Right now its the only way. There is a reason we use fossil fuels so much; muscle. Its that simple. Fossil fuels give you a lot of energy. That's why you run your car on gas and not solar power, you need horsepower and gas is the only choice if you want to go more than 2 miles an hour. Fossil fuels are so popular because they are good its not rocket science. Renewables are unfortunately just not up to the task. They are very expensive and inefficient, and due to reasons of fundamental laws of physics simply do not give you the same kind of power as fossil fuels. They are a supplement. They will never been a replacement.
Nuclear is not technically renewable it uses fissionable material (uranium, plutonium or thorium which is making big waves) which is finite in the Earth's crust. Thing is this stuff releases so much energy you don't need a lot. The laws of chemistry dictate that you cannot get more than about 17MJ/kg out of a chemical fuel, but nuclear gives you about 82 million MJ/kg so you can get the same amount of energy with a lot less fuel. So there is enough to last several thousand years.
Basically if you want an energy source that is carbon free and doesn't mean you'll have to go back to using candles and horse drawn carts, its got to be nuclear. There simply isn't another technology on this planet.
Some people say that renewable power could supply our energy needs by 2050. To such people, I ask, what about the other 10% and what about the meantime? We could wean ourselves off of fossil fuels twice as fast if we use nuclear power as well as renewable power, compared with renewable power alone. This difference could be crucial in keeping the warming below 2 degrees C.
Alph
You can say the same thing about wind power, hydro power or geothermal power. There have been solar powered aircraft, but they would not be practical airliners.
It definitely needs to be part of the toolkit. It will take a while before we can meet all of our energy needs with renewable energy, or before we can develop nuclear fusion instead of fission (that is, energy made by smushing hydrogen atoms together instead of energy made by breaking apart larger atoms). If we don't use nuclear power, then we'll have to keep using coal and the like that much longer.
However, we do need to exercise appropriate caution, to avoid nuclear accidents. And we should be looking into thorium reactors and the like, and into ways we can *safely* reduce the costs of nuclear power.
When hydrogen and methane fuel cells become economically viable we will see an expansion of fossil fuel consumption considering that is a main source for mass production of hydrogen and methane. But yes we need more nuclear power plants and an updated and more locally centric power grid.
it's a costly option and only good for stationary application- you can't fly airplane with it unless converting power to a portable fuel. I'm not a fan of current Uranium fission. Breeder/thorium would probably work in some applications and Fusion might still occur- again for some applications.
most of the solar and wind power is not concentrated enough, but that's what they said about PC's vs mainframes back in the 80's. we can have an 'energy internet' that can work. Lots of small distributed systems have advantages over concentrated centers. On renewables, we've only started to tap tidal power and geothermal- there is a lot of energy not used.
we can do better with fossil fuels too, moving to natural gas from coal, refusing to drive cars with 5% efficiency, have much better heating/cooling systems and efficient buildings.
Dependence on fossil fuels is an extremely difficult problem to solve. Global warming and the other consequences of enhanced atmospheric absorption of infrared are the main problems with it, though not the only ones.
It is hard to disagree with most non-partisan, professionally informed people on the matter, who say that a variety of of alternative means of energy production should be utilised, according to the merits of each and the stage of development and implementation of the technologies.
The production of highly radioactive material is alarming, because of the potential harm it can do. There have now been two major accidents involving nuclear waste: Chernobyl and Fukushima. Also, the spectre of thousands of years of radiactivity of waste products is a reality. For these reasons, its hard to resist the conclusion that there must be a 'better way'.
Global warming ended in 2012 November. / Mike/ Global command
It is a good power source. It is in its infantile state and the atom could be used more efficiently, but when you have nit-wits influencing our legislation you will never advance to where nuclear energy is really safe and efficient.
Quote by Paul Ehrlich, professor, Stanford University: “Giving society cheap, abundant energy would be the equivalent of giving an idiot child a machine gun.”
Quote by Jeremy Rifkin, Greenhouse Crisis Foundation: “The prospect of cheap fusion energy is the worst thing that could happen to the planet.”
The fact is, there are people in power like this who need a problem to stay in power. Cheap efficient power is good for mankind but not good for these evil people who use energy to control you.
There is no AGW. It has never been close to being scientifically proven. So yes, nuclear power is good, but it will never solve a problem that isn't really a problem.
Quote by Ottmar Edenhoffer, high level UN-IPCC official: "We redistribute de facto the world's wealth by climate policy...Basically it's a big mistake to discuss climate policy separately from the major themes of globalization...One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. This has almost nothing to do with environmental policy anymore."
Quote by Club of Rome: "In searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill....All these dangers are caused by human intervention....and thus the “real enemy, then, is humanity itself....believe humanity requires a common motivation, namely a common adversary in order to realize world government. It does not matter if this common enemy is “a real one or….one invented for the purpose."
global warming? what century are you from. scientists found about five years ago (the century comment was a joke) that since approx. 1935 the earth has actually been going into a global cooling due to the frontal breakdown of the multan core, buf if that theory was still ineffect then dam enegy (water power energy) is the best to avoid global warming.
I would say so. Nuclear powerstations are very good at producing lots of steady power. Wind turbines would be much better if we had a cheap way to store the electricity from them. Then it would not matter so much that they often produce electricity when we don't need it and don't produce any when we do.
If we could perfect thorium reactors then it would be even safer than now. Governments wanted to use uranium because the same technology helped to make bombs.
Yes without doubt, but a lot of work needs to be done, and it needs at least ten years before they come on line, we have wasted so much time, thorium reactors were invented in 1980 in the U.S. before the idea was scrapped, now China is researching and developing them, looks like in the future we will have to buy nuclear power stations from them.
There are many options, small modular stations, pebble reactors, thorium, fast breeders, but our stupid politicians are ignoring them.
may be..
it's a best way to reduced global warming
First understand there is no global warming to worry about.
Top climate scientists say there is no man-made Global Warming.
The Great Global Warming Swindle
It's like fixing a broken arm by amputation rather then setting it in a cast. It works but it's not the best way
One word... Fukushima. Nuclear power is dangerous and dirty. We have clean technology, but the people in charge need to let us use it.
"Best"? No, but it is an alternative.
no it is not sustainable with uranium shortage and the waste is dangerous to handle
