Posted on 01/07/2008 7:36:07 PM PST by Stoat
The future ... Sellafield plant
EXCLUSIVE
BRITAIN is to build a new generation of nuclear power stations with NO LIMITS to the amount of energy they supply.
At least 40 per cent of our energy will come from state-of-the-art plants.
That is twice current output – and ministers will confirm that new suppliers could ultimately provide ALL our energy needs.
The revelation will infuriate environmental campaigners.
Britain now gets just 20 per cent of its power from nuclear plants. France gets 80 per cent – and the UK is set to follow suit.
PM Gordon Brown has overruled objections, with the decision set to be announced on Thursday.
A Whitehall official said last night: “Nuclear power is the only realistic option for our future. We must not rely on other nations.”
Trade secretary John Hutton will tell MPs on Thursday that the UK must be self-sufficient.
Britain’s security will be in peril if we continue to rely on Russian despot Vladimir Putin or Middle Eastern states for our gas and oil.
Insiders pointed out that any option for future power will involve dearer domestic bills.
The PM’s spokesman said: “Power station owners and operators would have to set aside funds to cover the full cost of decommissioning. We have always been clear that the full costs of the long-term management and disposal of waste should fall on operators.”
Mr Hutton said: “The energy landscape is changing. The idea that Britain can meet its growing power needs through renewable energy and greater efficiency is nonsense.”
Britain will be unable to cope over the next 50 years on coal, gas and oil stocks. Wind farms are too costly and have huge opposition.
We currently have 12 nuclear power stations. A new generation of plants like Sellafield and Dounreay will dramatically cut our CO2 emissions.
New reactors are to be built at Sizewell in Suffolk, Dungeness in Kent, Hinkley Point in Somerset and Bradwell in Essex.
Moderate environmentalists agree nuclear power is a better solution to global warming. A string of the oldest Magnox reactors are to be put out of action, including those at Bradwell, Dungeness A, Hinkley Point A and Sizewell A and Calder Hall in Cumbria.
But Friends of the Earth’s Roger Higman slammed nuclear power as a “discredited dinosaur”, saying: “Britain can meet its energy needs, maintain energy security and tackle climate change with a programme of renewables, energy efficiency and cleaner carbon technology.”
This is what happens when one threatens a Brit's tea.
LMAO
Or their internet connection :-)
There is a message here.......
Hopefully our own politicians will not be so timid that they refuse to hear it.
The U.S. is behind on many technology and infrastructure issues. I believe one of the biggest reasons is our litigious society. France gets most of their power from nuclear but the litigation risks are huge in the U.S. A court broke up the finest phone system in the world and now we are well behind especially in broadband. Foreign designed cars long ago passed U.S. innovation. Other countries are exploiting all of their energy resources and the U.S. sits on theirs while sending their money abroad largely because of the "green" idiots.
This decline must be stopped.
I just hope and pray that the right-thinking politicians have the strength and courage to stand up to them for the long haul, because it will indeed be a long haul.
Now that it's glaringly obvious to everyone (except for the unhinged hysterics over at Democrat Underground) that we will prevail handily in Iraq, the Left will be looking for a new bogeyman. I'm sure that they will be delighted to resurrect all of the old idiocy that they used to inflict at nuke plants in the 1970's and 1980's.
Even the obvious truth eventually has to be accepted, even by the Left, when no other option exists :-)
They have run out of silly, ineffectual, feel-good plans for energy management and have been backed against a wall.
One naturally wonders what the world would be like today if the Left had not stood in the way of this obvious solution back in the 1970's and 1980's....the Saudis would not be quite so rich, buying that new electric-powered hot tub for The Cicero Estates would be easy to justify, and the nuclear power industry would probably be as robust and vibrant as the tech industry.
Amazing none of the Republicans have hammered this point ....
This is actually excellent timing from the Brits....any American politician who wants to instantly catch fire and set himself ahead of the pack can point to this new British nuclear initiative and cite it as something our country should emulate.
Any of them who puts forth a comprehensive pro-nuclear plan would surge in the polls, I'll bet.
No question about it — that WILL be a good thing. Unless, of course, like Algore, you really enjoy shivering in the dark (or at least WATCHING other folks shiver in the dark).
I fully agree!
It's called a Pebble Bed Reactor
For us to go nuke, we first need legislation that will put a lid on the lawyers
The Pebble Bed reactor takes advantage of a physics principle called Doppler Broadening:
When a reactor gets hotter, the accelerated motion of the atoms in the fuel increases the probability of neutron capture by U-238 atoms. When the uranium is heated, its nuclei move more rapidly in random directions, and therefore see and generate a wider range of relative neutron speeds. U-238, which forms the bulk of the uranium in the reactor, is much more likely to absorb fast neutrons.[1] This reduces the number of neutrons available to cause U-235 fission, reducing the power output by the reactor.In a nutshell, if the reactor temperature goes up, the amount of energy produced goes down, and the reactor temp stays stable. Instead of water, the PBR uses helium gas (which cannot be made radioactive by neutrons).In some reactor designs, such as the pebble bed reactor, this natural negative feedback places an inherent upper limit on the temperature at which the chain reaction can proceed. Such reactors are said to be "inherently safe" because a reactor failure cannot generate a criticality excursion. It is worth noting, however, that because of decay heat emitted from the decay of fission products, a meltdown is still theoretically possible if the ability to cool the reactor is lost, and thus the reactor design must be designed to prevent loss of coolant accident.
One cute aspect is the waste heat can be used in coal-to-gasoline conversion (which needs a high-temp steam input)
Good for the UK. I hope we are close behind.
Agreed. The only thing that stands in our way is the militant environmental Left and the Dems / Socialists, who are one in the same. Their hysterical overreactions to nuclear power will insure that we will be energy-dependent to muslim and other unfriendly nations for generations to come.
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