WBCSD – Nuclear Rebirth

The World Business Council for Sustainable Development has reprinted a National Post article from 14 July 2005 titled Nuclear rebirth that provides a balanced look at the prospects for new nuclear power plants. The article discusses the motivators for renewed interest in nuclear power along with some of the political hurdles that might slow down…

Another "In MY Backyard" resolution

There sure are a lot of “nobodies” in this world. Though the anti-nuclear industry still continues to claim that “nobody” wants a nuclear plant in their backyard, a number of communities have taken action to state loudly and clearly that they are very interested in having a new plant built in their area. The most…

Apple's Intel decision – does it necessarily mean x86?

You might be surprised to find a story about computers on a blog that traditionally focuses on atomic energy. The “tech” field, however, provides some interesting models that can be useful to people interested in the continuing development of practical atomic technology. One of my favorite companies is Apple Computer. (Disclosure: I own a number…

South Korea offers electricity to North Korea

A number of news outlets have reported today that South Korea has offered to supply North Korea with electricity via transmission lines in return for an agreement to stop developing nuclear weapons capability. Here is the BBC’s version of the story – http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4674785.stm. Apparently, South Korea believes that this offer of transmission line delivered electricity…

Nuclear Exchange in the Op-ed section of the Washington Post

Scott Peterson, one of the contributors to NEI Nuclear Notes, answered a July 6, 2005 piece by Peter Asmus titled “Nuclear Diosaur” with his own contribution in the July 12, 2005 edition titled “Wrong on Nuclear Power” (free registration required for the Post articles). It will be interesting to see who else chimes in and…

MHI expresses interest in Westinghouse

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) of Japan is one of the suitors interested in Westinghouse. The two organizations have a long history of cooperation, dating back more than 30 years when MHI licensed Westinghouse’s Pressurized Water Reactor (PWR)design. MSN Money reprinted an article from the Financial Times on the topic on July 10, 2005 under the…

Competition often drives attitudes

Discussions and articles about energy supply choices often overlook the impact of economic competition on the way that the choices are made and opinion posistions are established. Government organizations play a role because of the way that they get involved in promoting certain kinds of industries or because of the way that they gain tax…

Advanced Nuclear Economics

Steven Ayer at disinterested party has written a number of interesting articles about nuclear power and its future prospects. One of my readers pointed me to his recent article titled Nucleonomics. Unlike Steven and a number of other writers who have written about nuclear power economics, I have a direct and significant interest in getting…

Trackback added – comments?

Since Blogger does not directly support trackback, the kind folks that run the service suggest that their users wanting this feature use Haloscan commenting and trackback. The installation process was very simple, I would be interesting in hearing feedback from anyone that tries using the service from here.

Interesting explanation for Westinghouse decision

On July 6, 2005, Malcolm Wicks spoke to a group of 200 delegates of the British nuclear industry. Mr. Wicks is the UK’s minister of state for energy. He stated that the government had put a lot of thought into the decision to sell Westinghouse. A major factor in the decision process was the fact…

Nigerian Nuclear Program

Nigeria is an interesting case of an oil rich but useful energy poor country. It is a major crude oil exporter, but its citizens get by with an average of about 8 watts of electricity, which is about 1/5 of what the light above my computer uses. Apparently, some of the leaders of the country…

Better use of Tritium for power

One of the issues that I have with fusion enthusiasts is that they obscure the truth about the fuel that they plan to use. When talking about the potential for fusion to supply the world’s energy needs, they often talk about using hydrogen and point out that it is the most abundant element on the…