Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×

Submission + - Global Nuclear Power Supply At Lowest Level Since 1980s (huffingtonpost.com)

Submitted by mdsolar
mdsolar writes: Atomic power's share of global electricity supply is at the lowest level since the 1980s following the shutdown of Japan's reactors after the Fukushima disaster, and may fall further without major new plant construction.

The forecast is one of the main conclusions of the World Nuclear Industry Status Report 2014, a draft copy of which was passed to Reuters before general release later on Tuesday.

The report paints a bleak picture of the industry more than three years after three reactors melted down at Tokyo Electric Power Co's Fukushima Daiichi station north of the Japanese capital after an earthquake and tsunami.

Rising costs, construction delays, public opposition and aging fleets of reactors will make it difficult for nuclear to reverse the decline in its share of global energy supply, even after two reactors in Japan won provisional approval to restart earlier this month.

Submission + - U.S. Coastal Flooding on the Rise, Government Study Finds (nytimes.com)

Submitted by mdsolar
mdsolar writes: Flooding is increasing in frequency along much of the U.S. coast, and the rate of increase is accelerating along the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic coasts, a team of federal government scientists found in a study released Monday.

The study examined how often 45 tide gauges along the country’s shore exceeded National Weather Service flood thresholds across several decades. The researchers found that the frequency of flooding increased at 41 locations. Moreover, they found that the rate of increase was accelerating at 28 of those locations. The highest rates of increase were concentrated along the mid-Atlantic coast.

Submission + - Why We Said Goodbye to Fossil-Fuel Investments (chronicle.com)

Submitted by mdsolar
mdsolar writes: "This spring, after considerable study, Pitzer College announced a comprehensive and ambitious climate-action plan, including a commitment to divest the endowment of substantially all fossil-fuel-company stocks by the end of 2014. It was not a decision made lightly, but one that we felt was a key step in more fully aligning the college’s actions with its mission and values.

Our deliberations began last October, when the Board of Trustees formed a working group, which I chaired, composed of students, faculty and staff members, and trustees. In the course of our discussions, we confronted a wide variety of objections to divestment, many raised by other colleges and universities that have rejected it. Taking the road less traveled required much research and soul-searching, but, personally, I can say it was well worth the journey.

As other colleges consider fossil-fuel divestment and confront those objections, I would like to share the objections and our responses, which helped shape Pitzer’s decision..."

Comment Re:already done (Score 1) 133

OK, so they are right and Wald reported accurately. NRC already agrees with the report. It hardly seems late if it is a report requested by congress with a particular scope. NAS is usually pretty thorough. It hardly seems wrong for congress to want to know about this since the US shoulders nearly all the risk for an accident through the huge Price Anderson subsidy.

Comment Re:already done (Score 1) 133

But isn't that what the National Academy of Sciences is saying in the report? Platts reports he same. http://www.platts.com/latest-n... "US nuclear regulators and industry officials must do more to protect reactors from extreme, but unlikely, events like the earthquake and tsunami that caused the accident at Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant, the National Academy of Sciences recommended in report issued Thursday."

Slashdot Top Deals

"Ninety percent of baseball is half mental." -- Yogi Berra

Close