An article titled “US sweetens pot to study siting for spent nuke fuel storage” was published in the January 26, 2023 edition of the Washington Post. The article included a paragraph that credited “environmentalists” as being the main source of opposition to construction of consolidated interim spent fuel (CISF) storage facilities that are either licensed…
During the contentious effort that resulted in passage of the Atomic Energy Act of 1946, Sen Eugene D. Milliken (R-CO) played an important role in establishing an attempted US government monopoly over all atomic energy information. During the House-Senate conference committee to resolve differences between versions of the bill passed by the two legislative bodies,…
On December 8, 1953 President Eisenhower announced to the UN that the US knew how to harness atomic energy to produce useful power. He stated that the US was willing to widely share that knowledge. He described an especially intriguing possibility of using atomic energy to bring power to the “power-starved areas of the world.”…
In a break from its historical tactic of quietly enabling surrogates, the US petroleum industry has started to openly engage in battles to suppress use of atomic fission. The Ohio division of the American Petroleum Institute (API Ohio) recently issued a press release urging members of the “Ohio legislature to reject legislation that would subsidize…
The Beaver Valley (PA) Times has published an important article titled Group forms to oppose bailout of struggling nuclear power industry. That article needs to be read and retained by those of us who believe that existing nuclear plants are important pillars of the U.S. electricity supply network that is often called “the grid.” The…
A coalition of electric power producers that operate natural gas-burning generation plants have filed suit in the U.S. District Court Southern District of New York. They are challenging the New York State Department of Public Service’s (NYSDPS) recently enacted Zero Emission Credit. Competition wasn’t designed with customers in mind The lawsuit filing document Indicates that…
Ken Silverstein posted a thought-provoking piece on Forbes.com titled Being ‘Good Neighbors’ And Staying Out Of Print Motivates Companies To Be Environmental Stewards. The following quote stimulated me to provide a slightly different interpretation and expansion on the reasons why companies and investors large and small are often actively involved in the environmental movement. And…
In my continuing efforts to produce a narrative about the way that the public was taught to be afraid of ionizing radiation, no matter how low the dose, I came across an interesting write up in the Rockefeller Foundation Annual Report for 1958. Here is some important temporal context. The Foundation Board of Trustees asked…
Yesterday, I wrote a quick post that linked a recently issued UBS report’s negative views about the economic viability of merchant nuclear power plants in the US to UBS’s large portfolio of troubled loans to companies involved in various aspects of the natural gas extraction technique known as “fracing” (alternatively spelled as fracking in many…
UBS Investment Bank holds a large portfolio of loans to companies involved in extracting natural gas using the combination of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing. Because of the healthy fees associated with generating those loans initially, UBS, along with several other large investment banks, supported drilling programs for production that was not justified by the…
Recently an Atomic Insights reader shared a document that inspired a new line of thinking about the chronology of atomic energy development. The inspirational document was a PDF copy of a chapter titled Little Red Schoolhouse from Freeman Dyson‘s memoir, Disturbing the Universe. It was a brief tale about a memorable burst of creativity in…
We’ve been repeatedly told that 97% of climate scientists agree that CO2 emissions from human activity are a major cause of climate change. Scientists who question that assertion are villified as “climate change deniers” and marginalized as representing a fringe point of view. They’re frequently accused of being paid by fossil fuel interests. Politicians, journalists…