Guest post by Steve Aplin
How will those centres be powered? I hope, with the only carbon-free non-hydro power source that does not rely on the planet’s rotation or the whims of wind: nuclear power. Nuclear plants in the U.S. not only generated around 79 billion watts during the president’s hour-long speech, (79 million kilowatt-hours in total) but did so without emitting a gram of CO2, the principal manmade greenhouse gas.
More important, those nuclear plants kept right on generating those 79 billion watts even after the speech wound up, and are still at it — reliably providing some of America’s cheapest and by far its cleanest energy.
But natural gas is the politically correct fuel of choice for the anti-nuke crowd, and certainly the fuel the president extolled. So how much CO2 would have been emitted if that same energy came from natural gas? That figure would then be 79 million kWh (79 billion watts times 1 hour, divided by 1000 to get kW) times 550 grams per kWh (CO2 emission factor for gas-fired generation) = 43 million metric tons avoided by the unmentioned and unsung energy source during the state of the union speech.
in one hour
79 Million kWh
that produced zero emissions
in one hour
79 Million kWh
43 Thousand Metric tons of CO2 (43 Million Kg.)
Nuclear power, in other words, provides many of the things the president called for in his speech: clean cheap energy, cutting edge scientific research, and economic progress.
What a pity the president did not mention nuclear power. It has done him and the world so many favours. It’s the unknown soldier, it’s the unknown battalion.
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11 Comments
The president is a very intelligent man; surely he understands the limitations of solar power. However, those whose religion is anti-nuclear have politicians so scared that they are unable to make rational decisions. That is the problem we are facing.
It would also help if politicians had more guts.
I agree Frank. Yes guts and finding the time to learn about the science. At least enough to know the right questions. Perhaps selecting advisers based on there education rather than their political correctness.
Considering the difficulty of getting cabinet members approved by Congress, it us understandable that presidents have to consider politics when appointing them. On the other hand, presidents can have advisers who are not cabinet members. Presumably they would not need to be approved by Congress.
Although I have great respect for Obama’s intelligence, I am very disappointed by his failure to explain things adequately to the public and in some cases to insist that the right thing be done. That includes failing to explain the need for nuclear power and doing what is necessary to implement adequate nuclear R & D so that better nuclear technologies can be implemented.
I think it is political pressure and he truely doesn’t understand nuclear power, but grew up when so many were campaigning against it. He has wobbled between being for and against nuclear energy in his speeches.
I have recommended on the White House Facebook page and White House website that he visit a plant and learn more about it first hand.
Visiting a nuclear plant could be helpful, but in doing so, he would learn about only one type of nuclear reactor, i.e., the pressurized water reactor (PWR). He needs to know about other types of reactors, i.e., the liquid fluoride thorium reactor (LFTR), the integral fast reactor (IFR), and know that there are many types of reactors and many possible variations within each type. He doesn’t have to understand these at the level of a nuclear engineer, but he needs adequate understanding to know to whom to listen and to be able to evaluate what he hears.
If he understood the above, then he would understand the need to have more R & D to develop and implement a better nuclear technology than our PWRs which, in my opinion, are a serious mistake.
This is why the president should have an expert energy secretary AND at least one staffer who’s an energy specialist.
That surely would be helpful.
Also, if Obama does decide to support nuclear energy, he should explain the reasons to the American people. One of Obama’s shortcomings is failure to explain his positions adequately. For example, on economic issues, he should use charts and graphs to fit financial data, policies, and economic theory into some sort of perspective that people could understand, and also enlist the assistance of respected economists to explain the economic theory. Neither side does that; instead, they simply repeat their positions over and over without providing any supporting theories. The same is true with energy policy.
Most of the American people do not even know that there many possible designs and variations of nuclear reactors. There has been no effort to educate people. The nuclear industry is also partly at fault. About four years ago, I visited a nuclear education display in Stevens Point, Wisconsin. None of the employees there knew anything about reactor types except for the pressurized water reactor. Nor could they explain why nuclear reactors operate at a lower temperature than coal-fired steam boilers.
The media make no effort to educate us. Their main interest, even in news programs, is to entertain viewers to maximize the number of viewers thereby maximizing advertising revenue.
Unfortunately, the ONLY way to become adequately educated on any important matter is through spending countless hours searching for the knowledge.
Can anyone advise us how to insert paragraph breaks into comments? Doing so would make comments easier to read.
Hi Frank
Thanks for pointing that out. I had to play with the settings but now when you insert a space between paragraphs they stay.
This is a paragraph spacing test.
Will there be a blank line between this line and the above line?
Hooray we did it!!!