeding energy into the grid in scenarios where the frequency is too low or storing it when frequency is too high. They will also provide a minimum 30 minutes operating reserve. Having said that, I again do agree with a lot of the OP, with the point that also a lot of the ones proposing change also do consider nuclear power as a part of the solution; in fact most of the proposals and plans in the USA do not concentrate on just solar and wind, different sources of energy are considered. Sadly, it has to be also mentioned that a lot of the proposals like the carbon tax are non starters for a lot of the Republicans that control congress now. ---
**Author:** ![Translucent\_Daydream](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/translucent_daydream/32/16170_2.png) [@Translucent\_Daydream](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Translucent_Daydream)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 8:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/4 "2016-12-05T08:16:45Z")
I as the average joe schmo would be totally down, if there was a safe way to handle the waste from the reactor. Could we possibly send this to the moon or something of that nature? If we can not cause another Chernobyl and you could convince the public that would be okay to do, AND you couldn’t somehow rob the reactor to get stuff to make a dirty weapon with… The pro nuclear folks need to jump this hurdle I would think. ---
**Author:** ![Mnemnosyne](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mnemnosyne/32/3347_2.png) [@Mnemnosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mnemnosyne)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 9:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/5 "2016-12-05T09:07:26Z")
I’ve always thought the hazard of the waste has been played up to a ludicrous level. The idea that we need some place that will be stable and safe to store and contain it for a hundred thousand years or whatnot is utter nonsense. Our planet is full of remote locations far away from any current inhabitants. Pick a spot out in the middle of the desert, build a facility, and then keep it in good repair regularly. Who cares if the earth shifts and it might leak over the next hundred years? You FIX IT and keep it secure. If no humans are around to fix it anymore, then keeping it contained is utterly irrelevant. But overall, it definitely seems to me that some of the largest blame for global warming today has to go to the people who have been blocking nuclear power for decades. Twenty years ago we had enough evidence of global warming that environmental objections to nuclear should have seriously diminished…ten years ago there was enough that any environmental objections should have vanished, and environmentalists of all stripes should have become the greatest proponents of immediate large-scale nuclear efforts. There may yet have been opposition on both safety and NIMBY grounds, but if the environmental opposition had near-universally turned to support, it seems like there’d be a much better chance that today, we would no longer be on a seemingly inevitable slide past the point of no return on climate change (which we may or may not have crossed already, depending on what I’m reading on any particular day). And personally, I’d rather have had a dozen more Chernobyl-scale incidents, to imagine a horrible, worst-case scenario far beyond the likelihood of any realistic level of catastrophe that would have come from expanding nuclear power, than the global warming track we might inevitably be on now. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 10:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/6 "2016-12-05T10:17:20Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > If we wait for solar and wind, a decade from now we’re going to be looking at maybe a couple of doublings in capacity if we’re lucky, which will bring it up to a whopping 7.2% of our electricity needs. And I believe that is a very optimistic scenario. Large solar plants take a long time to construct, and there are often years of legal entanglements before they even start. They require so much space and so much material that we could run into resource limitations if we tried to do it much quicker. > > But nuclear plants can be built quickly if we change some of the regulatory rules. For example, a rule that says once a design and pilot plant has been approved safe, identical plants should be subject to much more rapid regulatory review. In addition, a law preventing lawsuits once a site has been approved would remove a lot of the capital risk that goes into a nuclear plant. > > Add in carbon taxes, with a promise that the carbon tax revenue will go straight into nuclear research and production, and you could ramp up nuclear power very quickly. Small Modular Reactors may make that process even faster. I’d be a lot more inclined to believe your analysis if you were making a fair comparison between renewables and nuclear. Solar plants are held up for years because of legal entanglements; but if we just prevent lawsuits against nuclear plants they can be up and running lickety-split. Technical progress on renewables is slow; but we can speed up research on nuclear power by funding it with a carbon tax. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/7 "2016-12-05T12:07:10Z")
I agree that nuclear power needs to be emphasized; and I applaud **Mr. Stone** for writing a long post with no snide remarks about misguided liberals or tree-huggers. I didn’t know he was capable of that. > [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > I’d be a lot more inclined to believe your analysis if you were making a fair comparison between renewables and nuclear. Solar plants are held up for years because of legal entanglements; but if we just prevent lawsuits against nuclear plants they can be up and running lickety-split. Technical progress on renewables is slow; but we can speed up research on nuclear power by funding it with a carbon tax. Don’t worry — if government money is diverted to nuclear power companies not in the portfolios of Koch Brothers et al, those posting rational remarks now will be first to whine. [Look at the program started by G.W. Bush which eventually helped finance Solyndra](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-11-28/trump-can-t-kill-solyndra-loan-program-that-outperforms-banks). That government program has outperformed many private portfolios overall (and everyone knows a venture capitalist whose ventures never fail isn’t venturing enough) but the meme “The Stupid Kenyan stole our money and flushed it down the toilet with Solyndra” attracted almost as much attention, for a while, as the murders Hillary commited at Benghazi. ---
**Author:** ![SmartAlecCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/67e7ee/32.png) [@SmartAlecCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmartAlecCat)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 12:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/8 "2016-12-05T12:14:10Z")
Nice detailed analysis of nuclear power by Richard Carrier (well researched, with sources linked): [The Shocking Reasons Why We Should Go Nuclear](http://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/11390) > [@](#): > > […] > And actually, any sane energy policy would devote considerable resources into expanding our nuclear power infrastructure instead. The people’s fear of it just has to go. This is, after all, the same ignorant populace that is so scientifically illiterate they think “irradiated food” will be radioactive or poisonous; when in fact it would be neither, and actually save the lives of thousands of people every year by nearly ending food-born illnesses and extending the shelf-life of perishables. By the same reasoning, we need to replace the bulk of our power generation with nuclear plants. And we need that badly. Because all the other options, “(like solar, wind, seismic, and thermal) and alt fuels (like algal biofuels, hydrogens, and other artificial fuels),” even smarter uses of old-school petrofuels (from coal to oil to gas), are actually super shitty. Yes, even solar and wind. Super, super shitty. > […] ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/9 "2016-12-05T12:18:18Z")
[QUOTE=Robot Arm] I’d be a lot more inclined to believe your analysis if you were making a fair comparison between renewables and nuclear. [/quote] It would also help **Sam** ’s credibility if he were somewhat more candid about sourcing his rather carefully cherrypicked claims. For instance, he shifts from talking about Germany’s renewable energy in general to their solar energy in particular, because saying Germany gets only 6.5% of its total energy from solar sounds more discouraging than saying Germany gets [around 12% of its total energy consumption from renewables](https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/germanys-greenhouse-gas-emissions-and-climate-targets). Likewise, he claims that the US reduced carbon emissions almost twice as much as Germany did in the time since Germany started a “big push to solar”, which presumably means in the early 2000s. He carefully ignores the fact that most of the US’s [12% carbon emissions reduction over 2005-2015 came from the natural gas/fracking boom plus the effects of the Bush 2008 recession](https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=26152), and that [the US has not actually been outperforming Germany in carbon reduction either over the last few years or long-term:](https://www.carbonbrief.org/climate-showdown-has-the-us-uk-or-germany-done-more-to-cut-emissions) > [@](#): > > US carbon emissions […] were rising until about 2005, before levelling off and then falling rapidly in part, because of the global financial crisis. Since 2009, US carbon emissions have been effectively constant. > > Germany’s emissions […] fell steeply in the early 90s in the wake of the collapse of communism and then steadily declined until the financial crisis. Since its Energiewende was set out in 2010, German emissions have also been effectively constant. […] > > US carbon emissions in 2014 were around 13 times higher than those from the UK and seven times Germany’s. The US population is only five times larger than the UK and four times Germany’s. Each American is emitting a lot more carbon than the average European. […] > > The UK and Germany, along with the rest of the EU, use a 1990 baseline to measure climate progress. […] > > Looking at the charts above it’s perhaps not hard to see why the US makes a different choice, using 2005 as its baseline for international climate pledges. […] > > US carbon emissions in 2014 were around 8% above 1990 levels, having fallen back from a mid-2000s peak. German emissions are 24% below 1990 levels while the UK’s are down nearly 30%. IOW, the habitually carbon-blasting US experienced a sort of “carbon crash diet” during a few years due mostly to a massive recession and the fracking boom. The much more carbon-frugal Germany, OTOH, with nowhere near as much low-hanging fruit available in the area of potential carbon emissions reduction, nonetheless has achieved larger and steadier reductions over a longer period. None of this, of course, in any way negates the various genuine benefits of nuclear power as an energy source. It just confirms that you can’t look to **Sam Stone** ’s post for an honest and thorough appraisal of the comparative benefits and costs. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/10 "2016-12-05T12:59:56Z")
As we see in this thread, liberals would rather use global warming to bash Republicans than do anything substantive about the problem. > [@](#): > > But nuclear plants can be built quickly if we change some of the regulatory rules. For example, a rule that says once a design and pilot plant has been approved safe, identical plants should be subject to much more rapid regulatory review. In addition, a law preventing lawsuits once a site has been approved would remove a lot of the capital risk that goes into a nuclear plant. This kind of thing should be a no-brainer. Unfortunately, nothing is a no-brainer when you are dealing with the Luddites in the green movement. They make some superficial noises about nuclear energy, but the problem is [when to believe them](http://dailycaller.com/2016/08/14/hillary-has-flipped-on-nuclear-power-8-times-while-running-for-office/). Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/11 "2016-12-05T14:17:54Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > This kind of thing should be a no-brainer. As **Robot Arm** astutely noted, though, it only looks easy because of **Sam** ’s skewed comparison. Inconvenient “regulatory rules” hobbling construction with “legal entanglements” are lamented in the case of solar plants but briskly dismissed as NBD in the case of nuclear plants. Size and expense issues are fretted over in the case of solar plants but blithely waved away as an easy quick fix with a carbon tax in the case of nuclear plants. This sort of disingenuous “no-brainer” framing of the issue starts looking somewhat less simple when you actually use your brain on it. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/12 "2016-12-05T14:22:20Z")
I don’t know what you are talking about. If you are claiming that liberals sue solar plants as much as they sue nuclear, I will need to see a reasonable cite. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/13 "2016-12-05T14:28:57Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > As we see in this thread, liberals would rather use global warming to bash Republicans than do anything substantive about the problem. > This kind of thing should be a no-brainer. Unfortunately, nothing is a no-brainer when you are dealing with the Luddites in the green movement. > > They make some superficial noises about nuclear energy, but the problem is [when to believe them](http://dailycaller.com/2016/08/14/hillary-has-flipped-on-nuclear-power-8-times-while-running-for-office/). The Daily Caller looks at the Democratic Platform and not what Clinton put in hers: [https://www.hillaryclinton.com/briefing/factsheets/2016/10/10/hillary-clintons-plan-for-combatting-climate-change-and-making-america-the-clean-energy-superpower-of-the-21st-century/](https://www.hillaryclinton.com/briefing/factsheets/2016/10/10/hillary-clintons-plan-for-combatting-climate-change-and-making-america-the-clean-energy-superpower-of-the-21st-century/) > [@](#): > > Clean Power: Clinton will award challenge grants to accelerate the deployment of clean power, whether wind, solar, geothermal, hydro, nuclear or carbon capture and sequestration. This includes efforts to streamline permitting for rooftop or community solar to reduce installation times and to accelerate utility-scale renewables and transmission siting to get low-cost clean energy to market. Looks to me as more of what Obama has been doing, by contrast a guy that ran on a platform to drill, drill and drill is not going to make much of an effort to help Nuclear power by looking for a tax on carbon, it is less likely so when he thinks that the effort needed is based on a “hoax”. > **[Trump: Bad News for U.S. Nuclear Power?](https://www.powermag.com/blog/trump-bad-news-for-u-s-nuclear-power/)** > > Trump: Bad News for U.S. Nuclear Power? > [@](#): > > Maria Korsnick, incoming CEO of the Nuclear Energy Institute, said in a statement, “During the campaign, Mr. Trump spoke out on the need to build more nuclear plants and expand the nation’s overall energy supply. As a successful real estate developer, he understands the pressing need for reliable sources of electricity as the foundation for economic growth that brings significant overall economic benefits.” That’s customary boilerplate. > > But the nukes have plenty of reason to be wary of the incoming administration, which may ultimately be less instrumentally favorable to nuclear power than either the Obama or George W. Bush administrations. That’s because the chief selling point the nuclear lobby has been promoting in its arguments for atomic energy for the last several years has been that their electric generating plants don’t produce carbon dioxide. > > While new nukes are horrendously expensive, the industry’s argument has been that the conventional economics don’t recognize the value of reducing carbon dioxide emissions. Without U.S. nuclear plants, the country’s carbon emissions, which have been on a downward track, could turn upward. And the best way to turn the curve further south is new nuclear plants. > > It doesn’t look like the Trumpeters will care very much about the carbon footprint of nuclear power. That’s because The Boss (and most of his acolytes) don’t view global warming as a likely or significant issue. Trump campaigned on the erasing the pains of the coal industry, putting Rust Belt coal miners and steel workers back to work. He championed greater access for fossil fuel developers to federal lands and offshore areas. His campaign’s support for nuclear was pro forma, about what one expects for Republican candidates. > > If Trump’s energy agenda – as best we can define it at the moment – succeeds, nuclear plants are likely to be less competitive on conventional economic grounds for many years to come. It now seems clear that the U.S. has vastly greater oil and gas resources than previously imagined, thanks to directional drilling and hydraulic fracturing. “Peak oil” has now become a joke punch line. > > So the nuclear industry may have to find a new political peg on which to hang its business hat. The carbon footprint probably won’t work. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/14 "2016-12-05T14:38:01Z")
Who said anything about liberals specifically suing them? Lawsuits cost the same amount regardless of the political alignment of the person suing. > [@](#): > > Quoth **Translucent Daydream** : > > I as the average joe schmo would be totally down, if there was a safe way to handle the waste from the reactor. First get back to me with a safe way to handle the waste from a coal-burning power plant. There’s a lot more of that, by any measure (even if we measure just by the amount of radioactive waste), and everyone just ignores it completely. Do you know what the worst American radiological disaster associated with power generation was? [The Kingston coal ash spill](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly_ash_slurry_spill). And on the larger topic, what we really need to be doing about global warming is, in a word, everything. We need to ramp up wind power, which is already practical and competitive. We need to push R&D on solar to get it to the point where it’s practical and competitive, too. We need to develop new renewable sources, like tides, waves, and geothermal. We need to transition what fossil fuels we have away from coal and more towards gas, which is both less carbon-intensive and more time-flexible, enabling it to fill in gaps in wind and solar. And yes, we need to build a lot more nuclear plants, too. And even with all of that, we _still_ need to brace ourselves for impact and prepare for the changes that global warming will bring, because we haven’t done all those other things fast enough, and we’ve already had significant climate change and will continue to have more of it. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/15 "2016-12-05T14:39:19Z")
> [@SmartAlecCat](#): > > Nice detailed analysis of nuclear power by Richard Carrier (well researched, with sources linked): > > [The Shocking Reasons Why We Should Go Nuclear](http://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/11390) About that “paltry” point that I did notice he does not source: > **[Solar Panels Now Make More Electricity Than They Use](https://www.popsci.com/science/article/2013-04/solar-panels-now-make-more-electricity-they-use/)** > > And by 2020, the solar industry will have completely "paid back" the energy it took to produce the world's panels. > [@](#): > > Solar panels make energy, but they take energy to make, too. And, until about 2010 or so, the solar panel industry used more electricity than it produced, according to a new analysis. Now, the industry is set to “pay back” the energy it used by 2020. > [@](#): > > Solar panels’ energy balance is now tipping, however, because newer technologies reduce that electricity consumption. For example, some newer panels require less silicon, or waste less material in the manufacturing process. Researchers are also looking to replace silicon with more abundant affordable elements, such as copper, zinc, tin and carbon. > > Dale and Benson published their full analysis in the journal Environmental Science & Technology. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/16 "2016-12-05T14:40:46Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > The Daily Caller looks at the Democratic Platform and not what Clinton put in hers: > > [https://www.hillaryclinton.com/briefing/factsheets/2016/10/10/hillary-clintons-plan-for-combatting-climate-change-and-making-america-the-clean-energy-superpower-of-the-21st-century/](https://www.hillaryclinton.com/briefing/factsheets/2016/10/10/hillary-clintons-plan-for-combatting-climate-change-and-making-america-the-clean-energy-superpower-of-the-21st-century/) That’s what I mean - was she lying on her platform, lying during the debates, or simply ran as a representative of a party that was lying on its platform? Or did she mean she was going to award grants so people could build nuclear plants on their roofs? Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/17 "2016-12-05T14:52:45Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > That’s what I mean - was she lying on her platform, lying during the debates, or simply ran as a representative of a party that was lying on its platform? > > Or did she mean she was going to award grants so people could build nuclear plants on their roofs? > > Regards, > Shodan Clearly the Daily Caller did mislead others, but I can see why you will not deal with that. What does count indeed is what Clinton did put in writing and what the current president was doing. The point stands more because of who was elected as president. Most of what the OP is talking about nuclear will not be improved in a Trump administration because for Trump any effort to add the actual costs to the use of fossil fuels is based on a “hoax” and he will most likely ramp up efforts to increase the use of fossil fuels. That will, for all purposes, make nuclear power plants less viable. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/18 "2016-12-05T15:02:43Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > I don’t know what you are talking about. About your claim that removing obstacles to construction of nuclear plants “should be a no-brainer”. You’ve been misled by **Sam** ’s optimistic handwaving about the simplicity and ease of just “changing regulatory rules” to to make nuclear construction a snap. In fact, even with all the fast-tracking and massive support provided in the [2005 Energy Policy Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_energy_policy_of_the_United_States) and subsequent funding, new nuclear construction is still heavily stalled in the US: > [@](#): > > In total, over almost $5 billion, as well as extensive tax breaks, were originally designated for nuclear funding, but far more would be put forth to back the loan guarantees. […] This legislation jump-started the nuclear industry again by firmly establishing it as the alternate energy source that politicians wanted. Moreover, it provided financial backing for building, tax incentives, risk insurance, and repealed the Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935 which allowed utility companies to merge. […] > > Because of the enormous costs involved, the nuclear industry requested more loan guarantees from the government, totaling $100 billion. In February 2010, President Obama, who ran on a pro-nuclear platform, negotiated with the companies and added $36 billion to the budgeted $18.5 billion, bringing the total of $54.5 billion to the Presidential 2011 Budget for the DOE loans. […] > > […] NRG Energy has ended construction of the two largest proposed nuclear plants in South Texas. NRG claims that they will write off the $331 million investment as a loss and according to David Crane NRG’s CEO, that unless the situation changes, the chance of continuing is “extremely daunting and at this point not particularly likely.” […] NRG notes that there is a surplus in Texas of Natural Gas utilities and the nuclear incident in Japan has led to further funding problems for the facilities. […] The halting of construction of these reactors marks the “second of the four to die; Calvert Cliffs 3, in Maryland, seems unlikely at this point, because Constellation Energy could not reach financial terms with the Energy Department.” […] > > Many license applications filed with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for proposed new reactors have been suspended or cancelled. As of October 2011, plans for about 30 new reactors in the United States have been “whittled down to just four, despite the promise of large subsidies and President Barack Obama’s support of nuclear power, which he reaffirmed after Fukushima”. This launch failure has jack-shit to do with imaginary hordes of angry liberals all fired up to sue nuclear power plants: on the contrary, as repeatedly noted, the relatively liberal President Obama has been an enthusiastic supporter of nuclear power. The real obstacle is simply that **nuclear power plants are way freaking expensive** , and highly publicized occasional disasters make the public in general wary of them. (Not just liberals, either: only [slightly more than one-half of Republicans and slightly more than one-third of Democrats support nuclear energy generation](http://www.gallup.com/poll/190064/first-time-majority-oppose-nuclear-energy.aspx).) So investors are not finding nuclear power attractive, despite the favorable financing and regulatory packages that the government is offering for them. Instead of just whining about those terrible anti-nuke liberals, why not try changing some hearts and minds among your anti-nuke fellow conservatives who constitute nearly half of all US Republicans? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/19 "2016-12-05T15:15:56Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > As we see in this thread, liberals would rather use global warming to bash Republicans than do anything substantive about the problem. Pretty shameless, dude. One post mentions the Koch brothers, all the others up to this point were basically agreeing with the OP that nuclear would be good but he provided a tilted summary of the argument for it. But you need to turn it into typical partisan sniping by saying it’s already typical partisan sniping. Shameless. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2016, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910/20 "2016-12-05T15:30:37Z")
> [@SmartAlecCat](#): > > Nice detailed analysis of nuclear power by Richard Carrier (well researched, with sources linked): > > [The Shocking Reasons Why We Should Go Nuclear](http://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/11390) [ > [@](#): > > With a Ph.D. from Columbia University in ancient history, he specializes in the intellectual history of Greece and Rome, particularly ancient philosophy, religion, and science, with emphasis on the origins of Christianity and the use and progress of science under the Roman empire. He is also a published expert in the modern philosophy of naturalism as a worldview. ]([http://www.richardcarrier.info/about](http://www.richardcarrier.info/about))He sounds like a smart guy, but I don’t think energy is really his field, eh. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/global-warming-and-the-necessity-for-nuclear-power/773910.md?page=2)