25 years after Chernobyl and with the current ongoing crisis at Fukushima Daichii in Japan, I'm going to have to do something fairly staggering: change my position on nuclear energy.
I think it's a bit of a shame. After all, we're one generation- just one- maybe two if we're lazy- of nuclear plants away from getting out of the fossil fuel business once and for all. Nuclear does have some extremely nasty byproducts, but it's clean, much better for the environment than coal and unlike wind, solar, hydro or wave power, it's something we can do right now.
Unless of course, it explodes.
Hence my newfound change in position. Would nuclear be the perfect energy to get us over the hump and away from fossil fuels once and for all? It would- if the political will and national sense of purpose were there to do it. Who are we kidding? No politician in this country is going to get us out from under fossil fuels. And if there's no clearly defined plan to perfect alternative energy to do that, then building a next generation of nuclear plants serves no purpose whatsoever.
So what to do? We can't survive on oil alone. Chopping the tops off of mountains in West Virginia ain't going to do it, either. Fracking has been causing Earthquakes in Arkansas. Oil sands from Canada just make more oil. We're crap at drilling for oil too apparently, given what happened in the Gulf of Mexico last year. I don't know what the answers are, but building a shiny new nuclear plant right here in Iowa is NOT the answer. I know that much.
Besides, everyone in the Middle East seems intent on burning the place down currently. And if $6 a gallon at the pump doesn't make people take another look at a hybrid, I don't know what will...
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