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I have finally worked my way through nearly 3 hours of the town hall meeting at the National Clean Energy Summit 2.0 held on August 10, 2009 in Las Vegas Nevada. The panel included John Podesta , President and CEO of Center for American Progress, Al Gore, Harry Reid, T. Boone Pickens and Cathy Zoi ,...

During my nearly thirty years of being a nuke, I have participated in hundreds of conversations about the basis for the widespread misunderstandings about the technology that are held by the general public. A variety of possible causes have been proposed over sodas, beers and glasses of wine including...

Some of the commenters on my recent fusion related posts have been quite defensive and irritated by my skepticism. They claim that there is a lot of value in the experiments that I have not mentioned. They also have told me that my assertions about the sales efforts by the fusion science backers have...

On the Economist web site, I found an article officially titled Greenstanding: Gordon Brown’s New Deal will do little to advance renewable energy . The reason I used the word "officially" is that title is the one that is displayed on the visible page on the web and in print, but the title tagged...

There is an article in the Chicago Tribune titled Chicago's 'green' promise fades: Chicago taxpayers on hook for carbon credits that do little to fight global warming that tells the story of the city purchasing carbon offsets from a plant burning wood waste from the forest products industry...

A friend reminded me that I need to keep an eye on the activities of Better Place - an electric car company with some intriguing ideas and growing momentum. They appear to be signing up additional industrial, financial and government partners for their idea of building and deploying electric cars by...

One of the big ideas in promoting a large industry dedicated to producing solar panels and wind turbines is the "feed in tariff". As practiced in Germany, this concept guarantees that any supplier of power using approved methods can sell the power at a price high enough to provide a rate of...

Arstechnica has a story titled Nuclear power? Yes please! inspired by a session titled Keeping the Lights on: The Revival of Nuclear Energy for Our Future held on February 14, 2009 at the American Association for the Advancement of Science annual meeting in Chicago. Apparently the writer has been mulling...

The more I have read about the discussions surrounding Vermont Yankee's license extension, the more I have become convinced that the underlying major issue is the fact that its customers are trying to establish a strong negotiation position. Not only is the plant up for an operating license extension...

Nancy Thorner of Lake Bluff has written a letter to the editor of the Daily Herald to tell them she would rather have a restarted Zion Nuclear Plant in her backyard than accept several proposed wind turbines that would produce just a tiny fraction of the power - if the wind blows from the right direction...

One of the weapons that the anti-nuclear movement used against nuclear power in the first Nuclear Age was the testimony of disgruntled workers who often had legitimate concerns about the way that their particular slice of the industry was being managed. In some cases, the specific workers became so disillusioned...

I have always tried to be clear when I talk about how fossil fuel interests have been responsible for much of the success of the organized anti-nuclear movement. Many people in various discussion forums have misinterpreted my words "fossil fuel interests" as meaning just major oil companies...

The Wall Street Journal has published an editorial by William (Bill) Tucker, author of Terrestrial Energy , titled There Is No Such Thing As Nuclear Waste . Of course, we all know that headline is a bit of an oversimplification designed to capture attention, but the sentiments are in the right place...

Sometimes I collect documents and brochures at conferences and gatherings and never get around to reading them. Other times, it just takes me a couple of days before I get "a round tuit". Last Friday I attended "Beyond Electricity" a talk sponsored by The Heritage Foundation and Third...

A friend sent me a link that once again indicated that the Internet, despite search engines and alerts, is still a source of content and opinions that is so vast you can still find surprises about even a very narrowly focused topic. I have been publishing and researching articles and commentary about...

Joe Romm, that predictable purveyor of climate crisis talk made illogical by his strong dislike or disregard for atomic tools, has written a piece for Salon.com titled The heat is on Bill Gates (registration required). The basis premise of the article is that Bill Gates, who is operating a foundation...

Quick note - go and read Op-Ed: Nuclear Power is looking for a new identity and the associated comments. The blog is not supportive of atomic energy, but the comments sure are interesting. Off to enjoy the warmth of the coming spring with another lengthy bike ride. ...read more

I remain offended and disappointed the the US House and Senate decided to remove the provisions in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 that would have enabled an additional $50 Billion in private capital to be made a bit more available to projects using innovative new nuclear power plants...

Darren and Heather McLaughlin are the editors of Our Green Empire which describes itself by the following profile statement: Our Green Empire is a blog devoted to eco-friendly solutions for modern living. The environment is our friend, and sustainability is our goal. Here is an example quote from a March...

A friend shared a link to a well written, fact-based opinion piece by Donald Jones published in TheStar.com titled No Future For Wind In Ontario . According to Jones's by-line, he is a retired professional engineer with 35 years of experience in CANDU reactor design. Here are some quotes from the...

Green Leaf Report has a thoughtful post about nuclear power, its public perception, and the way that some people have an immediate, negative response to the idea of increased use of nuclear technologies. The author even uses one of my favorite phrases - fear, uncertainty and doubt (aka FUD) - to describe...

A few days ago, I stumbled into a discussion on Green Party Watch about Progress Energy's proposed plant in Levy County Florida . That discussion turned rather interesting, especially once I was able to get my comments through the spam filter. One of the commenters, who turned out to be one of the...

One of the debate challenges that pro-nuclear advocates face is that the forces opposed to using nuclear energy have some glib spokesmen who have been able to insert so much chaff into the argument that casual observers get completely befuddled. One of the more difficult rhetorical tools to overcome...

One of the arrows often slung against nuclear fission power is that the technology is only useful in extra large sizes. For people of the small is beautiful mentality, that thought provides a strong negative connotation and a reason for battling against the forces of wealth and power represented by centralized...

It continues to frustrate me that mainstream environmental groups cannot bring themselves to change their political alignment to include acceptance that nuclear fission power is a real alternative to fossil fuel combustion. I feel like I have so much in common with most members of the Sierra Club - I...