oops, my apologies. I posted an unspell checked comment proving that I am not a college professor but also quite imperfect.

Excuse me.

Nevertheless,

Rico S, thank you for your comments. I will avoid the personal other than to say that I am not a college professor and to note that the profession is noble. I hope your intent was not to disparage that career.

China has begun taking new nuclear plants off the table and funds alternatives by a factor of 5 times that of nuclear. It, like Germany, has committed to a ‘replenishable’ energy strategy with less waste or risk. I certainly can provide sources to sustain that point but I don’t think it will matter here.

As for your assertions / protestations that Truthdig has a socialist agenda and that I may think that government “...can deliver better than private enterprise?” I respond that both are simple and sad. You are exhibiting the same old class v. private v. government v. socialism v. communism v. capitalism dogma that has dominated the socio - political horizon since before 1917. It is stale, antiquated and little more than a facade to keep the masses amused.

There was a time that American sectors, both private and public, thought beyond convention. Now, through mindsets like the one your present, we point fingers, fight each other and fall behind. 

Frankly, I don’t give a rat’s rumpus which (government v. private) can deliver better anymore than I care if Truthdig as any set ‘ism’ defining it agenda. I also don’t want to hear how government has screwed us in the past so it much be ineffective going forward, or how the private sector caused our current fiscal challenges and should be restrained. Such arguments are entrenched asseverations producing little but a total waste of time. Further, they are indicative of what I meant by ‘lack of cultural concision’ in my original post.

America is not a perfect place. It is a wonderful place. There have been times in our wonderfully imperfect shared history where we mitigated the BS and gained enough cultural cohesiveness to not only move forward but to also lead. WW2, the space race, dealing with Great Depression are three apparent examples.
Get off your aged ‘isms’ fodder. It is tired. Dare to dream something better, something new.

Rico S, thank you for your comments. I will avoid the personal other than to say that I am not a college professor and to note that the profession is noble.

China has begun taking new nuclear plants off the table and funds alternatives by a factor of 5 times that of nuclear. It, like Germany, have committed to a ‘replenishable’ energy strategy with less waste or risk. I certainly can provide sources to sustain that point but I don’t think it will matter here.

As for your assertions / protestations that Truthdig has a socialist agenda and that I may think that government “...can deliver better than private enterprise?” I respond that both are simple and sad. You are exhibiting the same old class v. private v. government v. socialism v. communism v. capitalism dogma that has dominated the socio - political horizon since before 1917. It is stale, antiquated and little more than a facade to keep the masses amused.

There was a time that American sectors, both private and public though beyond convention. Now, through mindsets like the one your present, we point fingers, fight each other and fall behind. 

Frankly, I don’t give a rat’s rumpus which (government v. private) can deliver better anymore than I care if Truthdig as any set ‘ism’ defining it agenda. I also don’t want to hear how government has screwed us in the past so it much be ineffective going forward or how the private sector caused our current fiscal challenges and should be restrained. Such arguments are entrenched asseverations producing little but a total waste of time. Further, they are indicative of what I meant by ‘lack of cultural concision’ in my original post.

America is not a perfect place. It is a wonderful place. But there have been times in our wonderfully imperfect shared history where we mitigated the BS and gained enough cultural cohesiveness to not only move forward but to also lead. WW2, the space race, dealing with Great Depression are three apparent examples.

Get off your aged ‘isms’ fodder. It is tired. Dare to dream something better, something new.

Yup. New Fords do NOT resemble the exploding Pinto, one of the WORST pieces of shit Detroit EVER crapped on the world (The Chevy HHR is an example of Detroit’s devotion to tradition—of producing ugly, stupid, uncomfortable cars. I was given one as loaner once.  I can’t tell you how many ways I hated it. Even “English Eccentric” cannot compare.)

If the nuclear industry would commit to REPLACING every old plant with a new, gravity “fail-safe” plant, decommissioning the ticking time-bombs as the price of proving the safety of the new ones, it’d be pretty easy to get them built.

Monkeymind:

China has at least fifty nukes on the drawing board.

I was talking about natural disasters which damaged nukes, not natural disasters in toto.

If, in fact, there have not been containment improvements since TMI, it’s not technology’s fault. And, yes, there are very realistic ways to store nuclear waste, just not very political ways. (NIMBY)

And:

” I posit that while there are several factors at play here, many more than can be considered in this forum, two that are paramount are the cultural inertia associated with our outdated mode of capitalism / corporate capital mode of production for return profit to shareholders over return to the public domain, and lack of cultural concision brought on by diluted focus of the lobby system.”

Wow! You must be a college professor. Why didn’t you just say, “Truthdig is just too cowardly to admit it’s socialist, and special interests rule the day.”

And if you want “an approach shift away from what has become common and towards the inventive”, do you really think government can deliver better than private enterprise?

Rico, nope, not really. There have been 3 rather serious accidents since 3 mile island. The recent tsunami was not a 100 year event. Regionally, of course, there was an even more destructive quake / tsunami event on Boxing Day 2004. Pan Pacific there have been over 10,000 since Boxing Day 2004 including the devastating Chilean and New Zealand quakes.

There have not been containment improvements since 3 mile island and, most significantly, there is no way to accommodate, store, neutralize or recycle nuclear waste which must be transported from origin over land routes. Based on this alone,it is not prudent to consider more nuclear plants until such time as these formative considerations are overcome. It is foolish to do otherwise.

Now, I am not going to take a radical green stance firmly refusing to consider any view of a nuclear future. I am going to state that plants such as the ones the TVA are proposing are the easy capital fix to a very complex energy problem, just as is opening up the Arctic to expanded drilling or letting new leases in the Gulf of Mexico or California Coast. There are better solutions offering less risk and grander long term results. These require paradigmatic shifts in the current tenor of our capitalist mode of energy production. China, India, Brazil, Germany are all moving surplus capital towards such methods in the form of wind, solar and geothermal. There grids are being updated as are there transportation networks.

Last year, China spent more than any other major country on clean energy, including wind and solar, toppling the U.S. from the top spot for the first time in five years, 2010 Pew report says. The U.S. is also on the verge of losing the top spot in terms of installed renewable energy to China. Now consider that U.S. climate change budget has more than doubled—from $7 billion to $18 billion—since 2008. Military spending in that same time period has risen from $696 billion to $739 billion. For every dollar spent on climate in 2008, the U.S. spent $94 on the military. That will drop to a $41: $1 ratio this year.

Like in education, America is being left behind. I posit that while there are several factors at play here, many more than can be considered in this forum, two that are paramount are the cultural inertia associated with our outdated mode of capitalism / corporate capital mode of production for return profit to shareholders over return to the public domain, and lack of cultural concision brought on by diluted focus of the lobby system. Remember, the TVA was not born of capitalism. It was a social program later semi- privatized.

No doubt that America can catch up in energy and education. But, we need an approach shift away from what has become common and towards the inventive.

Mr Yell:

You wrote nine sentences. Only the sixth sentence is grounded in reality. The rest are halucinatory blather.

diamond:

Insanity is believing that the TVA’s nukes are going to be just like Dai-ishi’s or Chernobyl’s or TMI’s. Or the new Ford will be just like that ‘75 Pinto.

I’m curious:
Was there a town of Shima near “Fuk-U, Shima” or is that just coincidence?

Lets see how they are going to handle Fukushima first.

“These are the criteria which militate against the decision to build a small, new, safe, technologically advanced nuclear power plant.”

And pigs not only might fly but will. As Einstein said, ‘Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and thinking you’ll get a different result.’

First issues first. This story is making rather splashy headlines here in Asia yet I don’t see it anywhere in the US media.
http://nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/International/18-Jun-2011/US-orders-news-blackout-over-crippled-Nebraska-Nuclear-Plant-report

Second, brick nations, India, Germany and others are abruptly turning away from this energy model. Why this US plan? It makes no sense.

Eastern Tennessee?  I thought all the rednecks in favor of nuclear power were in WESTERN Tennessee, like around Nashville.  How many C&W stars are Dems out of the zillions that are Republicans?

Or, is this one of those things: We want it. Anyone who doesn’t want it is “un-American”.  Just not in OUR backyard!

Let’s see. A thirty year old technology, badly managed, fails due to a once in a century natural catastrophe. The death toll has so far soared to zero. There is “international panic.”

These are the criteria which militate against the decision to build a small, new, safe, technologically advanced nuclear power plant.

I can see it now. Ford wants to build a new car model, but is stopped in its tracks by the “panic” caused when someone gets incinerated when a 1975 Pinto gets rear-ended and the gas tank explodes. Pintos, Fords, hell, all automobiles are by defintion, death traps! That is precisely the logic being brought to bear on the TVA nukes. Truthdig logic, I might add.

“In terms of function and design”? Ed Lyman is an anti-nuke proselyte, not a scientist. Does he REALLY expect any sane person to believe that the reactors on the drawing board for TVA are even remotely like the Dai-ishi models in terms of safety, effectiveness, and the unparalleled management expertise guaranteed by the “quasi-federal agency”?