In the February 8, 2006 issue of Newsweek magazine, there is a story titled Another Nuclear Dawn in which the author, Fred Guterl repeats an often used, but erroneously thought out statement. He said “Environmentalists, who used to be the natural enemies of nuclear power, are now busy beating their drums over climate change.” It…
The Bush administration has often pointed to Iran’s oil and gas resources as prima facie evidence that their nuclear power ambitions must be related to weapons. After all, the expressed logic goes, why would a country that is well endowed with oil and gas want nuclear power stations. (Of course, that argument is bunk, especially…
It looks like the Wall Street Journal is realizing that offering some of its excellent content for free might help to draw in new readers. I was very encouraged yesterday to find that one of its articles turned up in one of my Google news alert summaries. I was especially pleased by the topic of…
This posting needs a little context. I occasionally get into conversations with people that wonder why I am so passionate about atomic energy. Explanations of that sort often require some background information. I composed this letter as part of a conversation with a journalist whose views are completely divergent, but who is willing to listen…
On 3 July 2006, I published a post titled “Nuclear referendum in the market”. The topic of the post was the announcement from BNFL that they had decided to put its Westinghouse division up for sale. Since the division focuses almost exclusively on nuclear technology, the gist of my post was that watching the progress…
The International Herald Tribune is reporting on a new wrinkle to the energy supply situation in European Russia in an article titled Report: Prosecutors call blasts on Russian pipelines sabotage. Two natural gas pipelines running through southern Russia into Georgia and then into Armenia were damaged by explosions that occurred early Sunday 22 January 2006….
It has been really, really cold in Russia for the past few days. Even the weather resistant Russians are turning up the thermostat and causing huge demands on their electrical power and natural gas delivery systems. According to the BBC, electrical power consumption peaked at 146,000 MW on Wednesday, a level not seen since the…
There is an interesting discussion going on at Long Now Discuss > View topic – 02006-01-13 > Peter Schwartz and Ralph Cavanagh. The initiating post in the discussion is a summary by Stewart Brand of an event held by the Long Now Foundation on 13 January 2006 at the Herbst Theater, 401 Van Ness Avenue,…
As of 16:33 GMT on 16 January 2006, the BBC is reporting that Iran has accused CNN of incorrectly translating a recent speech by its President. The argument is over a very key word – CNN reported that the President’s speech contained a statement asserting Iran’s right to nuclear weapons, while Iran is stating that…
David Gram, a writer for the Associated Press, recently wrote an article describing how Vermont has managed to achieve a situation with lower electricity prices than those of her neighbors. You can find the article under the headline Big switch: Vt. now has some of region’s lowest power costs on the Boston.com web site. Vermont…
One of the themes that I continue to pursue is the fact that the established energy industry has the means, motive and opportunity needed to be a silent partner in the anti-nuclear enterprise. When I bring up this topic at nuclear industry gatherings, I am often met with either silence or vocal disagreement. Many of…
I am a Cold War veteran, having spent a good portion of the 80s underwater, on alert and ready to fire on short notice. When I came across the article Putin and the New Cold War it caught my immediate attention. Though the US is embroiled in a costly guerilla war in Iraq, I still…