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Supporters of increased nuclear power say Vermont, and anti-nuclear activists, are ignoring many of the benefits the fuel source provides in terms of reduced greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and a stable supply of electricity.
Nuclear supporters also point to a sort of "nuclear renaissance" around the globe, including the commitment in the United States to build six new 500-1,000 megawatt reactors, the result of an energy bill passed by Congress in 2005.
There are currently 103 operating reactors in the United States, meeting about 20 percent of the nation's electrical demand. And, some would like to see that number go even higher through a mix of extended operating licenses, power uprates, and new plants.
In Vermont, Entergy is already producing 20 percent more power at Windham County's Vermont Yankee (VY) than the power station was originally licensed to produce, and would like to keep operating the plant beyond 2012 when its current license expires.
Outside of Vermont, Entergy, which earned $216 million in the first quarter of this year from its nuclear operations, is looking to expand the number of plants it operates.
Entergy has received an early go-ahead from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to file permits for a new plant in Port Gibson, MI. The company hopes to file its full application later this year, according to Diane Park, a spokeswoman for the company's nuclear business development group.
Entergy is also eyeing a new plant in St. Franciseville, LA, but Park said she doesn't expect that permit to be filed until sometime next year.
These new plants, along with another being proposed by the Tennessee Valley Authority, are part of a 10-member group called the New Start Consortium, a mix of energy companies and nuclear plant designers and suppliers.
However, bringing a nuclear power plant online is both expensive and takes nearly a 10 years from filing a permit to grand opening, and costs nearly $2 billion to construct.
"The NRC has said they would expect about a four-year review cycle and if we submit at the end of 2007 then you're talking about 2011 or 2012 when their review would be complete," said Park. "And, then you're looking at four to five years' construction time."
Park said that is a ballpark estimate.
Aside from these plants, which are being boosted financially by Congress' offer of subsidies and GHG credits, Entergy is cautiously looking at building other plants, and the jury is still out on whether these new plants will be built, Park said.
"There is a regulatory and technology path that we're going down and concurrently there is a business path to decide whether to build makes sense financially," said Park. "There we are considering load projection, interest rates and the cost of capital, and what does the picture look like to the alternatives to nuclear energy."
Talks of new nuclear power plants are mostly in the South and mid-Atlantic regions of the country, where load growth is the most pronounced.
"We're certainly not saying that nuclear should be the only source of power for the country. We believe in a diverse power mix, but nuclear is a good source of baseload power," said Park.
As to the questions of waste, and safety, Park said no form of energy is completely benign.
"There is no form of energy that doesn't leave some kind of footprint. Even if you get to solar and wind, it takes a considerable amount of land space to do anything," said Park. "Every form of power developed on a scale that meets our increasing demand is a trade-off and it comes down to what different people find acceptable."
Europe: A fresh look at nuclear
In Europe, where nuclear power remains unpopular in a number of countries, efforts are underway to develop new power plants, or keep older plants online longer.
The main reason: Nuclear power advocates call it the only power source to utilize if society is serious about cutting greenhouse gases.
In the wake of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster and concerns about where to put the waste generated from nuclear power, European nations stopped building nuclear plants for 15 years.
Finland was the first to break the silence, and is expected to see its first new reactor come online in 2009. A similar power plant is expected to be built in France and be online by 2020.
Countries in eastern Europe, such as Bulgaria, Romania, and the Czech Republic, are also putting plants back online, and looking to expand their nuclear power capacity in the next 10 years.
And the list goes on - Switzerland, Italy, Sweden, Germany, and Belgium are all lifting moratoria, or backing off plans to mothball nuclear plants.
At the same time, many European countries are also expanding their investments in wind and solar, in particular Germany, which is making some of the largest investments in solar and has a so-called "solar resource" roughly the equivalent to Vermont's.
According to nuclear proponents:
• As of January 2007, 30 countries worldwide were operating 435 nuclear reactors for electricity generation;
• Thirty new nuclear plants were under construction in 12 countries;
• Nuclear power plants provided some 16 percent of the world's electricity production in 2005; and,
• In total, 16 countries relied on nuclear energy to supply at least one-quarter of their total electricity.
With all of this focus on nuclear power, another problem is raised: Uranium is considered a finite resource. There is believed to be enough known sources of uranium to fuel existing power demands another 50 years or so, but that does not take into account an increased power output. Factoring that in, some industry observers say the uranium could be depleted in 20 to 25 years.
The largest supply of uranium is in Australia, followed by Kazakhstan, Canada, South Africa, Namibia, Brazil, Russia, the United States, and Uzbekistan.
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