Originally published June 29 2005
New push for nuclear energy revival
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
With the country’s total energy consumption estimated to balloon by 50 percent from 2003 to 2025, nuclear energy has received renewed attention from policymakers, energy corporations and even some environmentalists.
As various economic, political and ecological debates converge over nuclear energy policy, the controversial power source -- which seemed to be entering its sunset twenty years ago -- now seems poised for rebirth.
With the country's total energy consumption estimated to balloon by 50 percent from 2003 to 2025, as a relatively clean-burning alternative to coal, the country's primary electricity supply, nuclear energy has received renewed attention from policymakers, energy corporations and even some environmentalists.
Advocates for nuclear power say climate change, a strained domestic electricity supply, and recent advancements in technology and productivity all warrant a greater role for the industry.
"The quest for safe new nuclear power remains a pipe dream," said Paul Gunter, director of Reactor Watchdog program of the Nuclear Information and Research Service*, a coalition of groups opposed to nuclear power.
No nuclear power plants have been built since a major reactor accident in 1979 at the Three-Mile Island nuclear facility.
To opponents of nuclear power, the roadblock to a sustainable alternative energy path is not a lack of environmentally sound options, but conceptual inertia among policymakers and the public.
"If we were only to make the commitment to increase our ability to use energy more wisely and more efficiently," said Gunter, "we could begin to cut emissions and at the same time, reduce demand."
For now, environmentalists aiming for their own version of an energy renaissance are struggling just to stave off what they see as a relapse into the nuclear perils of the last generation.
"We're involved a process of trying to get out of a hole with a shovel, at this point," said Gunter, "and building more [reactors] is only digging us deeper into this problem."
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