Too cheap to meter: 1960's promise, "The sun is free..."

[NNadir]

Recently, as part of the fun I've been having with a scientific illiterate, I've been rereading parts of the fascinating autobiographical account of the great scientist, Alvin Weinberg, who once headed Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

I have recently posted links to that work, "The First Nuclear Era: Life and Times of a Technological Fixer," American Institute Press, 1994.

Like the recently deceased Nobel Laureate Hans Bethe, who passed away at the age of 98, after a very full life (in the presence of - gasp - radiation), Weinberg is an ardent advocate of nuclear energy who also maintained profound liberal political sympathies.

(From Bethe's Guardian obituary: "Yet, in nuclear affairs, Bethe was perhaps the most polished, vocal and convincing of establishment figures. He balanced vigorous participation in disarmament negotiations against cautious but unwavering commitment to nuclear energy, which he saw as the only available bridge to safer energy technologies in the future.

He argued persuasively that the 1986 Chernobyl disaster was a product of design, engineering and control failures that could not occur in the west. And, like many establishment physicists involved with nuclear affairs, he sought to explain to an increasingly skeptical public, the virtue and value of applying risk assessment techniques to show how safe the nuclear option would be in the future.

Perhaps because he was amiable, relaxed, accessible, in possession of a huge store of knowledge and always generous, Bethe was much more than a winner of a vast array of awards and a truly great scientist. In matters of science, society and government, his approach was meticulous, his integrity absolute..."


He was delighted in 1992 when he shared the Albert Einstein Peace Award with Joseph Rotblat, thus joining an elite group of peacemakers, which then included Olof Palme, Andrei Sakharov and Mikhail Gorbachev..."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/obituaries/story/0,,1432534,00.html

One of the more stupid remarks - among a sets of remarks notable for their stupidity - that we frequently hear from anti-nuclear anti-environmental immoral hypocrites is that nuclear power is unacceptable because it is not "too cheap to meter." The justification for this remark is that in 1954 (more than fifty years ago) Levi Strauss, then head of the AEC predicted that atomic energy might be too cheap to meter. Of course, Strauss was speaking before any commercial nuclear power had been built.

While nuclear power is, in fact the cheapest form of fully loaded (this means including environmental costs) available, it decidedly is not "too cheap to meter." At the plant, nuclear energy costs, at most, about four or five cents per kilowatt hour.

http://www.nmcco.com/education/facts/business/outlook.htm

Although stupid people have been predicting the demise of the nuclear industry on economic grounds, the reactors crank along, day after day, year after year, producing more power than they ever have.

So let's ask the stupid solar only activists to identify a form of energy that is too cheap to meter.

Stupid "solar only" activists?

They can't identify a form of energy that is too cheap to meter?

I didn't think so.

Now, of course, solar only anti-environmental anti-nuclear activists love to tell you about the alleged nuclear failures. They have orgasms of stupidity whenever a pipe leaks, or a reactor shuts down, or - although it really hasn't happened much since Chernobyl almost 20 fucking years ago - someone is actually injured by nuclear activities. They think that by doing this, they are making some kind of point, but the trick - which even a sixth grader should be able to see through - is that anti-environmental anti-nuclear activists insist on seeing nuclear power in isolation.

I frequently make the point that people die every day - in Iraq, in New York City, in New Jersey, in Germany, in the Ukraine, in Belarus from fossil fuel operations - in much greater numbers each year than nuclear power has injured or killed in its entire existence. Anti-nuclear anti-environmental activists are rather notable, however, in insisting that this status quo remain in place. Vaguely they appeal to some solar nirvana that is supposed to take place in the distant future.

Some people may have the impression that this "solar only" balderdash - that we can save the earth's environment simply by appeal to solar energy and conservation - is new. It is not.

One of the more fascinating aspects of Weinberg's book is his personal acquaintance with thinkers who got caught up in the anti-nuclear hysteria of the 1970's. Weinberg traveled in liberal circles. One of the regrettable things about the 1960's and 1970's is that many of us - myself included - unlike Hans Bethe, became confused about the very real distinction between nuclear power and nuclear weapons. We became - much to our future intellectual embarrassment - knee jerk anti-nuclear power reactionaries. One senses Weinberg's very real pain about this state of affairs.

Weinberg writes the following about his 1960's relationship with his "friend" or former friend, Barry Commoner (anybody remember him?)

"These worries of the public were catalyzed by environmental activists such as Barry Commoner or Paul Ehrlich. (I had encountered Barry Commoner before he emerged as the prophet of American environmentalism: both of us had been on the board of Science Year, the widely circulated year book of the children's encyclopedia, the World book. Barry was tough, knowledgeable, and dedicated. But I gradually realized that his environmentalism was part of a large political agenda...restructuring of our political economic system along socialist lines...

...To my cry that inexhaustible nuclear energy was the only way to avert Malthusian disaster, Barry would retort, But the Sun is free..

(Bold and italics are mine.)

Let's repeat that for the benefit of those with poor reading comprehension skills:

The sun is free. - Barry Commoner, "solar only activist."

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/Summaries/V62I3P116-1.htm

Now, let's check with solar buzz which provides real time updates on the price of PV solar power:

http://www.solarbuzz.com/Moduleprices.htm

Let's see, January 2005, that would be now, some 40 or so years after Barry Commoner remarked that the sun is free. What is the price of one watt of solar power? $5.15. That means to light a 100 light bulb during the day, when the sun is shining brightly, when there is no snow cover, when there are no clouds, when all the local trees have been cut down, one would need to invest $515.00!

Free?

Too cheap to meter?

Well, since solar energy is not too cheap to meter, perhaps we should ban it, no?

Why is Barry Commoner different than Levi Strauss? Because stupid people say he is?

Here is the reality folks, unpleasant as it may seem. Anti-nuclear anti-environmental "solar only" activists are very, very, very, very selective in their attention. They are in fact, slick snake oil salesmen. What they are selling is not the glib, cheap, clean energy they promise.

They are selling you coal.

There is no free lunch. Issues of energy and the environment are serious matters that are best left to people who know how to think.

"Some thirty years ago, Barry Commoner calculated that an area less than the size of Arizona could, through solar energy, produce more than the current US energy needs. I once calculated that if I covered the roof of my southern California home with solar cells, I could, with adequate storage facilities, supply all my household electrical needs, with surplus watts to send to the power company. Solar panels produce electricity directly, and that electricity can, in turn, produce hydrogen through electrolysis – a process familiar to all high-school chemistry students..."

http://www.energybulletin.net/3510.html

Some thirty years ago... Where, exactly, the fuck is it, Barry?

[sce56]

1. I looked into getting a job working on solar projects sales etc guess who

owns them? Oil companies BP oil had a venture in PV cells and sold off to Shell Oil company. My take on it is they want to keep the cost up so when peak oil sets in they control the sun too! Right now the cost could be lower if some one more efficient than the oil companies owned the cell manufacturing plants then we would have real competition and less price fixing. Could you imagine all the roof tops in LA sucking electricity off the Sun that would idle a lot of fossil fueled power plants! Can we smell the irony of this here.

[dweller]

2. interesting site link

http://www.nanosolar.com/index.html

dp

[GumboYaYa]

3. Here's a radical suggestion....

maybe we should try conservation first. The energy we don't use is certainly cheaper than any from of energy we can produce, even that which is too cheap to meter (if there ever could be such).

Energy consumption isn't the only consumption that is polluting our environment. Even assuming nuclear is no threat to the envirnment (which requires one to ignore the actual history of the nuclear industry), cheap energy regardless of the source allows people to continue to live suburban lives with all the toys and gadgets that they desire. Making and running those toys and gadgets, not to mention the trappings of suburbia, creates outlandish amounts of waste.

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[GumboYaYa]

5. ROFLMAO

Yes, China and India are big producers of greenhouse gases and that is expected to grow. But then exactly what do you think they are doing with the extra energy they are now demanding. Here's a clue, they are building toys and gadgets for Americans.

Excessive energy usage is one form of pollution in the world, but there are many other types of pollution that are produced as an anciallry to the type of lifestyle permitted by cheap energy. My fear is that people will jump at the simple solution of nuclear power and feel that permits them to continue to live their wasteful lifestyles.

Regardless of your protestations to the contrary, nuclear energy production has a history of pollution. You like to ask people to name one person killed by nuclear power generation (which I have done) to try to make the point that it is harmless, but that is a canard. No one has ever ben killed by CO2, but we all recognize the problems it creates. Nuclear is much the same, while there may not be immediate death caused by nuclear pollution there is lots of evidence that there are significantly higher cancer rates around plants where pollution has occured.

For nuclear to be truly safe on a global basis requires cooperation between nations that does not exist. While we may manage the industry in the US so that terrorists don't get access to nuclear materials, how do we assure that is the case worldwide? Not to mention the fact that nuclear industry is private industry in most cases. So long as there is a profit motivation, there is substantial risk that the owners of facilities will cut corners in building design and maintenance that could have devastating effects.

So we see that nuclear energy, to be safe, requires cooperation on the government and industry level that does not exist. Maybe, just maybe, we should not pin all our hopes on this one answer. Maybe, just maybe the problem and the solution is just a little more complex than rushing head-long into building more nuclear power plants.

Wind power is at least as promising as nuclear in the US and is expanding rapidly. It is at least part of the solution (and I know about back-up power so don't go on that tirade). Solar is more of an individual solution and currently does not work as a centralized production and distribution system, but there are places where solar will be useful. If we had dumped the money into the solar industry that we have dumped into nuclear power, solar research would be much farther along. There is also biodiesel, which can be generated from many different wastes. There is some very promisimg research in using algae and muncipal waste to produce biodiesel. In Missouri, where I live, there is a signifigant amount of biomass that can be used for energy production at a very low cost. The possible solutions to the energy problems are widespread. Nuclear has its place, but IMO it should be used minimally given the problems with potential pollution and storing waste.

Conservation and diversification in the sources of our energy is the key to strength. I simply can not agree that nuclear is the only answer to our energy problems. Anyone who espouses a one-solution answer to this complex problem is very difficult to take seriously.

[jpak]

7. Although I agree with most of you post

I disagree with the notion that PV cannot be used for large scale grid applications

Germany announces the construction of a new "world record"-sized (MW scale) PV facility every few months.

Portugal is building a 116 MW PV facility - compare that to the "famous" (LMAO) 110 MW Pebble Bed Reactor (which doesn't exist).

PV can be adapted for small-scale and should be distributed, but that doesn't mean that it can't produce MWh or TWh of electricity for the grid.

[thegreatwildebeest]

6. Actually...

Nobody with half a brain is against energy efficiency and conservation. However nobody with any brain matter at all, Barry Commoner, 1970's twit aside, should pretend that we are going to conserve our way out of this tragedy. People have been talking this way since Commoner first began loud wishful thinking. Many strides in conservation have been made, but look outside: Our climate is still collapsing.

Actually, very few strides in conservation have been made. Are cars still the predominant form of transportation? Yes. Is most of our food production reliant on a vast, oil fueled transport network and methods that deteriorate land and have dangerous run off? Yes. Do we have recycling bins now? Yes, but that doesn't mean conservation is happening, in any serious way.


Again: There is no free lunch. There isn't just one solution that is available to people who provide us with endless stupid Greenpeace links. To deny the importance of nuclear power is to demand for middle class rich person reasons the deprivation and poverty of billions of people. This isn't merely an issue of game boys and coffee grinders or SUV's.

Funny you should mention coffee grinders. A leading cause of deforestation in many countries (besides expanding commercial farming) is America's insatiable taste for coffee, grown often times through forests that have been slashed and burned in order for farmers (who often get paid nothing) to make ends meet.


People who oppose nuclear power lack supple minds, even the barest understanding or risk analysis, and very selective, self-serving, and rather egocentric attention.

Ridiculous, overly broad generalizations are not conducive to debate and discussion.


It is well understood that uncontrolled population growth is closely tied to economic hopelessness and poverty. This may come to a surprise to people who are only contemplating issues of whether or not their consumer toys have problems, but many people in the world have children in hopes of providing for their old age, and high infant mortality, poor access to health care, etc, etc do cause people (if stupidly), to more children than they can really manage. Also their is the matter of the low status of women, which in turn is connected with ignorance and poverty.

Actually, most if not all mainstream environmental groups recognize the problem of overpopulation. It is a touchy subject though, since the words "population control" raise spectres of eugenics and forced sterilization. Many people are confronting the unwanted pregnancy issue in many poor countries by increasing sexual education awareness and access to condoms and abortion. These things are no magic bullets, but they can help, alongside educational programs and jobs (which you mention below).


The best way to conserve is probably to provide decent (not luxurious, but decent) living standards as a basic human right. This is not possible with fossil fuels nor with solar fantasies and reciting empty repetitious drivel about some PV scheme that will be available in four or five putative decades.

I think everyone here would agree that a decent living standard is a basic human right. But that is not possible with nuclear energy either. Nuclear energy does not solve the problem of water usage, it does not solve the problem of deforestation, it does not solve the problem of corporate agriculture that deteriroates and destroys the land. Nuclear energy is not a pancea. Changing the energy source of a vast and wasteful society will not make it all of a sudden sustainable. The issues that confront the earth are multipronged ones.


If you want to talk conservation, I think the best place to start is to face those whose numbers outweigh the fact that their per capita energy consumption is low. This may also come as a surprise, but they are human beings. Look them in the face and tell them that their problems can be solved by banning game boys.

Look them in the face and explain to them that they need to adopt some sort of population control scheme, ala what you vaguely suggest below.

China, now climbing out poverty, is the only country on earth with a well developed officially sanctioned program of population control. This is, I expect, because for the first time in many centuries, the Chinese finally have something to lose. The Chinese, I note, lead the world in nuclear power expansion.

They also happen to have a human rights abuse record a mile long, vast stretches of poverty, and many environmental issues beside air quality (pollution of water, heavy coal mining, vast and ridiculous terraforming projects). Population control "programs" smell alot like India's attempts at forced sterilization and vaguely of eugenics programs that anti-immigration and white supremecist groups go after. Any forced population control program is rife with too many problems, too many potentials for prejuidice/discrimination to be realistic. People have to be willing to make the choice themselves, and all things considered, I think most people WOULD if given the chance. Most women, i am sure, would not want to be merely child factories if they could MAKE something of themselves. The opportunities in third world coutnries, hwoever, are limited, and need to be expanded.

[jpak]

8. Snake oil indeed

The cost of PV has declined 100-fold since the 1970's...

http://www.unu.edu/unupress/unupbooks/uu24ee/uu24ee0j.htm

...and continues to decline today. Between 2000 and 2004 the average cost of PV modules declined from ~$5.90 per peak watt to ~4.90 per peak watt - a >4% decline per year. The recent rise in PV module costs is due to high demand for PV modules in Europe and Japan. As the PV industry is adding hundreds of MW of new production capacity each year, prices are expected to continue their historic downward price trend once this bottleneck is removed.

Note: the lowest priced PV modules on the market today are ~$3.36-3.71 per peak watt.

http://www.solarbuzz.com/

The cost of PV electricity in Japan (arguably the world leader in PV production and installation) is 11-15 cents per kWh compared to 21 cents per kWh for juice from the nucular powered grid.

http://www.energybulletin.net/2567.html

The cost of wind power is also declining...down 80% since the 1980's

http://www.worldmarketsanalysis.com/InFocus2002/articles/global_energy.html

http://www.sustainableenergy.org/resources/technologies/wind.htm

In contrast, the cost of nucular power has only increased with time.

According to the California Energy Commission, the cost of electricity from new nucular plants is 11.1-14.5 cents per kWh - the most expensive option considered.

www.awea.org/pubs/factsheets/Cost2001.PDF

In 1972, the 920 MW Maine Yankee nucular plant cost $231 million dollars to build - around 25 cents per installed kW.

http://www.nukeworker.com/pictures/thumbnails174.html

(Note: it cost >500 million to decommission).

In 1994, the 1200 MW Watts Bar plant (the last nuke to be built in the US) cost $7 billion - or $5883 per kW (compare this to the current cost PV modules on the market today ~ $3500-5100 per peak kW).

The price of uranium will only increase (the sky's the limit)

The cost of Yucca Mountain rose from ~$20 billion in the late '80's to more than $60 billion today - and that doesn't include the $50 billion nucular plant operators are seeking from the DOE in additional spent fuel disposal costs.

The costs of decommissioning currently operating US nucular plants is $23 billion (and rising).

The costs of decommissioning US uranium mines is in the billions of dollars (and rising).

There's a reason why no nucular plants have been ordered since 1973...

and there's a reason why the PV industry is BOOMING today...

Economics trumps Cry-baby Logic every time.

[hunter]

9. Wow, a whole damned motherload of fake numbers!

The way you started it out with "The cost of PV has declined 100-fold since the 1970's..." has set me in fine spirit for such calculations.

In 1955 PV cost $1800 a watt, which is about $12,000 in today's money. So I want to yell:

The cost of PV has declined 3,000-fold!!! _{(since 1955)}

I am especially amused by our nation's Yucca Mountain accounting. Yucca Mountain is the political equivalent of ancient Egyptian tomb building. In fact to pay for it all we might bury dead people in there right alongside the nuclear waste. Maybe we could suggest to some gullible Hollywood Celebrities or GOP billionaires that it's possible the radiation will bring them back to life and cure their impotence. I suspect they would pay mightily for the prvilige.

Now, now Mr. Bush, when you do find yourself brought back to life by the radiation the motion detectors will turn on the lights and you'll see a case of cold beer and a telephone right over there. Pick up the phone and one of Dick Cheney's hot young mutant clones will be right along to help you out. Once you've had your beer, of course...

It could happen...

3000 years from now, one of your ancestors may be digging around in Yucca Mountain, maybe cracking open a few "caskets" here and there, expecting to find the remains of carefully preserved kings, but without my "born again" Yucca Mountain human burial plan, he will be disappointed and leave the place to report that people in the early twenty first century actually worshiped nuclear waste. (No, he will not die in fiery green smoke and flames like the guy who opened the trunk in Repo Man. After 3000 years this nuclear waste will be just as dull and quietly malevolent as the less exotic non-nuclear waste we leave behind. 3000 years from now folks will have learned to expect such crap from us.)

Yes, it's true, there's a reason why no nucular plants have been ordered since 1973... at least in the United States, anyways. Mostly it's a dumb reason. I know there are some perfectly good non-dumb reasons out there, but they are sometimes difficult to find.

Just a quick note, this may be my last post here for a couple of weeks. I'm off on a road trip. I'll see if I can find some good reasons along the way, but probably not anything to do with nuclear power. (In my twisted youth I was quite the Don Quixote...) If I'm lucky and my wife (or homeland security) doesn't stop me, maybe I'll get some good pictures of power lines, ant hills, and windmills.

See y'all around. I love this place.

[jpak]

10. Which numbers are "fake" ??????

I can wait...have a good trip!

:)

[NNadir]

13. Economics? Please demonstrate where one (just one) nuclear power

plant has been shut down because of cheaper solar power.

Anywhere.

On earth.

You can't?

I didn't think so.

Solar power isn't free. Now, we are all acutely aware of the extreme lack of mathematical ability of the solar only crowd but, just for fun, let's pretend that they could (because they so love that word "could") multiply:

3.81/watt (if in fact this number, the "cheapest" cited above is remotely connected with reality) is the equivalent of a nuclear power plant (1000 MWe) that would cost $3,810,000,000 dollars for 1000 MWe. But now, the solar plant doesn't work at night, does it? So, in fact, pretending for the benefit of the stupid that there is 100% efficiency for battery storage (which is NOT free any more than solar power is free), we have to double the price on average, i.e. provide two solar.

That means a 1000 MWe solar plant will require actually 2000 MWe of solar capacity or roughly 7.8 billion dollars. Then we have clouds, and then we have the fact that batteries are no more free than the solar electricity was 30 years ago (when Barry Commoner promised it) than it is when other equally vapid dunderheads promise today.

Now, I can imagine what kind of carrying on would happen if every nuclear plant cost $7,800,000,000 and depended on all kinds of "free batteries" running at 100% efficiency.

One thing that mathematically weak anti-environmental anti-nuclear dunderheads are not is consistent. They obviously lack even a modicum of intellectual self-respect and are clearly unafraid of doublespeak. Like George Bush himself they certainly apply magical thinking. No risk or cost counts if you say "solar" and every risk or cost is magnified when you say "nuclear."

What intellectual weaklings! They must be high or something.

PV solar power is not too cheap to meter. It is not, as predicted in the early 1970's "free." It is in fact (with the obvious exception of wind power, which is a form of solar energy) the most expensive energy option known. This is why it doesn't provide even 2% of of the world's electrical energy.

Even the head of Siemen's solar power is predicting less than 1% of the worlds electricity by 2023!

"However, the focus is now on widespread application of small distributed grid connected systems at individual household or commercial building scale. For example in 1998 a demonstration system of 26 solar skylights covering 25,000 square meters was installed at a car plant in the UK capable of generating sufficient electricity to meet all the plants lighting needs. Similarly the world's largest rooftop system with a capacity of 1 MW was installed in Germany. Since the early 1990's the government and utility companies have subsidized over 10,000 grid-connected roof-top systems. Japan has initiated a more ambitious program to install 70,000 systems over 10 years with the ultimate aim of having 4600 MW of PV in place by
2010. The US has announced a one million rooftop initiative which translates to 3000 MW at an average of 3 kW per rooftop.

Total installed capacity worldwide is about 600-700 MWp. The managing director of the PV company, Siemens Showa Solar, recently made the point that if worldwide electricity consumption continues at its existing long-term growth rate of 2.5%, and the PV industry were to maintain an annual growth rate of 25%, PV would contribute
1% of the world's electricity supply by 2023."

http://www.greenhouse.gov.au/markets/mret/pubs/6_solar.pdf

(Pay attention to that little p after MW, the abbreviation for "megawatt." It means "peak." That's right folks, these numbers for installed nuclear power are represented only when the solar capacity us performing maximally, you know, that twenty minute period around noon.

Lately I am repeatedly being called a "crybaby," by the intellectually weak. Sometimes they manage accidentally to state the truth: I am crying indeed. I am so sick of weak minded mendacity, the tedious illusions of those who can't think that it makes me weep. It makes no difference if the weak's misrepresentations consist of pretending that global climate change isn't real or whether their misrepresentations include the claim that it can be solved by some magical solar industry that yet, after 30 years of empty promises, still has a minuscule impact. The effect is the same:

There is an immoral attempt to weaken our efforts against one of the greatest crises of our time (maybe even of any time).

All one can do in the face of stupidity that repeats itself, whether it comes from a mindless acting President, a mindless wasted Greenpeace twit, or any other such person, is to calmly and clearly repeat the truth. We cannot expect that these people will ever recognize the truth or respect the truth, since they have little dignity, intellectual or otherwise, but we do want to have our statements out there for comparison with reality. Sooner or later reality's ugly head must be confronted.

Now, I am sure I am about to be barraged with stupidity yet again, but I will nonetheless repeat the truth, merely because telling the truth is more and more important in a world that thrives on distortion and outright lies: Solar only energy advocates are not going to provide some magical nirvana of holy solar energy. They are not Santa Claus bringing bright and shiny toys that work. They are bringing you lumps of coal, vast lumps of coal that will kill you, kill your children and may yet kill most of the life on earth.

[thegreatwildebeest]

14. Well...

"Economics? Please demonstrate where one (just one) nuclear power plant has been shut down because of cheaper solar power.

Show me a nuclear power plant that has not benefitted in some form of another, from government subsidies? Nuclear energy was heavily subsidized in its beginnings, and solar and wind have not received anywhere near that amount of money or legislative blessing as America gave nuclear power in the 50's and 60's. I'm not saying this is good, bad, or ugly, but you seem to love to point out that the solar industry has not made great leaps or bounds in the past 30 years, yet the nuclear industry in America did not spring up over night with GE and Westinghouse producing plants. It took (and still takes) significant amounts of government funded research, promotion, and limited liability to get power companies to sign on to nuclear power. Why if its okay for the nuclear power industry to get as much, that wind and solar don't?


Lately I am repeatedly being called a "crybaby," by the intellectually weak. Sometimes they manage accidentally to state the truth: I am crying indeed. I am so sick of weak minded mendacity, the tedious illusions of those who can't think that it makes me weep. It makes no difference if the weak's misrepresentations consist of pretending that global climate change isn't real or whether their misrepresentations include the claim that it can be solved by some magical solar industry that yet, after 30 years of empty promises, still has a minuscule impact. The effect is the same:

Calling people twits from the get go and then barraging anyone who disagrees as "intellectually weak" does not endear you to others, nor does it lead to productive discussion. If you can't keep the discussion to the relevent arguments without calling people names and cutting them down then it makes YOU (and by proxy your arguments) look bad to neutral parties. If I was to come onto this board and see someone representing what you readily admit is not a well accepted position and see that person calling others names, I'm not even going to bother reading the rest of what he has to say. Why should I? Clearly he can't keep the argument strictly to the facts. And if other people are being childish about than don't stoop to their level.


Now, I am sure I am about to be barraged with stupidity yet again, but I will nonetheless repeat the truth, merely because telling the truth is more and more important in a world that thrives on distortion and outright lies: Solar only energy advocates are not going to provide some magical nirvana of holy solar energy. They are not Santa Claus bringing bright and shiny toys that work. They are bringing you lumps of coal, vast lumps of coal that will kill you, kill your children and may yet kill most of the life on earth.

This whole paragraph, but particuarly the last, is absurd. It presumes a number of things, one that those who advocate a solar only response are responsible for the wasteful, polluting society were living in (if anyone is responsible for killing "you" or anyones children its the people at the energy companies and their cronies in government), two that nuclear energy is a pancea (it is not, for a number of reasons that have nothing to do with energy grids), and three that most if not all solar only advocates lie about the ability to sustain the status quo with solar (I have never heard anyone suggest solar power can replace things as they are without a corresponding dive in consumption).

I think the focus on the backend energy problem to the neglect of other issues is detrimental because it doesn't solve numerous other problems which are just as immediate as the climate change issue. The issue of soil erosion, of heavy nitrate deposits in rivers which are leading to ever larger algea blooms, the issue of corporate agriculture and genetically modified plants, the issue of water, the issue of population etc etc. These things will not be fixed by either solar or nuclear energy.

[jpak]

15. OK

The Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) shut down its Piece of Shit Rancho Seco Reactor in 1989 and replaced it with a PV array (until recently the world's largest PV array but now puny by European standards).

http://www.solarelectricpower.org/SEPA_Member_News/index_detail.cfm?LinkAdvID=22126

Here's a nice little thumbnail pic of the SMUD PV array and the shut down Piece of Shit Rancho Seco Reactor...

http://www.forth.com/resources/appNotes/app-smud.html

SMUD produces some of the lowest priced electricity in California and weathered the Enron inspired "electricity crisis" of the early 1990's with ease.

http://www.smud.org/residential/rates.html

Some other numbers to make the nucular crowd hold their breath until they turn blue.

Cost of Watts Bar I (1200 MW) = $6.8 billion

http://www.iecan.org/072503.html

Cost of Seabrook 1 (1100 MW) = $7 billion

http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/news/061105_APstate_nukeresurgence.html

Makes $7.8 billion for 2000 MW of PV look REAL good.

Since 1947, nucular power has received $145 billion in government subsidies compared to $5 billion for solar and wind combined - and no new US reactors have been ordered by US utilities since 1973.

The Cheney Regime, however, wants to throw good money after bad with their Nuclear Power 2010 initiative, which should pacify the pro-nucular whiner crowd...

Unka DIck - Baby Want Glow Suckie! Baby Want Glow Suckie!!!!

http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=1933

http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=4528

http://www.cato.org/dailys/05-18-01.html

http://64.233.179.104/search?q=cache:uE4zUZ3ssOkJ:www.nirs.org/factsheets/doefy2006budgetfactsheet.pdf+bush+nuclear+power+subsidies&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

http://www.commondreams.org/views01/0519-04.htm

and check this out...

http://www.climateark.org/articles/reader.asp?linkid=42222

[Kolesar]

11. I wish First Energy's reactors would crank along, day after day

..year after year, producing power. Perry #1 tripped off line once again about a week ago. This happens too often. I think that company has some training problems. They are the ones who brought us the blackout of 2003. It gave my favorite brewery a great name for one of its great beers.

[phantom power]

12. where can I get me some of that?

[Kolesar]

16. It is in the stores near me

Great Lakes Brews are shipped cold and have a limited shelf life because they do not use preservatives (so I recall).

The company also sources biodiesel. yay