World Changing has a debate on Nuclear Energy.

[suziedemocrat]

http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/004300.html#more

Interesting comments following the article.

Nuclear Power and Climate Change: Is Our Choice Glow or Cook? | Alex Steffen
A Newly Electric Green – Sustainable Energy, Resources and Design see all posts in this category

Nuclear energy, which not so long ago seemed an obvious dead-end to most people concerned about the environment, has seen its fortunes rise a bit lately as concerns over climate change (or climate chaos, as the latest buzzphrase goes) intensify.

The argument, as made by people like James Lovelock and the Wired crowd, goes something like this: we must make drastic cuts in our greenhouse emissions; renewable energy is not yet ready for prime time and efficiency improvements alone won't work; nuclear energy is safer than it was and is zero-carbon in operation; therefore, climate chaos demands a massive program of building nuclear reactors.

There are numerous problems with this argument. First and most pressingly, a massive global nuclear program raises massive unanswered questions about the realism of safely operating (and storing the radioactive waste from) so many reactors in so many places. Second, while more research needs to be done, it appears that nuclear energy is not all that climate-safe after all:

Nuclear power stations may produce less carbon dioxide pollution than those burning coal and gas, but analysis of the carbon footprint of nuclear, from extraction, through to decommissioning and waste storage, shows it to be more carbon-emitting than initially apparent.