The case for nuclear energy
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Started by metmike - March 10, 2019, 7:25 p.m.
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By mcfarmer - March 10, 2019, 8:08 p.m.
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I am largely in favor of nuclear energy, I think it is really the only efficient alternative to fossil fuels we have today. We need to save that oil to make the valuable products it is used for.


Folks will say nuclear power is costly due to the safeguards that are necessary, and that is probably true. I think we just have to accept higher priced power, I don’t think wind will do it. Solar might be helpful if it is incorporated in new construction but I don’t think you can run industry on it.


The waste has to be managed, that’s one bugaboo. 

By silverspiker - March 10, 2019, 9:01 p.m.
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Navou , IL ....


  .... NIGHTS OF LIGHTNING AND THUNDER

Illinois is by far the most nuclear reliant state in the United States. As of 2017, if Illinois were a nation, it would be the 10th largest nuclear power in the world. There are ten reactors closer to Chicago than Chornobyl is to Kyiv, Ukraine.

Over the years Illinois has been plagued by a series of firsts and mosts:

In December 1942, under the stands of Stagg Field at the University of Chicago, Enrico Fermi and Leo Szilard initiated the first human controlled atomic chain reaction in history. Thus began the Atomic Age.  The reactor, Chicago Pile One (CP-1), was later rechristened the CP-2 and moved to nearby Palos Park as part of the Manhattan Project. A second reactor, the CP-3, was also built there. After the war, waste from and parts of both reactors were buried there; the dumpsite area is now part of the Palos Hills Forest Preserve.

Illinois was also home to the first large-scale commercial power reactor, Unit 1 at (then) Commonwealth Edison’s Dresden Power Station, opened in 1960. Subsequent serious radioactive contamination problems forced the permanent shutdown of this unit in 1978, thus also making it one of the first commercial power reactors to close prematurely.

ComEd’s two large Pressurized Water Reactors in Zion, IL, first opened in 1973, also had to close prematurely. They are the second and third large (over 1000 MegaWatt) power reactors to close prematurely, going offline in 1998.

Illinois also has the first and only commercial storage facility for high-level radioactive waste (HLRW), the General Electric Morris Operation (GEMO).  GEMO was to have operated as a spent-nuclear fuel reprocessing facility, but the technology employed by GE was faulty and failed.  The HLRW initially gathered to be reprocessed has largely remained at the site to this day.

Besides the 3 reactors that closed prematurely, Illinois currently has eleven operating nukes – far more than any other state. The Dresden Nuclear Power Station was one of the three first sites to apply for an operating license extension that would let the plant run for 20 years longer than its original design intended. (Incidentally, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), in conjunction with the nuclear industry, is exploring the option of an additional 20-year operating license extension beyond the first, meaning reactors may be licensed to operate for up to 80 years if this policy is adopted.)  To date (2017), NRC has granted 20-year operating license extensions to all Illinois reactors except the Clinton-1 reactor in Central Illinois.

You can download a map of Nuclear Illinois here.

Illinois Reactors and Radioactive Waste Facts

Nuclear Illinois Facts – 2017

Nuclear Illinois Facts – 2016

Nuclear Illinois Facts – 2015

Nuclear Illinois Facts – 2013

The sites and facilities that make this “Nuclear Illinois”

Operating Reactors:

Closed Reactors:

  • Dresden I – 9 miles east of Morris, IL
  • Zion I and Zion II – Zion, IL
  • University of Illinois TRIGA research reactor – Urbana/Champagne, IL

Nuclear Fuel Production Sites:

  • Honeywell Specialty Chemicals Plant in Metropolis, IL. Converts uranium dioxide into uranium hexafluoride
  • Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant – In Paducah Kentucky, just across the Ohio River from Illinois. Produced enriched uranium needed for reactor fuel from 1952 to 2013.  10 Billion Gallons (that’s Billion with a “B”!) of contaminated groundwater

Research Facilities That Work With Radioactive Material:

  • Argonne National Labs (Argonne, near Darrien, Woodridge and Lemont – all Chicago Suburbs)
  • Fermilab (Batavia)

Nuclear Waste Dumps:

  • The GE Morris Operation – Storage for High Level Radioactive Waste
  • Low-Level Radioactive Waste Dump in Sheffield, Illinois – (LLRW) closed in 1978 when it reached capacity, later it developed leaks and was abandoned by its operator (US Ecology).
  • Manhattan Project Wastes buried in the Palos Forest Preserve in Red Gate Woods. A publicly accessible nuclear waste dump – perhaps the only one in the world!
  • Spent fuel at Illinois reactors: as of 2017, over 10,000 tons of spent reactor fuel is currently stored onsite at all Exelon r


By pj - March 10, 2019, 11:05 p.m.
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Mcfarmer: 

I too am in favor nuclear power and believe it can be done safely.  Mostly that has been demonstrated already with all the plants that have been run safely for so many years and newer designs are even safer. But I doubt it will really get going again. Afraid there are just too many anti-nukers, too many years of the negative drumbeat that brainwashed too many on the subject. Too much hype about the accidents that have happened.

" The waste has to be managed, that’s one bugaboo. "

If there were to be a number of new plants, I have an idea I think could solve or at least alleviate the accumulated waste problem by incorporating the waste into the construction materials used to build the new plants. This might involve taking into account the small amounts of additional radiation generated in the design of the plants, perhaps modifying the shielding if necessary.

By mcfarmer - March 11, 2019, 12:01 a.m.
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If there were to be a number of new plants, I have an idea I think could solve or at least alleviate the accumulated waste problem by incorporating the waste into the construction materials used to build the new plants. This might involve taking into account the small amounts of additional radiation generated in the design of the plants, perhaps modifying the shielding if necessary.”


Interesting, never heard of that. I guess if you are already shielding some.


We’re talking about things I have no business making responsible comments on.