January, 2009

On January 28, 2009, the Senate Foreign Relations committee invited former Vice President Al Gore in to testify about global climate change at its first major policy related hearing of the current Congress. Through the amazing tool of C-span video, I watched and listened carefully to the entire hearing...

While catching up on today's UPI news feed, I realized that there were a number of articles about intense negotiations on various aspects of at least three different natural gas pipeline systems. Budapest is hosting a gathering that includes representatives from financial organizations, Caspian area...

I love people who evaluate issues based on hard nosed facts and critical thinking. The Fulton Sun apparently hires writers who feel the same way. On Monday, January 26, 2009, Don Norfleet wrote an article for that publication titled Nuclear plant foes shift from environmentalists to consumer groups that...

I have recently become an active participant on TheEnergyCollective.com. It is an interesting site that is aggregating commentary and blog feeds from diverse source that include Dan Yurman's Idaho Samizdat and Joe Romm's Climate Progress . This morning I ran across a fascinating "inside...

There is a story in the Sunday, January 25, 2009 issue of the Washington Post that is contains one of the best illustrations of the Jevons Paradox that I have seen in a while. (From the Wikipedia entry - "In economics, the Jevons Paradox (sometimes called the Jevons effect) is the proposition that...

Joe Romm at Climate Progress has an interesting point to make about the frustrations of debating people who make stuff up on the fly . It can be quite challenging to be in a situation where you have done your homework, have all of the charts and graphs, and can speak with reasonable fluency about the...

Exelon is the largest electricity supplier in the country. It also owns and operates the largest fleet of nuclear power plants, with a total of 17 operational reactors that have an average capacity factor well in excess of 90%. Last week, it reported a 26% increase in its 4th quarter profit figures compared...

At the beginning of the gas supply interruption in Europe, I commented on the possibility that Russia, a nation of chess players , had made what might be a short sighted strategic move by cutting off gas supplies to Ukraine as part of a negotiation over sales prices to that former Soviet block country...

While browsing through this morning's Wall Street Journal (20 January 2009) I could not help noticing the below full page ad from Peabody Coal which claims to be the world's largest private sector coal company. It was in a prominent location for the the political junkie class - a special Inauguration...

A friend of mine just sent me a link to a desmogblog.com post describing a proud friends and family newsletter from a Virginia based public relations firm called Hawthorn Group. The newsletter provided numerous details about how Hawthorn Group used a focused set of traditional public relations tactics...

I published the promised episode of The Atomic Show with clips from Steven Chu's confirmation hearing with the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee this morning. After spending several hours listening and digesting the sworn testimony of the proposed leader for the DOE, my conclusion is...

Physical Insights is one of my favorite blogs to visit. It is produced by a science student at the University of Melbourne Australia. He recently produced a pithy post with two photos and some computations that should provide a lot of food for thought for those honest environmentalists that are concerned...

As a former resident of the west coast of Florida, (and the father of a daughter who still lives there), I gave a silent cheer this week as I read the news that Progress Energy had signed a contract to build two new nuclear plants at a green field site in Levy County. Part of the reason for my enthusiasm...

I have been spending the last couple of hours digesting Chu's responses to some very interesting questioning in preparation for an Atomic Show that I will be putting together this weekend. Though I have a great deal of respect and hope for what Chu should be able to accomplish, I am now less enthusiastic...

The gas crisis in Europe continues. The European Commission has sent a letter to Slovakia requesting clarification for the reason it has announced its intention to put aside its EU the accession agreement. That agreement, despite requests for reconsideration, resulted in shutting down two 408 MWe reactors...

Senators Lisa Murkowski, Jeff Sessions, Richard Burr, and Mary Landrieu all asked pointed, pro-nuclear questions during Steven Chu's confirmation hearing yesterday. Warms my heart to think that the message is finally getting across - there is NO supportable logic in a position that states that energy...

I knew it was going to be an interesting night, worth stretching my already long day to the point where I did not even leave DC until after my normal bedtime. The event was nearly custom designed to provide excitement, at least for a pro-fission geek like me. The headline acts at last night's Energy...

If you have followed any of my recent Twitter posts, (atomicrod) you will note that I have been involved for a day or so in an ongoing discussion with an anti-nuclear California lawyer from Marina Del Rey named Roger Sowell on Joe Romm's Climate Progress blog. It has been an enlightening experience...

I hope that the below copy is readable, but if not, you might try clicking on it to get access to a larger version. It came from the December 8, 2008 issue of Fortune Magazine. Just in case you cannot read the copy, here it is: "Tackling climate change and providing fuel for a growing population...

Eric Berger, writing for the Houston Chronicle, published an article on Friday titled Nuclear power's core of support gains strength . He provided some opposing view commentary from Peter Hartley, a man he describes as "an energy expert at Rice University". Here are some of the quotes from...

A couple of days ago, I linked to an article quoting Bulgarian President Georgi Parvanov stating a need to restart Kozludy 3, a 405 MWe nuclear power plant that was forced to shut down at the end of 2006 as a result of EU demands as part of Bulgaria's accession to the EU. A reader named Momchil provided...

I am not sure if anyone else will as amused as I am with the following quote, but I just had to share it. This is from an article titled International nuclear fuel program set for Monday published on January 9, 2009 in the Pahrump Valley Times, which bills itself as Nye County's largest newspaper...

Entergy and Dominion Resources have announced that they have been unable to reach an agreement with GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy on the details of building Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactors (ESBWR) as their next new nuclear power plants. Entergy had started the process of obtaining a Combined Construction...

As a result of the gas supply crisis in Europe, Bulgaria has announced the start of activities to begin producing electricity from Kozloduy 3 , a 405 MW reactor that was shut down in 2006. The reactor has been purposely maintained in a condition that would allow it to be restarted within approximately...

I have been getting into conversations with people about nuclear energy for several decades now, and nearly every one of them eventually gets around to "the waste issue". It happened to me again on Monday night during an interesting conversation with a politically active federal government...