Nuclear plants performed well during Sandy – as expected by professionals

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 the facility. The low cost fuel also enables a…

Fission Fans Should Unite – Target Of Interest Is Fossil Fuel Market Share

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 found in atomic nuclei to…

Winning a debate in Sydney – We have seen the future and it’s nuclear

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 that minimizes CO2 and…

The Atomic Show #185 – Is Thorium Superior to Uranium?

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 reactors based on liquid-fluoride thorium reactor…

A little pronuclear fun for a Saturday morning

Several months ago, Suzy Hobbs of PopAtomic Studios and the Nuclear Literacy Project gave me a signed print of the Bellefonte Nuclear Power Plant with some Photoshopped cooling towers. She created the print as part of her effort to show nuclear plant owners how their massive concrete structures could be used as an excellent canvas…

Low-level Radiation and Its Implications for Fukushima Recovery

If a special session occurs and the press ignores it, did it really happen? Ted Rockwell, one of my favorite nuclear pioneers, was unable to attend the American Nuclear Society annual meeting despite having worked diligently to help organize a President’s Special Session titled “Low-Level Radiation and Its Implications for Fukushima Recovery.” He eagerly looked…

There are three Superfuels – uranium, thorium and plutonium

Meredith Angwin, who blogs at Yes Vermont Yankee, published a book review post titled Superfuel: A Book I Wanted to Love. The book is a tribute to thorium and the people that Richard Martin refers to as “thorium-heads”. The villains in the book are the people that Martin calls “nuclearati” – otherwise known as the…

Pronuclear environmentalists present to 100 curious citizens in Walkerville, SA

I am running a little late this morning, so I do not have a new post for you. Instead, I would like to recommend that you spend a few minutes reading Walking the talk- pro-nuclear advocates stand together at Ben Heard’s Decarbonise SA. It is an important report about an event where four pronuclear environmentalists…

Reactions to Macfarlane nomination for Chairman of NRC

A number of people who have read of my opposition to the appointment of Dr. Allison Macfarlane to be the Chairman of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission have counseled me to passively accept a “done deal” because they believe it is obvious that the fix has been in for quite some time. They think that…