The trend is very encouraging, and I am excited about solar (even as a nuke). I just wish that storage was required of home solar arrays instead of intermittently pulling from and selling back to the grid. I would love to install solar and have a DC grid in my house to run my lights and to plug all of my electronics into. It just isn't affordable right now.

The reason why there has been a lot of focus on new designs is because anti-nuclear groups are calling for retrofits on old plants that just do not make any financial sense. The anti groups are arguing that nuclear is unsafe because the plants are getting old and that almost all of the internals should be replaced. In the same breath they are arguing that because nuclear is unsafe we shouldn't build any new plants. How is the industry supposed to respond? We can spend the cost of a new plant completely rebuilding existing reactors, and still have 50 year-old designs or we can utilize the latest technologies and build new plants.

Many people in the nuclear industry are ok with phasing out the old plants and we do recognize that it needs to be done. However, we also recognize that solar and wind are not ready to fill the void caused by shutting down all our nuclear plants. This means that most of that capacity would be replaced by coal. In the interest of everyone around the world, we do not want more coal plants. Most people in the nuclear industry (at least the ones that I have met) care about the environment. We do not want to see more coal plants being built. We are ok with decommissioning the old nuclear plants, but please, let us build new ones.

Forgive me if I fail to see what you mean by this. Do you mean that I should be scared about living in Chernobyl or Fukushima because of radiation? The truth is, there are those of us who do research who regularly get higher doses than what you would receive by living in those areas. There are also people around the world who live with higher background doses. If your fear is radiation then there are other places in the world/occupations that you could tell a person to go that would result in them receiving a higher dose.

I get tired of people telling me that if I don't think that there are problems with Fukushima or Chernobyl why don't I go there. Or with those that tell me that if I think that nuclear waste is safe why don't I store it in my basement. I do not fear the waste because I study it, I work with it, and I know what it can, and cannot do. I would love to be able to separate out the Sr from the waste and put it in a capsule in my basement. With that I could heat my house and have all the hot water that I wanted for a hundred years.

Now, with that said, I do believe that we need to exercise caution and try to keep the dose to the public as low as reasonably achievable. What happened in Fukushima is a disaster. I feel for all of those who were displaced from their homes. But we also need to look at the risks that are associated with the elevated radiation levels in the different areas. Although the levels are higher than the normal background in many area, the levels are still so low that the probability of health effects is negligible.

The article that you link to has quite a few shortcomings. Some of them are outlined here

The end-game of a majority of people putting solar on their homes is higher utility rates for everyone. Utilities buy back the electricity that the solar panels overproduce at a high price. The production from the solar panels is intermittent and so the utilities cannot rely on them. This creates even greater swing in the demand that utilities see, yet they still have to to be able to produce enough to cover everyone if the sun isn't shining.

Although the installed cost of solar may be less than the cost of nuclear, if we tried relying on solar we would find the the low capacity factor of solar, combined with the cost of grid storage would quickly move the price well beyond affordable.

I have been preaching this for a while now, we really need to reform K-12 education. I believe that the amount of material that is covered by 12th grade could be covered by the end of 10th grade (with adjustments to the system, of course). This would allow the last 2 years of high school to be for technical training or college generals. It would not cost public school systems that much more money and students with just a high school education would be much more productive in the work force. Also, if students can graduate high school with an associates degree then all they would need is 2 years of college (half the student loans) for a BS.

This plan would require massive restructuring of the K-12 system, but the system needs it anyway.

How about the sliding locks on the lavatories in airplanes? You have a latch that you stick your finger on and you slide it to unlock. There are also "locks" (plastic channels) that attach on the top of bi-fold doors that you have to slide to unlock. Heck even the latches on many bathroom stalls are "slide to unlock". Slide to unlock is nothing new.

Why are temporary storage sites unsafe? The fuel pools are not the best places to be storing fuels, I will grant you that, but what is wrong with dry cask storage? Those casks are really robust and can withstand a great deal of damage. There is also very little chance of Cs and Sr escaping into the air*. Sr is often listed as an element of concern with radioactive waste, but in accidents it is always the Cs you hear about. The reason is that Cs is a vapor somewhere above 600C. The fuel can reach these temperatures and so Cs will be released as a gas into the air. In dry cask storage the fuel has cooled down and the releases will be limited to those noble gasses that are still active. *There is a chance of escape if the casks are hit with sufficient explosives to blast the spent fuel into the air. Of course, to completely vaporize concrete casks of the that size would require nuclear weapons.

Uranium does not have a high uptake in plants. The greatest danger is having contaminated dust on the leaves. The roots of the plant do not readily uptake the Uranium. Uranium is also not highly metabolized in animals, the body will get rid of about half of the uranium in 15 days. Uptake from the water is also not typically a huge issue. The uranium is so dense that it quickly falls to the bottom. Uranium is not terribly likely to end up in the food or water that you consume.

I think one of the major problems (at least in the US) is the lack of competitiveness of K-12 education. I personally believe that we could do a lot more with K-12 education to get it to the point where students could finish the current equivalent of a HS diploma after 10th grade. This would allow for 2 years of technical training for those who do not want to go to college or 2 years to get all of the college-level generals out of the way. This plan would not require the states to pay more for a child's education, plus it could allow the completion of BS level education in 2 years of college. This would cut the total amount that a student has to pay out in half. Then if a student decides that they want more education it is their choice.

The problem with states subsidizing education is that graduates don't always stay in the state they graduate from. You could argue that the net flux across states is 0, but this is not true, especially for mid-west states. For states that are suffering job loss, a large migration of students out of the state would further cripple an already fragile economy.

It is worse than that. Current regulations for Yucca Mountain are on the time scale of 1 million years. With regulations on this scale there is no wonder that compliance cannot be shown. No one has any idea what the climate will be like anywhere on this planet 1 million years from now. Heck, look at 1 million years ago; walking upright was the new thing (relatively) and controlled fire was the stuff of science fiction.

The thing is though, there really isn't a conceivable scenario that would result in danger to humanity. The engineered barriers that are used (canister, back fill, overpack, etc.) are sufficient to ensure containment for thousands of years. This is more than enough time to ensure that pretty much anything but the trans-uranics are decayed away. As far as the trans-uranics go, we have a really good idea of what they do in the wild. The presence of uranium mines is a great indication that it doesn't spread quickly over a large area. By the time that we have contained the waste for 10000 years all we have left is essentially a new uranium mine just like the one that we dug up.

One of the problems with Yucca Mountain is that the government is doing so much research that you are bound to find scientists who disagree with the majority of the findings and are always raising concerns. The public gets wind of these concerns and refuses to allow Yucca Mountain to progress until the concerns are addressed. Said scientists gets another grant, does more research, finds another "problem", and the cycle continues. There is research done regarding Yucca Mountain the flies in the face of our understanding of the oxidizing behavior of Uranium. Yet it is done by a scientist and opponents grab onto it and use it. Though Yucca Mountain is a great place to store the waste, it will never open thanks to the current regulations surrounding it.

Who are the firms that are storing the nuclear material that are "raking in huge amounts of free and unbounded taxpayer dollars"? Most of the spent fuel (the stuff the Yucca Mountain is designed to handle) is being stored on-site at commercial reactors. The utilities are paying to store the waste, plus they are paying a tax so the government can dispose of the waste. The utilities are more the willing to have a permanent solution.

Your political and financial reality has a large dose of fantasy in it. Any area that accepts the waste repository is not necessarily going to become very rich. Jobs will be created in the area, but a desert won't suddenly become a metropolis. Just look at the area around Yucca Mountain, closing the project hasn't turned Nevada into a ghost-state. A few people have lost their jobs but the communities around there are still thriving. Your comparison between a nuclear waste dump and mountain top coal mining is fantasy at best. I am not sure how nuclear waste will destroy surrounding towns and I the proposed waste sites are well out of the way of any tourism.

Agreeing to host a waste repository isn't exactly political suicide either (and it isn't like you are agreeing to become the world's dumping ground like you seem to suggest). Accepting a repository will bring some jobs and moneys into your state. It is a lot safer than having chemical plants being built in your state. Accidents in chemical plants have claimed many more lives and contaminated more area than nuclear waste accidents have.

Forgive me if I seem snarky, nuclear waste is my area of specialty and I get tired of the same old arguments.

I wasn't going to reply to you, but you used a magic phrase with me...wealth redistribution. I pay my taxes like you, but I am tired of it. I agree with the principle of wealth redistribution. I wish that everyone could have their basic needs met. If I made sufficient to help others I gladly would...if I knew that they were working hard and doing their best. Where I get tired is when there are many people who are just living off the system and do nothing to contribute to society. I think janitors should be able to hold their head high with the doctors since they are both engaged in honest employment. I understand that there are people who, for whatever reason, are limited. But I believe that there is something that everyone can do.

I get tired of people who are unemployed because they think that available jobs are beneath their dignity. There is no shame in honest work.

Sorry to go off topic on your post, but I think that there are many jobs available for these protesters. Heck, there are people flooding across the boarder to get them. Let's put our own people to work in the fields and tax the rich to help make-up what the poor can't earn.