Florida’s Nuclear Energy Scamming: It’s Not Rickover’s Atomic Power Program Anymore

[kristopher]

Florida’s Nuclear Energy Scamming: It’s Not Rickover’s Atomic Power Program Anymore



I was fortunate enough to be accepted into the Navy nuclear power program in the early 1970s. It was run at the time by a man the entire world owes an unpayable debt to, Admiral Hyman Rickover—Uncle Hymie. He was charged with taking the knowledge gained from the Manhattan Project and Enrico Fermi’s experiments at the University of Chicago in the 1930s and developing a safe and reliable nuclear reactor to power the first nuclear submarine, the USS Nautilus. He did. He built it from scratch. The Nautilus was reliable, safe and awesome.

...After his success and renown from the Nautilus project, the country was sold on the promise of peaceful uses of nuclear reactors to generate electricity. Think about it: no fuel costs. We were told that electricity would be so cheap, we wouldn’t even bother to meter it, it would come to your house for free.

Well, maybe. But Rickover had learned what this would require ensuring the safety of the American people. He basically invented the whole process. He knew these promises would never be kept unless the process was controlled by the government without the temptation to cut corners on the construction, operation, maintenance or lifespan of every plant. In short, he understood that you do not surround every city in America with slow-motion atomic bombs to provide electrical power in exchange for a profit to investors. That would invariably lead to cutting corners and disaster.

Rickover did what would be unthinkable today. He used his prestige to insist that any reactor used to generate electricity in the United States should be built and operated by the U.S. Navy to ensure its safety. After all, you did say the electricity would be free, so why would Wall Street want to build nuclear plants anyway?

So the first reactor ...

http://flaglerlive.com/26306/gc-fpl-nuclear-power

[Kolesar]

1. Florida utility customers have been forced to pay "construction work in progress" fees

...for nukes that will never be finished:

So these two will ask the Florida legislature to let them continue charging us all today, as they have for the past three years, for the nukes they plan to build in the future. And of course the lawmakers who enacted the scheme and the Florida Public Service Commission acting as lackey will let them. Energy independence, rah rah, Hugo Chavez, Arabs, Blablabla. In return for a few campaign contributions, a few rounds of golf, a consulting contract and a paid speech or two, we all know we are going to get screwed.

[kristopher]

2. CWIP for nuclear has a solid history of screwing ratepayers so there is no excuse...

... for not knowing the dangers. Given the plummeting costs of renewables nuclear, with it's extremely long lead time to build, is a terrible investment for both financial institutions and ratepayers.

What did you think of the writers perspective on Rickover? Here is another:

...Admiral Hyman Rickover, who was in charge of building the first nuclear power plant in the United States, Shippingport in Pennsylvania, and is heralded as the “father” of the nuclear navy, finally realized that. In a farewell address before a committee of Congress in 1982, as he retired, Rickover said, “I’ll be philosophical. Until about two billion years ago, it was impossible to have any life on Earth; that is, there was so much radiation on earth you couldn’t have any life—fish or anything.” This was from cosmic radiation around when the Earth was in the process of forming. “Gradually,” said Rickover, “about two billion years ago, the amount of radiation on this planet…reduced and make it possible for some form of life to begin…Now, when we go back to using nuclear power, we are creating something which nature tried to destroy to make life possible….every time you produce radiation” a “horrible force” is unleashed, said Rickover, “and I think there the human race is going to wreck itself.” Rickover went on to declare: we must “outlaw nuclear reactors.”

That was Rickover, a key figure in nuclear development in the U.S., not Greenpeace...

http://karlgrossman.blogspot.com/2010/11/push-to-revive-nuclear-power.html

[Kolesar]

3. Wow. Rickover was a man of great intellect.

It is not surprising that he sleuthed out the misguided plans.
At the other end of the debate was Edwin Teller, who was still writing opeds for building more nuclear bombs.

[kristopher]

4. He does seem to have maintained a firm grasp on reality...

A feat that stands in stark contrast to most of those engaged on operating the same technology for profit.

[kristopher]

5. Kick

[kristopher]

6. Kick for PamW