I don't understand why the energy put to fight nuclear energy, so far victimless in the West, is not put against coal which kills thousands every year and pollutes everything. I'd rather have a second generation of nuclear plants for baseload power, together with wind and a little bit of gas-fired plants for flexibility and peak, until solar becomes economic (because we invest to make it so), than coal for everything, but that's what will happen if we keep on banging on nuclear all the time. (coal has a simple political justification: jobs, jobs, jobs). In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
Also, to claim nuclear energy has been victimless is false. Sorry, I hate to disagree with you, I am continually educated by your writing, but the mining of uranium has caused many deaths. People who were told there was no danger and sent in to the mines with no breathing apparatus or any safety method. In our town, a smelter was run for the uranium and vanadium - I don't know how all of that worked - but the slag from this plant is low level radioactive. Back in the 50s and 60s this material was used as fill. Fill for residential houses. So now we have address lists of potentially radioactive foundations - but you won't find it at the realtors! Anyway, the point is there have been many, many victims and people are fighting to improve coal.
I would suggest a complete and holistic analysis of all energy sources for their costs on a per megawatt basis.
But low level radioactivity is not very dangerous In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
Regarding supposed danger from low-level radioactivity: parts of the world with high natural-background radioactivity have fewer cancer deaths. New Mexico, a major producer of uranium in the past and home to large ore veins that have yet to be mined, has a higher than average level of natural background radiation. It's higher than that of Chernobyl. Even with uranium miners, Los Alamos, Sandia National Labs, etc., NM has one of the lowest rates of cancer in the US--along with Utah (also a radioactive state) and Hawaii (ditto, thanks to vulcanism).
Uranium workers do not have higher rates of cancer, nor do radiologists, X-ray technicians, etc.--even though they receive greater exposures than people in other professions. Of all the professions, the workers receiving the greatest exposure to radiation are airline crews.
Greenpeace is an unreliable source of information about anything nuclear. Just ask Patrick Moore, one of its founders, who refers to his former colleagues as fear mongers and who speaks about the billions of tons of carbon that nuclear energy has spared the world.
There is no risk-free form of electricity generation.
See the website of Environmentalists for Nuclear Energy:
www.ecolog.org
