As the country looks to decarbonize, nuclear’s popularity climbs to the highest level in a decade:
A Gallup survey released in late April found that 55 percent of U.S. adults support the use of nuclear power. That's up four percentage points from last year and reflects the highest level of public support for nuclear energy use in electricity since 2012.
[...] Nuclear energy has historically been a source of immense controversy. A series of high-profile nuclear accidents and disasters, from Three Mile Island in 1979 to Chernobyl in 1986 to Fukushima in 2011, have raised safety concerns — even though the death toll from fossil fuel power generation far outstrips that of nuclear power generation. Several government nuclear programs have also left behind toxic waste that place disproportionate burdens on Indigenous communities.
But nuclear power doesn't produce carbon emissions, and it's more consistent and reliable than wind and solar energy, which vary depending on the weather. For these reasons, the Biden administration has identified nuclear energy as a key climate solution to achieve grid stability in a net-zero future. The administration is pushing for the deployment of a new generation of reactors called "advanced nuclear": a catch-all term for new nuclear reactor models that improve on the safety and efficiency of traditional reactor designs.
In a recent report, the Department of Energy found that regardless of how many renewables are deployed, the U.S. will need an additional 200 gigawatts of advanced nuclear power — enough to power about 160 million homes — to reach President Joe Biden's goal of hitting net-zero emissions by 2050.
Gallup has tracked several swings in public opinion since first asking about nuclear in 1994. From 2004 to 2015, a majority of Americans favored nuclear power use, with a high of 62 percent in support in 2010. But in 2016, the survey found a majority opposition to nuclear power for the first time. Gallup speculated that lower gasoline prices that year may have "lessened Americans' perceptions that energy sources such as nuclear power are needed." In recent years, views on nuclear power had been evenly divided until the latest poll, conducted between March 1 and 23.
The new poll found that 62 percent of Republicans support the use of nuclear power, compared to 46 percent of Democrats. The support from Republicans is likely driven by "a focus on energy independence, supporting innovation, supporting American leadership globally, and supporting American competition with folks like China and Russia specifically in terms of the nuclear space," said Ryan Norman, senior policy advisor at the center-left think tank Third Way.
[...] In addition to the Department of Energy's modeling, the International Energy Agency's Net Zero by 2050 scenario found that in order to fully decarbonize the global economy, worldwide nuclear power capacity would need to double between 2022 and 2050.
In Congress, nuclear power has enjoyed some rare moments of bipartisan support. Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle have joined forces to pass a few successful pro-nuclear laws. The 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law injected $6 billion toward maintaining existing nuclear power plants. And while the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act was an entirely Democratic effort, it included a technology-neutral tax credit for low-carbon energy that can be used for nuclear power plants. The climate spending law also allocates millions in investments for advanced nuclear research and demonstration.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Adam on Wednesday May 10, @04:18PM (1 child)
160 million houses of electricity is roughly half of the current US total electricity use. For reference, there are currently ~125 million US households and they use about 38% of the country's electricity.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by SingularityPhoenix on Wednesday May 10, @04:49PM
Keep running already built nuke plants that are safe to continue running.
Whether nuclear power is viewed well or not, I think the economics will continue to prevent it from being built. Investors typically don't care about public opinion.
The earth has a lot of thermal mass. It takes a long time to heat up or cool down. Just looking at average global temperatures, at the upward trend, I think that if we stopped all greenhouse gas emissions today we would still see significant warming in the decades ahead.
If you look at when nuclear power plants in the USA stopped being built nearly as much, it was after TMI (Three mile island). At TMI the estimated deaths from the radiation released is 1. The investors were hurt. Their expensive power plant became an even more expensive liability because of costs to clean up. What I wonder is if we can afford all the emissions that happened between the 70s and now because nuclear died.
But with the cost of industrial sized wind and solar dropping so much in the last 10 years. I doubt nuclear power can compete on cost, and I doubt it really is necessary.
If wind and solar continue to get cheaper, their production variability and inability to load follow especially for peak load, would be much better complimented with gas turbines than nuclear. Gas turbines ramp up and down quickly, produce the least amount of CO2 of any fuel, and is currently cheap because of fracking.
And if wind and solar continue how they're trending, they will get cheap enough to be worth storing (understand storage, like say pumped hydro, has the cost of a hydroplant, but it doesn't produce any net electricity, which is a huge hurtle), or cheap enough to install excess capacity (where some production will be wasted because it can't be used or stored).
Don't get me wrong. I really like nuclear power. I think the physics behind it is interesting. I would be happy if they built a nuke plant in my (figurative) back yard. They certainly use a lot less land than wind, solar, or hydro power. If you look at the statistics, nuclear is safe. But whether its built depends on the economics.
Well that's a long 2 cents.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by DannyB on Wednesday May 10, @04:20PM (10 children)
Can they really make it safe?
This is not a question about technology. It is a question about operational management, politics and the will to do the right thing both now, and . . . uh, oh . . . in the future.
It is difficult to secure political commitments to do the right thing in the future.
We can't even pay off national debt that we incurred under prior administrations. How can we be sure that in the far future two or even three years from now we will care enough about ongoing safety?
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Tork on Wednesday May 10, @04:35PM (1 child)
I have a similar concern. I hope I'm just being a pearl-clutcher but I've been keeping an eye on that big plant in Ukraine and ... ugh. It's one thing to make these plants safe and reliable even in the face of natural disasters, but political-proofing them?
Slashdolt Logic: "25 year old jokes about sharks and lasers are +5, Funny." 💩
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 10, @05:09PM
Who is going to bet that's never going to happen? What are the odds? Now factor in the number of nuclear power plants you'd have to build to reach those targets.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Wednesday May 10, @04:43PM (5 children)
I'm betting it is "I support nuclear energy... but NIMBY."
"I LOVE nuclear energy...but NIMBY."
Let's do a survey.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 10, @05:19PM (1 child)
Thing is I'm betting there'll always be crazy people and incompetent people. For bonus points add guns and explosives to the crazies.
Expose a solar or wind farm near my backyard to crazy and/or incompetent people and I might still not even need to move house.
(Score: 2) by turgid on Thursday May 11, @07:04PM
Already achieved.
They could blow off the blades, which are pretty big, and one could destroy your house. Or they could topple one of those tall towers which could destroy your house.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 5, Interesting) by RS3 on Wednesday May 10, @05:49PM (2 children)
As I commented in another discussion, I think people look at things in a "snapshot" way. Everyone needs to look at timelines. Nuclear power is relatively new compared to other forms of electric power generation. That and it has mysterious layers that only advanced engineers and scientists understand. We're still learning about what radiation does to various materials.
We're also learning how to do nuclear much more safely. Public opinion can be pretty fickle and easily swayed, sometimes gullible either way. But overall as time progresses, and the need increases, I think the public is getting used to nuclear. They've seen the accidents, and despite the many problems, life goes on for most of us. All of the media hype over TMI just made the media look like stupid fearmongers selling sensationalism. (yes, really!)
I live ~ 20 miles from a nuke. I have no worries, I've never heard of any, nor have I heard of anyone worrying, including people who live very close to it. I think people are more worried about some other things.
I like the idea of much smaller reactors, and Westinghouse has introduced the AP300: https://www.neimagazine.com/news/newswestinghouse-launches-ap300-small-modular-reactor-10836205 [neimagazine.com]
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Wednesday May 10, @07:18PM (1 child)
--Top article
--https://thebulletin.org/2019/06/why-nuclear-power-plants-cost-so-much-and-what-can-be-done-about-it/
Would not this money be spent better on green tech?
Make all new housing/buildings be built with solar/wind, and with green space/gardens built on top: but i guess that would cut into profits too much.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Interesting) by RS3 on Wednesday May 10, @08:58PM
Generally I agree, understand, and empathize with the sentiment, but back to the time thing: we need something to carry us over until we have (much) more "green" energy in place. It's like so many things in life: people need to look at trends, progress, movements, economics, supply-chain, transportation / logistics, on and on.
For example, the more rules, laws, mandates, etc., the govt. puts in place, the more the price skyrockets- for anything and everything. It's all about supply and demand.
But to make it personal- 10 or so years ago I had a gig job installing PV systems. I didn't make a lot of money doing it, but I felt like I was helping a little. Just showing I agree, not just in words, but actions.
Again, I absolutely agree qualitatively, but again, that mandate will drive PV prices way up. IMHO, we have more of a manufacturing problem. I've railed against "offshoring" when it closes down North American factories and boosts China. Now they own the production. We may do some partial PV assembly here, but I'm not aware of large scale polysilicon manufacturing in the US or Canada (or Europe?) If we could scale up production, then by all means, please please put them everywhere, especially large buildings like shopping and office buildings.
I don't have numbers, but the guy I was working for doing PV installs (he's also a BSEE + MBA) said that solar hot water heating saves much more dollars than PV, but PV was getting all the press and govt. grants at the time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 10, @04:56PM
Clean, safe, too cheap to meter
Safe, cheap, too clean to meter
Clean, cheap, too safe to meter
(Score: 2) by turgid on Wednesday May 10, @07:44PM
The UK system of operation and regulation was completely overhauled following the Chernobyl disaster of 1986. It adopts a safety-first no-blame culture and policy with independent regulation with strong legal powers. If you can't make a robust safety case to operate which can convince the regulator, you will not be allowed to operate. If you fail to uphold standards and follow regulations, you will be prosecuted, including jail time potentially.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Common Joe on Wednesday May 10, @04:22PM (7 children)
This kind of thinking is very short sighted.
I don't mind using nuclear in the short term, but we really don't know how to safely dispose of the spent fuel -- whether you look at it from an ecological stand point or a weaponized stand point. (Dirty bombs for instance.) This renewed focus on nuclear is awful, in my opinion.
Additionally, at least when I was more involved in this stuff a few years ago, nuclear was used as a steady base energy, topped with carbon fuels, further topped with renewables. You can't just turn nuclear energy on and off quickly when demand quickly rises and drops (which happens quite often). The job of the carbon fuels was to deal with that.
These days, I hear of wind and solar being used as the majority of energy production in some countries for extended periods of time. I'm very happy about that. No, I'm not a zealot because I acknowledge there are major problems with the renewable technology. (For instance, they only recently came out with a prototype for a material that could dissolve the wind blades of turbines. Otherwise, there is no way to destroy the blades once their life is used up. And making batteries is not friendly to the environment.) It just seems that going back to nuclear is the wrong direction.
(Score: 3, Informative) by MIRV888 on Wednesday May 10, @04:28PM
Absolutely. Nuclear is base load with NG turbines for peak loading. We're coal fired (KY) but NG turbines have been peak loading for 20 years now.
(Score: 5, Informative) by gnuman on Wednesday May 10, @05:37PM (3 children)
We do. You can recycle it and use again. But that would cost like $100-$150/lb Uranium equivalent so it's not so economical. Hence, it's just stored. Burring it underground in glass-like stuff, that's just shortsighted, I think, since it's still could be useful in future.
Regarding "dirty bomb" .... I think pundits invented that after 9/11 to scare people. Reactors could be nice "dirty bombs" but not cold, spent fuel.
You can turn it down to 40% or so, depending on design. But it makes little sense for economic reasons. The fuel is tiny expense in comparison to capital costs, so every hour offline, is hour that money is burning. This is main reason why it will probably not catch on, especially if storage costs keep coming down.
(Score: 3, Touché) by tangomargarine on Wednesday May 10, @06:40PM (2 children)
You do know what a dirty bomb actually is, right? From your post I'm not convinced...
Just because the fuel is spent, it is not cold--either figuratively or literally. Heat is a waste product of nuclear decay, and the half-life of these elements (especially uranium) is very long. That's the whole reason you need to be able to store it for a long time, because it's still radioactive? (Granted, I'm not familiar with exactly how they store it...if they mix the nuclear waste with some other stabilizing agent and cast it into a big cube of ~glass or something, it may be more or less room temperature to the touch.)
The point of a dirty bomb is to spread radioactive material over an area, and the fuel waste is still radioactive for plenty of time.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by turgid on Wednesday May 10, @07:56PM
Yes, billions of years for U-238, which occurs naturally. In a thermal reactor it captures neutrons and turns into plutonium with a much shorted half life.
We dig U-238/235 out of the ground. It's natural.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 2) by gnuman on Wednesday May 10, @09:02PM
Yes, I know.
you see, now it's my turn to say "You do know what a XYZ actually is, right? From your post I'm not convinced..." :-)
Uranium, by definition, is very cold. Radiologically cold. Also, it's thermally cold too as consequence. Long half-life == cold. Short half-life == hot. That's the definition. Fissile "waste" only needs to be cooled for few years and only few months actively. Medium-hot stuff like cesium tends to be a problem in this waste material because that stuff remains dangerous to us in human lifetimes scale. Here's a nice summary worthy to read.
https://www.iaea.org/sites/default/files/gc/gc50inf-3-att5_en.pdf [iaea.org]
With reprocessing (re-cycling) of waste and using them in reactors like IFR, you can get waste down in size by 95% or so and have it back at initial uranium ore radioactivity levels within a hundred years or so. The problem is mostly will to do it and funding. But such is life. Fuel recycling is basically fraud upon due to nuclear anti-proliferation treaty reasons -- it's easier to be certain some waste was not reprocessed for weapon reason if you don't touch it ;)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integral_fast_reactor [wikipedia.org]
Exactly, that's why it's sooo useless invention of the TV pundits and scaremongers. If you spread radioactive stuff in a city block, the solution is to clean it up and hose off the residue. If it's particularly hot stuff, well, you can scrape off a few mm of concrete and you are done. That's why I also said that nuclear reactors are "great dirty bombs" because they are the only ones that manage to spread radiation over larger area via meltdowns. So this probably should tell you how useless a supposed dirty bomb is and why they mostly stopped yapping on TV about it.
Radioactive material is very easy to detect (since it glows to the instruments) and hence it's easy to clean over small area. It's much more difficult to clean up chemical spills effectively since you can't see them as readily.
(Score: 2) by ChrisMaple on Thursday May 11, @07:20PM (1 child)
I just did a web search for load change response time for nuclear power. Modern designs can change by at least 5% per minute over the range of 30% - 100% of rated power. From that, it seems to me that the common claim that nuclear can only be used at one power level all the time is at best untrue, and at worst a lie. Who is benefiting from this?
(Score: 2) by Common Joe on Friday May 12, @02:07AM
Keep in mind that electricity has to be maintained down to the sub-second level. Otherwise you get brownouts or the line is overcharged. Clocks used to hold the correct time simply by plugging them in... but if the alternating current oscillation is too low, the clock would be too slow -- too fast AC means the clock would be too fast. Even 10 or 15 years ago, they would adjust the frequency of the electricity to purposely be a little too high or too low to keep clocks at the proper time. I don't know if they still do that today. (Please don't hold me to these terms. I'm no expert and terrible with exact word usage in my areas of non-expertise.)
Although they can do fantastic predicting of when people turn on their lights, 5% per minute isn't fast enough when many people turn their lights in the morning at 5:02:47 instead of the predicted 5:02:30... or when a lot of people turn electrical items off. Hence the reason why nuclear was a base energy and not a proper way to react to changes in usage. The sudden impact of people turning things on or off is further mitigated by connecting grids together and spreading out the sudden spikes over large areas, thus smoothing the curve.
A lot of this is also complicated by energy markets where electricity is bought and sold days and weeks before it's generated. There are many businesses (producers of electricity and consumers of electricity) which are coordinated by ISOs (Independent System Operators). Also, generators need to brought offline for long periods of time for maintenance. This often happens in the Spring or Fall when energy demand is lower.
In short, electricity generation is very complicated in the modern world.
(Score: 2) by MIRV888 on Wednesday May 10, @04:25PM
In the meantime this is what we have for base load non-carbon emitting power.
Clearly bad things can happen with reactors, but design has come a very long way since GE mark1's.
Chernobyl, well that was a piss poor design from the outset, but whatcha gonna do?
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday May 10, @04:27PM
But do we need to upgrade our grid to deliver it to where it is needed.
EV charging stations.
Water desalination.
More and brighter Neon, or now LED lights on Fremont street.
Or, can we build more and smaller nuclear power plants closer to where it is needed, rather than one super duper one out in the desert somewhere.
With enough plentiful electricity, we could run power wind turbines to act as huge fans. [xkcd.com]
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 5, Interesting) by SomeRandomGeek on Wednesday May 10, @04:28PM (5 children)
I used to be for nuclear power when I thought it was a source of unlimited renewable energy. Then I was opposed to nuclear power when I saw it as a source of expensive energy, nuclear waste, and meltdowns. Now I just think it is irrelevant. Other forms of renewable energy are cheaper and getting more so all the time. The storage problem might well be solved in less time than it takes to build a single reactor. The biggest problem with nuclear power is that you need to put down billions of dollars today for a reactor that won't come online for ten years (if all goes well) and that will need forty years to pay for itself. A decade from now, things will be completely different. Solar costs 20% of what it did a decade ago. https://www.nrel.gov/news/program/2021/documenting-a-decade-of-cost-declines-for-pv-systems.html [nrel.gov]
Nuclear power only makes sense if you assume that other more promising solutions to our energy problems will all fail.
(Score: 2) by GloomMower on Wednesday May 10, @06:28PM (2 children)
https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2019/8/9/20767886/renewable-energy-storage-cost-electricity [vox.com]
This says storage needs to decrease by 90% to $20/kWh, maybe can be more expensive if allow for lower uptime and use non-renewables in those times.
You hear of some cool energy storage things coming down the pipe?
(Score: 2) by SomeRandomGeek on Wednesday May 10, @11:11PM (1 child)
How carefully did you read that article?
(Score: 2) by GloomMower on Thursday May 11, @06:47PM
I did, that was what:
"maybe can be more expensive if allow for lower uptime and use non-renewables in those times."
Perhaps badly worded, sorry if it added to confusion.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday May 10, @06:33PM (1 child)
On the other hand, nuclear works if we want to start building NOW. You can keep saying "let's wait 5 more years" forever, if you want to only build the perfect solar plant.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by SomeRandomGeek on Wednesday May 10, @10:57PM
1. Solar works if you want to start building now. Storage only starts to become an issue when about 40% of total capacity comes from solar. Until that point, the time when the sun is shining just conveniently happens to also be the time of peak usage.
2. It is debatable whether nuclear works if we want to start building now. Certainly nothing is stopping you from building a new nuclear power plant, except getting all the permits and finding someone to pay for it.
In 2022, the US managed to bring about 10 times as much solar as nuclear online. https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=50818 [eia.gov]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by oumuamua on Wednesday May 10, @06:12PM (1 child)
Thanks to cheap reactors from China, delivering electricity cheaper than solar in Pakistan https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-02-02/pakistan-launches-2-7-billion-china-designed-nuclear-plant#xj4y7vzkg [bloomberg.com]
Obviously the Western countries will not buy a single one and will have to stick with western modular reactors deliver half the power at twice the price. Ooops inflation, more than twice the price: https://ieefa.org/resources/eye-popping-new-cost-estimates-released-nuscale-small-modular-reactor [ieefa.org]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by turgid on Wednesday May 10, @07:46PM
Did you hear the one about the Chinese nuclear power plant which continued to operate despite fission products leaking out in the coolant? It's not just about the hardware, it's also about how you run it.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday May 10, @06:31PM (2 children)
Anybody else remember the whining from Nevada over the Yucca Mountain National Repository? Most of your state is empty desert, dude, shut up! And they're not even splitting the atom there, just storing the waste products :P
Huh. I get the Dem "hurting the planet" hippy angle, but really, Reps aren't worried it'll damage their corporate oil profits?
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday May 10, @06:56PM (1 child)
Oh, of course--the location they picked happened to be on tribal lands for some reason. Sigh.
I'm beginning to agree with "screw Nevada" being a good idea :P
The Scandinavian disposal site they're referring to is Onkalo [wikipedia.org], located in Finland and using Swedish storage techniques.
Heh, unfortunate false cognate in English.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by ChrisMaple on Thursday May 11, @07:26PM
There isn't a single square inch of land in the U.S. for which you won't be able to find - or bribe - someone who claims to be a native American, to say that that land is sacred. The argument from religion is bogus.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by gznork26 on Wednesday May 10, @07:21PM (1 child)
The discussion seems to have focussed on the strategy of using refined uranium-235 one time until is it no longer producing enough heat, and then storing the 'waste' for eons. The alternative is to refine the 'waste' to reclaim the unused uranium-235 and use it a second and third time, which further reduces the length of time it must be stored in the end.
This recycling of U-235 is already being done overseas, but only by one or two nations at present. For it to be done in the US, new construction would of course be needed, but we now have an immense supply of 'waste' that can be turned into fuel. Doing this solves two problems at once, reducing the problem of storing spent nuclear pellets, and providing the fuel for generating energy without additional mining or burning of fossil fuels, once the new processes are in place.
(Score: 2) by turgid on Wednesday May 10, @07:52PM
Reprocessing nuclear fuel isn't just about the U-235. There's a lot of (highly radioactive) plutonium in it which is fissile and can be used as fuel. In fact, over the decades it has been in several ways. Plutonium can be used in a fast reactor but it can also be re-used in a thermal reactor.
Many (most) thermal reactors require the uranium fuel to be enriched, that is the proportion of U-235:U-238 to be increased over natural uranium to increase the fissile content. However, since plutonium (nuclear waste) is fissile, it is possible to add plutonium to the uranium instead of enriching it, and the plutonium makes up for the missing U-235. This is called Mixed Oxide Fuel (MOX).
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 3, Insightful) by turgid on Wednesday May 10, @08:09PM
There won't be much more large-scale nuclear power from fission. There may be a few pockets here and there but the ship has sailed.
The damage to the environment from fossil fuels has already been done almost to the point of no return. The waste products from burning fossil fuels have been allowed to be dumped straight into the atmosphere for over two hundred years.
Due to poor political decisions and bad management, there have been a number of very serious nuclear accidents around the world that have frightened the general public such that resistance to any significant new use of nuclear power, no matter how technologically advanced, will be overwhelming.
There were opportunities to do things right 20-30 years ago, but political and financial short-termism won and we went the fossil fuel route. We could have spent those decades advancing the technology and the safety cultures while working on the waste issues. We chose to be cheap and timid instead. We chose a quick buck and environmental vandalism.
Nuclear fission would be a great way to generate large quantities of useful power safely and cleanly but it will not happen now. It will not make "investors" enough money. I would argue that the investment is in the environment as a whole, not just pensions and equity funds. The investment would have been having somewhere to live, Planet Earth, with a clear atmosphere and lower risk of climate change. That in turn would have allowed other business and enterprise to flourish.
I'm pretty disappointed at the pathetic level of funding we as a society have put into nuclear fusion. The reason it's always "20 years away" is because we invest peanuts and crumbs.
What a sorry species we humans are.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 2) by ChrisMaple on Thursday May 11, @07:37PM (1 child)
The U.S. is no longer replacing deaths with new births. Population is increasing by immigration, most of it illegal. Stop the immigration, demand for power declines. Violent crime will decline also. Also continue efficiency improvements, and demand will decline.
As for Republicans liking nuclear more than Democrats -- who's following the science now?
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Thursday May 11, @10:40PM
True.
False.
In 2018 an estimated 11.39 million unauthorized immigrants lived in the united states. An increase from about 3.5million in 1990.
cite: https://www.statista.com/statistics/646261/unauthorized-immigrant-population-in-the-us/ [statista.com]
So a 7.89 million increase, over 28 years averages about 281,000 per year.
Legal immigration in 1980 was 524,000; and has been more than that every year since then, with the run from 2008 to 2018 being over 1M per year each year.
cite: https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/Annual-Number-of-US-Legal-Permanent-Residents [migrationpolicy.org]
So.. no. The large majority of the immigration over the last few decades was legal.
Highly Unlikely; the need for electricity is increasing due to a variety of other factors aside from population growth. In particular the push towards moving away from fossil fuels for electricity for transportation and heating are creating massive demand for electricity from other sources. Further, the US economy is not sustainable without this immigration, and the economic shocks to the system by stopping immigration would far outstrip any benefit you could imagine by lessening the demand for power. The US is also completely unprepared for a declining population, one that inevitably skews elderly - just look at the problems it's causing in Japan.
I suppose if there are straight up less people in total there will be less violent crime in total. But studies on the subject of the relationship between crime and illegal immigrants have largely concluded that neither illegal immigration, nor legal immigration is associated with higher crime. Not every study agrees, and there are some caveats - illegal migrants have a higher rate of drug related arrests. But native born americans perform, per capita, the majority of most violent crime.
cite: https://www.factcheck.org/2018/06/is-illegal-immigration-linked-to-more-or-less-crime/ [factcheck.org]
I think you need to find a new bogeyman. Immigrants aren't it.
"EcoAmerica’s study finds that American support for nuclear power has grown 10 points from 2018 to 2021. Three years ago, 49% of Americans said they supported nuclear compared to 59% today. Republican support has remained steady over the four years [at 64%]. Independent support has shifted with just about half of Independents supporting nuclear in 2018 and just over 3 in 5 supporting nuclear in 2021 (61%). Steady growth unfolds for Democrats, with support consistently increasing between 2018 and 2021. In 2021, 60% of Democrats report support for nuclear energy, compared to 37% in 2018."
cite: https://ecoamerica.org/american-climate-perspectives-survey-2021-vol-v/ [ecoamerica.org]
So as of 2021 there was a 4% difference between Republicans and Democrat support for nuclear. I'll grant that it's been a good 30+ years of democrats with their head up their ass on nuclear, but as of now, they're about the same. Maybe we can finally get something done.