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I returned last night from a short vacation to Washington, DC. I am such an atomic geek that my idea of a vacation is to spend a couple of days at the Nuclear Energy Assembly (NEA) in a dim hotel conference room surrounded by a crowd of business leaders, many in dark suits who qualify [...] The post...

A couple of days ago, Andrew, an Atomic Insights contributor pointed me to Dr. Peter Sandman, a man who built a career out of helping large organizations improve their ability to communicate about risk. I want to thank Andrew for helping me to put a name to a topic that I’ve been wanting to study...

One of the primary reasons I am sharing the above video is that it has an analog in the multi-decade effort to restrict the growth of nuclear technology. Though not the topic of this talk, Mark pointed out the similarity between the anti GMO and antinuclear movements. At minute 15:30 he said: Indeed...

This is the kind of TV spot that we need the public to see at least as often as they see ads for “clean natural gas” or “100 years of energy right under our feet.” I realize that utility leaders have been taught that advertising is a cost with unmeasurable returns. For some odd...

Dieter Helm has generously shared an April 2013 article written for Prospect Magazine titled Stumbling towards crisis. In that article Helm points to US energy decision making as a good example that serves as a contrast to UK energy policy making. He sees chosen path in the UK as almost guaranteeing...

Dominion’s October 2012 announcement that it is closing the Kewaunee Nuclear Power Plant took the nuclear industry by almost complete surprise. My friends who write about nuclear topics on a regular basis had no clue about the possibility before it was announced. None of the contacts that I have...

Randy Olson’s post about the contribution of a short, alliterative slogan to the mass attraction of the No Nukes movement inspired my recent post about using Fission Fast! to inspire effective action to improve our climate situation. Olson has responded to that proposal with his own idea in a post...

Meredith Angwin has been fighting to save Vermont from itself for several years. She has been publishing a blog at Yes Vermont Yankee, teaching adult education classes about energy, attending public meetings, giving interviews, and participating in debates about energy policy since about 2008. (She’ll...

Fission FAST! My creative juices were inspired this morning by an article titled Climate is not a mass movement. The piece comes from Randy Olson, the filmmaker turned scientist who is most famous among my pro-nuclear communication friends as the author of Don’t Be Such a Scientist. Aside: I wonder...

On Sunday, February 17, 2013, a group of five nuclear energy professionals gathered to share their thoughts about the current state of the atomic energy business. Participants included: Margaret Harding (@M2harding), 4 Factor Consulting Meredith Angwin (@yes_VY), Yes Vermont Yankee Andrea Jennetta (...

Here are some items worth watching or listening to when you have some free time: On January 28, the Colbert Report included an interview with Michael Shellenberger of The Breakthrough Institute. Colbert introduced Michael as “an environmentalist who believes in nuclear energy. Finally, liberals...

One of the benefits of being “out there” in the social media world – which includes old fashioned email lists – is the opportunity to meet like minded souls without being limited to people who happen to be in your neighborhood or your physical social circle. I recently saw an...

Sami Mäkeläinen and I agree that the world’s economy is barreling forward on a course that will result in a great deal of pain and suffering as we collide with the limitations on the available supply of hydrocarbons paired with the negative environmental effects of continuing to increase the rate...

The Virginia Uranium Working Group held its final public meeting before turning their report in to the Governor on November 27, 2012. The meeting was held in a modest sized room at the Virginia Science Museum in a room where the photos on the wall celebrated Virginia’s railway heritage. One of...

The Virginia Uranium Working Group, the body chartered by the governor to provide a scientific policy analysis to determine if the current moratorium on mining uranium in Virginia should be lifted, is holding its final public meetin tonight. The meeting is scheduled to begin at 6:00 pm at the Virginia...

One of my favorite aspects of hosting a topically focused site like Atomic Insights is attracting active participation from people with varied backgrounds who join together to discuss their shared energy interests. I hope you delve into the comment threads; they are often more informative than the initial...

Energy discussions often frustrate me, partially because so many people in the discussion ignore what customers want. Perhaps my view is wrong, but my conclusion is that people really want power, not energy. There is a fundamental difference; power is energy per unit time. Power units measure the rate...

There are 34 nuclear reactors located in areas affected by Hurricane Sandy. Of those, 7 were shutdown for planned maintenance. Three units tripped due to disturbances on the grid or issues with one of their redundant cooling systems. The other 24 remained operational and supplied as much power as the...

Ben Heard, one of the most effective nuclear energy communicators I know, has produced a report titled Zero Carbon Options – Seeking an economic mix for an environmental outcome in partnership Brown & Pang. It has been peer reviewed by energy and climate experts Professor Barry Brook (Sir Hubert...

One of the best things about nuclear energy is that the fuel is cheap and densely concentrated. That characteristic enables facilities to be hardened against external events, and has the potential to reduce the vulnerability of nuclear energy facilities to infrastructure damage that happens outside of...

Donald Hoffman is one of the few entrepreneurs in the nuclear industry. His company, Excel Services, has been a profitable professional services provider to the nuclear industry for more than 25 years. Don is a leader who is willing to take calculated risks and also willing to recycle his profits back...

I’ve spent a fair amount of time during the past few days trying to convince people who promote only certain types of nuclear fission technologies that they are engaging in the wrong battle. They are failing to recognize that all forms of fission take advantage of the incredible energy density...

On Sunday, August 12, 2012, I wrote a brief commentary about how the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) had managed to produce a week long series about the changing landscape of energy production in America without a single mention of the ‘N’ word – nuclear. Daniel, an Atomic Insights...

Ben Heard of Decarbonise SA shared a teaser video clip from a recent Big Ideas debate titled We’ve seen the future and it’s nuclear. In this clip, Ben spends his allotted 9 minutes telling people how he became convinced that the only path to an abundant, reliable future energy supply system...

On July 23, 2012, busy schedules aligned and I had the chance to talk with Richard Martin, the author of SuperFuel: Thorium, the Green Energy Source for the Future and Kirk Sorensen, the co-founder and chief technology officer of Flibe Energy, a start-up company formed to “develop small modular...