The morning after
The lights will hardly be back on a few hours when the chanting begins: "Safe. Clean. Nuclear power. No foreign oil. No more blackouts. Safe. Clean. Nuclear power."
In fact, the mantra was already on the New York Times op-ed page the morning of the blackout.
| Posted at 2:38 AM | Permalink |
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Comments (5)
Meanwhile France is having trouble keeping its nuclear reactors cooled, may have to shut them down if the summer heat continues, and is asking citizens to cut down on power consumption.
Posted by Peter | August 15, 2003 7:25 AM
And, oh by the way, from AP wire reports, the whole thing may have emanated from a nuclear power plant.
Just think, we'll now get to hear GW say "nuculer" again.
Posted by hilsy | August 15, 2003 7:39 AM
New blog! Comments! Ooooh how long I've waited for comments.
Tis a testament to how little time I've had lately that I didn't know you'd upgraded. Good job--updated links to follow.
Posted by Emma | August 15, 2003 11:12 AM
O.K. No Nukes. No coal, wind is expensive and unreliable. Not to mention too unsightly. Natural Gas is the choice du jour, but is getting more expensive. It also has distribution problems. Oil is much too expensive. Hydro has been developed about as far as it can go in the U.S. and the "enlighten" people are talking about tearing out dams to save the fish.
What do you propose to use to generate power to meet the ever increasing demand?
Every construction project has to go through multiple reviews and get the O.K. from countless bureaucracies and "public" interest groups. Even with that, they have to defend against a parade of lawsuits by every group with the words "concerned" and citizens" in their name that can find some recent law school grads looking to build a rep.
Where are you going to build the transmission lines needed to distribute the power? No one wants the electrical lines in their neighborhood. But they have to go somewhere.
No matter what the problem, the solution offered never varies; higher taxes, more spending, more bureaucrats. In good times or bad the solutions offered never vary.
Posted by John Dunshee | August 17, 2003 1:53 AM
John Dunshee seems to have forgotten public investment in conservation as an energy source. Despite a few states and utilities efforts in this area, there is still a huge opportunity for energy savings / new power availability with conservation. The return on investment is a lot more promising than nukes. While conservation won't be a complete magical solution to power supply issues, it has great promise.
No matter what the problem the solution for some never varies: let the market place rule without regulation, ignore any concerns from the public, stop any pretense of due process.
The current state of the utility industry / electrical power supply is a conundrum. Its not a crisis - a major black out every few years is unlikely to capture the public or political elite's attention. Absent ETs handing us the secrets to cold fusion tomorrow, there is likely to be noisy public debate over how to proceed. No doubt many will complain that particular proposed approaches infringe on their interests. The government's remains to be determined. Likely the government's role will express the interests of that portion of the public that participates in the discussion. Thats democracy. Stop whining John and offer some meaningful contribution to the discussion.
While any source on the Internet deserves critical scrutiny, the Rocky Mountain Institute has some useful observations on the national energy situation: http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid506.php
Posted by Dave Christenson | August 18, 2003 9:01 AM