Re:Orr we could (Score 1)

YES! Finally someone who knows what to do here. What we need is accelerator reactors. They have an on/off switch without the worry of melt-down, they convert hazardous waste into something we can tolerate, and they can burn thorium and other more common elements, which would give us a clean, reliable energy resource until we can get fusion working. It is absolutely insane that we are not building an accelerator reactor right now! I was attending a talk at Fermilab, where the physicist indicated that it would take about 1 MW of protons to produce 10 MW of power from a U-238 or thorium target. The problem is that the current particle accelerator labs (with people who know how to build and manage accelerators) are located at laboratories that are not capable of easily dealing with the regulation typically imposed on nuclear power plants. Everyone who reads this (and decides this is a good idea) -- please send a e-mails to your representatives.