SEE
"The Clean Energy Scam" (TIME MAGAZINE - CNN NEWS) - "It's (biofuels)
dramatically accelerating global warming, imperiling the planet in the
name of saving it. Corn ethanol, always environmentally suspect,
turns out to be environmentally disastrous. Even cellulosic ethanol
made from switchgrass, which has been promoted by eco-activists and
eco-investors as well as by President Bush as the fuel of the future,
looks less green than oil-derived gasoline."
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1725975,00.html
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SEE
"Chemist warns of biofuel 'dead end'" - "Future historians may
ultimately see the biofuels of the early 21st century as a
technological dead end."
http://ukpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5hwwiUVDzBZM0GHevZ13mLxx_VyYQ
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SEE
Nuclear power is the only major solution to global warming
British scientist James Lovelock, the father of the living earth
Gaia theory, has stated that nuclear power is the only way to have a
large human population on planet earth without causing global warming
and destroying the environment. Nuclear power is the only technology
that can produce an extremely high volume of energy using just a tiny
amount of land and at reasonable cost, all without emitting any
significant amounts of greenhouse gases. Energy conservation, solar,
wind, tidal, geothermal, and other energy schemes can help the cause,
but nuclear power is the only major, core solution to global warming
available to human beings.
Using nuclear power we can make synthetic gasoline and jet fuel
directly from atmospheric carbon dioxide. This new energy scheme may
be cheaper and more practical than using hydrogen as fuel, because it
would require no changes to our existing energy distribution
infrastructure. Intense heat from nuclear reactors is used to break
down carbon dioxide into its component parts, carbon monoxide and
oxygen. The carbon monoxide can then be combined with water in a
catalytic process to make either pure hydrogen gas or more easily
transportable liquid synthetic fuels that can be used in ordinary
automobiles.
One of the benefits of nuclear power is that the United States
already owns huge stockpiles of nuclear fuel in the form of nuclear
weapons materials, which can be converted into fuel rods for civilian
power production. If you consider the amount of uranium easily
available in the earth's crust for mining, plus the use of much more
plentiful thorium as fuel in breeder reactors, then the world has
enough nuclear fuel to last for thousands of years; an essentially
endless supply. Nuclear power plants efficiently output at least 93
times more energy than they consume over their lifespan, including the
energy used in their construction and decommissioning.
Nuclear fuel rods can be reprocessed over and over again because
only a tiny portion of the nuclear material is actually used up during
each fuel cycle. When you reprocess fuel rods there is very little
high level nuclear waste that needs to be stored at the Yucca Mountain
Repository. The nuclear "waste" is simply reused as nuclear fuel, and
that is part of the reason why France's nuclear power program has been
so successful. France relies heavily on nuclear power plants and
nuclear fuel reprocessing, and France has the cleanest air and lowest
electricity rates in Europe.
The fears Americans have about civilian nuclear power plants are
largely unfounded. One lone disaster that occurred at an obsolete
Ukrainian reactor is insufficient reason to be eternally afraid of all
nuclear power plants across the board. The old Chernobyl reactor used
a dangerous design that has never been used in the West, and which did
not even have a containment vessel. The 1986 Chernobyl accident was
caused by Soviet engineers conducting irresponsible experiments that
were unrelated to normal civilian power production, and which would
not be allowed in the USA. The Chernobyl accident killed a total of
56 people, a great tragedy, but not a nation killing disaster.
Nuclear power plants in America have an excellent record for
safety and pollution free operation. By contrast, the over 600 coal
burning power plants which produce 49% of our nation's electricity
unleash tremendous pollution. They emit sulfur dioxide and oxides of
nitrogen which cause acid rain, tons of toxic mercury, and an enormous
skyward bound river of carbon dioxide gas which represents 10% of all
CO2 emissions worldwide. Coal power plants also spew out thorium and
uranium, both radioactive metals which naturally accumulate in coal.
The potential nuclear energy value of these metals far exceeds the
energy value of the combustible carbon content of the coal itself.
Coal power plants also release microscopic particulate matter, which
clogs the lungs and is attributed to causing approximately 24,000
premature deaths in the United States every year; 428 times the
Chernobyl death toll.
Why is there so little fear of coal burning power plants, but so
much hysterical fear of much safer and healthier nuclear power? The
answer is that nuclear power has been unfairly demonized by a
Hollywood entertainment industry trying to make a quick buck, and by
scientifically undereducated politicians and environmental activists.
There has never been a single death attributed to American civilian
nuclear power plants, which produce electricity at an average cost of
about 3 cents per kilowatt-hour, a rate comparable to hydroelectric
power and less than natural gas or coal.
Building new, more efficient standardized nuclear power plant
designs using mass production techniques for major structural and
control components can make nuclear power a bargain. Just like
manufacturing television sets, the more you build using the same
design the cheaper they become. For the total long term cost of the
Iraq War, estimated to be about 2 trillion dollars, we could build 670
1,500 megawatt nuclear power plants outputting a total of 1,005,000
megawatts. Gas cooled pebble bed reactors with containment structures
can be used in areas without sufficient water for conventional water
cooled designs. Pebble bed reactors are inherently meltdown proof due
to the basic laws of physics. If the reactor's cooling system should
fail, the core temperature automatically lowers itself to safe levels
without mechanical intervention.
This plan would give the United States virtual energy
independence, more than doubling our current national electric
generating capacity of 906,155 megawatts. Nuclear power has the
potential to save us from desertification of our heartland, increased
storm damage and coastal flooding. Unlike producing biofuels, use of
nuclear power will never cause food shortages, erode topsoil, or be
exquisitely dependent on climatic conditions for reliable energy
production.
For full biofuel facts, see-http://home.att.net/~meditation/bio-fuel-hoax.html
Christopher Calder
