nuclear power — Transition Voice

Fukushima meltdown driving increased abnormalities among US infants

By Staff Reports April 5, 2013

In wake of disaster, children on the west coast almost one-third more likely to suffer from thyroid abnormalities Infants on the West Coast of the United States are showing increased incidents of thyroid abnormalities, which researchers are attributing to radiation released following the March 2011 meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. According to a new study (.pdf) published in the Open Journal of Pediatrics, children born in Alaska, California, Hawaii, Oregon and … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Energy Tagged With: birth defects, Fukushima, nuclear power

For sale, habitable planet, too late

By Guy McPherson March 25, 2013

According to legend, Ernest Hemingway bet his 1920s-era colleagues he could write a complete story in just six words. Hemingway is said to have considered the resulting piece his best work: “For Sale, Baby Shoes, Never Worn.” Making no attempt to keep up with Hemingway, this article provides an overview of the dire climate-change situation in fewer than 300 words. Perhaps even Twitter users will find time for the entire essay. Addition by subtraction Until relatively recently, economic … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: apocalypse, dystopia, energy policy, Ernest Hemingway, Extinction, Guy McPherson, nuclear power, plutocracy

Fracking for yellowcake

By Jeff Rubin February 13, 2013

It works for oil and natural gas, so why not frack for uranium too? After all, America relies on foreign uranium just like it depends on foreign oil. In the U.S. these days, it seems like you can sell almost anything if you spin it as part of the pursuit of energy independence. Enter Uranium Energy Corp. A junior mining company with Canadian roots, UEC is developing the newest uranium mine in the U.S. And it’s counting on fracking to do it. Texans, in general, are no strangers to … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Energy Tagged With: fracking, nuclear power, uranium

The rust-bucket reactors start to fall

By Harvey Wasserman October 31, 2012

The US fleet of 104 deteriorating atomic reactors is starting to fall. The much-hyped "nuclear renaissance" is now definitively headed in reverse. The announcement that Wisconsin's Kewaunee will shut next year will be remembered as a critical dam break. Opened in 1974, Kewaunee has fallen victim to low gas prices, declining performance, unsolved technical problems and escalating public resistance. Many old US reactors are still profitable only because their capital costs were forced down … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Energy Tagged With: apocalypse, economy, energy policy, nuclear power

Indian grid failure offers lesson to us all

By Lindsay Curren August 1, 2012

A Washington Post story yesterday about the (so far) two-day electricity blackout that affected 600 million citizens was a study in trying to find an answer to the acute predicament facing Mother India. Numerous officials are cited in the article, mainly scratching their heads, baffled over the cause of grid collapse. Yet one paragraph stood out for its more definitive take on the problem. Indian industry leaders blamed the incident on a large and growing gap between electricity demand and … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Energy Tagged With: clean energy, climate change, economy, electric grid, energy policy, nuclear power, peak oil

Germany swaps nuclear for solar and wind power

By YES! Magazine June 6, 2012

In response to the Fukushima meltdown — which did $50 billion in damage to Japan’s economy — Germany aims to close all its reactors by 2022. Germany, the world’s most aggressive adopter of renewable energy, is taking a bold leap toward a future free from nuclear energy. In March, the German government announced a program to invest 200 billion euros, or approximately $270 billion, in renewables. That’s 8 percent of the country’s GDP, according to the DIW Economic Institute in … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Energy Tagged With: Germany, nuclear power, solar power, wind power

Occupying science: technology for the 99 percent

By Erik Curren December 19, 2011

Even to save the planet from climate change or to save the economy from the end of cheap oil, you can't stop the march of technological progress, we're often told. Whether it's the personal car, industrial farming or nuclear power, once the genie's out of the bottle, you just can't squeeze him back in. And anyway, we're also told, even the most dangerous technologies are morally neutral. They can always be used for either good or evil. It just depends on who's using them and for what. Thus, … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Books Tagged With: consumerism, Fukushima, nuclear power, Occupy Wall Street, solar power, technology

#26: Nonpartisan but NOT apolitical

By Staff Reports December 6, 2011

Big Oil, Big Coal and Big Nuclear rule American energy policy along with an even larger posse of corporate plutocrats who exercise far too much influence inside the Beltway. None of them seem inclined to give up their hold on Washington. Nor are they troubled by operating free from accountability to the American people. Their henchmen in Congress appear unbothered by this, too. Money in politics has never been as bad as it is now, which is leading to a raft of wretched policies, from a new … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: 31 Reasons to Support Transition Voice, communication, energy policy, global warming, nuclear power

Seeking solutions through social enterprise

By Ted Levinson September 13, 2011

For more than thirty years prior to 2007, Americans consistently identified nuclear war as their biggest fear. However, since then, North Americans have increasingly singled out the degradation of our environment as their biggest worry. It's a sad irony that the threat from our foreign enemies has been displaced by fear of our own destructive powers. Much of this concern is valid; our communal future is at risk less from a single, cataclysmic event than from the steady ruining of our … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Economy Tagged With: biodynamic gardening, clean energy, economy, nuclear power, peak oil, permaculture, social enterprise

As Obama hedges, Japan could go nuke-free by next spring

By Jeff Rubin August 3, 2011

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan was recently quoted as seeing the country as a nuclear-free nation. But unlike similar pronouncements from Germany, which pledges to be nuclear-free by 2022, Japan may become nuclear-free literally within a year. That would be quite a feat for a country that only five months ago relied on nuclear plants for about 30% of its electrical power. By some measures, the country is already two thirds of the way to becoming nuclear-free. Thirty eight of the … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Energy Tagged With: energy conservation, Fukushima, Japan crisis, Naoto Kan, nuclear power

Readers and authors talk

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Ed Johnson on Roundup of distressing climate news » Thank you all for your comments and commitments. I too sense this with out all the research backgrou...
Lee Samelson on The climate change mountaintop » It seems like the stages occur in reverse order for climate hawks Climate hawks or climate activists...
Steve on For sale, habitable planet, too late » Doug, I am in a similar place to you, I think. I have probably never really faced up to the reality ...