United States of America Energy Policy:
In 1973 we endured our Country's first major Arab / OPEC Oil Embargo.
During the 1973 Arab-Israeli War, Arab members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) imposed an embargo against the United States in retaliation for the U.S. decision to re-supply the Israeli military and to gain leverage in the post-war peace negotiations.
Oil prices skyrocketed...cars and trucks stood still waiting in line to buy fuel...it was a great wake up call for America...it was time to...
The news soon became obsessed with Watergate....Nixon resigned...
President Ford was still under the shadow of Watergate...
During the Carter administration's foreign policy - America lost Iran as an ally...
In the 80's During the Reagan administration, there were expanded efforts to experiment with alcohol fuels and during that time The Bank of America and the state of California were experimenting with alcohol powered vehicle fleets.
The experiments worked very well, but alcohol fuels had not become practical regarding cost.
George H.W. Bush's administration will certainly be remembered for the U.S. actions in the Gulf war, responsible for stopping Saddam Hussein from taking over Kuwait. But tragically, Saddam Hussein was allowed to remain in power.
Bill Clinton's administration had made numerous positive statements regarding re vamping the U.S. Department of Energy, but apparently those efforts lost priority somewhere under the pile of paperwork and Miss Lewinski...
George W. Bush's administration was very much involved helping the Country get through 9-11 - holding Al Qaeda's feet to the fire and taking correct care of Saddam Hussein.
The administration's energy policy had some hopes for alternative energy, but had very much re-opened the doors to expanded off shore drilling and expanding development of nuclear power plants.
Now, for the Obama administration. The Obama administration is generally held responsible for the money lost to Solyndra loan gaurantees, and other alternative energy concerns in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.
Not that supporting alternative energy concerns is at all wrong, it's just that applications for loan guarantees and business plans should actually be read before authorizing multi-million dollar loan guarantees..
The Obama administration in 2010 also authorized 8.3 Billion dollars in loan guarantees provided within questionable use of the facilities of the energy policy act of 2005, for the first new Nuclear Power plants to be built in the U.S., which are to be of design and manufacture by Westinghouse Electric, the now wholly owned subsidiary of Toshiba, a Japanese manufacturer, while purporting the new reactors offered new or significantly improved technologies, and as unfathomable as it is, knowingly without having a place to entomb and store spent fuel.
Then, after the Fukishima disaster, the Obama administration announced 450 million dollars in funding to help private industry engineer and develop small modular nuclear reactors, and continued multi-million dollar funding of nuclear power plant advancement efforts.
All around America, in different states, there are cache's of spent nuclear waste, waiting for U.S. DOE to remove the materials and bring them to permanent safe storage.
From the Union of Concerned Scientists:
"In 1982, the United States Congress passed the Nuclear Waste Policy Act (NWPA), which made the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) responsible for siting, building, and operating an underground storage facility for nuclear waste, and for taking ownership of the waste and transporting it away from reactor sites. The NWPA created a Nuclear Waste Fund to pay for the repository by charging reactor operators a fee on the waste they produced. Because of the federal government's failure to meet its legal obligation under the NWPA, a number of utilities that own nuclear reactors have successfully sued the federal government for breaching its contracts with the companies by failing to open a facility that could accept fuel by 1998 in exchange for collecting fees for the Nuclear Waste Fund. As a result of these lawsuits, the federal government has paid hundreds of millions of dollars in damages to the utilities for costs associated with storing waste at their sites long after the government was supposed to take title to it and ship it off site. "
From the Washington State Attorney General
"In 2002, Congress designated Yucca Mountain as the nation's sole current repository site for deep geologic disposal of high-level radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel.
In January 2010, President Obama, Secretary Chu and DOE determined they would withdraw with prejudice the application submitted by DOE to the NRC for a license to construct a permanent repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, for high-level nuclear waste and spent nuclear fuel.
Also that month, President Obama, Secretary Chu and DOE chose to to unilaterally and irrevocably terminate the Yucca Mountain repository process mandated by the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, 42 U.S.C. 10101-10270. "
"On April 13, 2010, Washington filed suit in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to prevent the federal Department of Energy (DOE) from irrevocably terminating the Yucca Mountain radioactive waste repository by withdrawing "with prejudice" its license application for the repository. "
End quotes from Washington State Attorney General...
*** Please pay particular attention to these dates:
May 13, 2009 | Press Releases - http://www.reid.senate.gov/ Washington, D.C. - Nevada Senator Harry Reid made the following statement on President Barack Obama's appointment of Commissioner Gregory Jaczko as Chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
"I am pleased that President Obama has appointed such a qualified individual to lead the commission. Greg's entire career has been dedicated to applying science to public policy. His work in Congress and at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has improved the safety of nuclear power plants and is based on his demonstrated commitment to bringing all stakeholders to the table.
"Having worked with Dr. Jaczko I know he will continue working toward a safe and effective nuclear energy policy that leaves Nevada and the nation more secure."
"January 29, 2010
Presidential Memorandum -- Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future
MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF ENERGY(excerpts)
SUBJECT: Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future
Expanding our Nation's capacity to generate clean nuclear energy is crucial to our ability to combat climate change, enhance energy security, and increase economic prosperity. My Administration is undertaking substantial steps to expand the safe, secure, and responsible use of nuclear energy. These efforts are critical to accomplishing many of my Administration's most significant goals.
An important part of a sound, comprehensive, and long-term domestic nuclear energy strategy is a well-considered policy for managing used nuclear fuel and other aspects of the back end of the nuclear fuel cycle. Yet the Nation's approach, developed more than 20 years ago, to managing materials derived from nuclear activities, including nuclear fuel and nuclear waste, has not proven effective....."
Barack Obama
Then on February 16, 2010...Just one month after Obama had decided to pull the plug on Yucca Mountain...one month before filing the actual motion to withdraw it's licensing application....
From N.Y. Times - February 16, 2010 - "President Obama, speaking to an enthusiastic audience of union officials in Lanham, Md., on Tuesday, underscored his embrace of nuclear power as a clean energy source, announcing that the Energy Department had approved financial help for the construction of two nuclear reactors in Georgia."
"If the project goes forward, the reactors would be the first begun in the United States since the 1970s.
The announcement of the loan guarantee - $8.3 billion to help the Southern Company and two partners build twin reactors in Burke County, comes as the administration is courting Republican support for its climate and energy policies. "
end quote from N.Y. times.
Then on March 3, 2010, DOE filed a 15-page motion "to withdraw its pending license application for a permanent geologic repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada."
So this is Obama and Cronies energy policy. The Obama administration started to try to permanently kill Nevada's Yucca mountain, obviously in some form of pandering cronyism or something to Nevada's famed Democrat Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid...
Then, whether or not you think that a national nuclear waste repository is right or fair for the residents or population of Nevada....which it very well might not be....
Then in the same breath of trying to kill Yucca mountain irrevocably, He's giving the first new nuclear plant to be constructed in the U.S. for over 30 years over 8.3 billion in loan guarantees...and giving it the go ahead.
That's Obama energy policy in a nutshell. Ludicrous Cronyism, Politicking and shortsighted insanity.
We still don't have a place to put spent nuclear waste.
The Obama administration is trying to kill Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The Democratic Senate Majority Leader is conveniently from Nevada, and the Obama administration is still promoting for further nuclear energy development in America.
Maybe Obama is planning to market all the spent fuel laying around the Country to Bill Gate's Terrapower - for Obama Supporter Gate's visions of traveling wave reactors or their next marketable name for a reactor type...but they'll still be more easily remembered as Desktop Dirtybombs...or maybe Win-Dose Plutoniums'...
From the U.S. NRC:
"
Source of Plutonium:
Today's light water reactors-used to make commercial power in the United States-create plutonium when the uranium in their fuel fissions. Some of the neutrons released by uranium interact with other uranium atoms to form plutonium. Some of the plutonium itself fissions-part of the chain reaction of splitting atoms that is the basis of nuclear power. Any plutonium that does not fission before the fuel is removed from the reactor remains in the spent fuel. Some countries reprocess spent fuel to extract plutonium and uranium, which can be mixed and made into new nuclear fuel.
Plutonium in the Body:
Most people will never come into contact with plutonium. But for scientists and engineers that have worked with it, it is important to know about the potential health effects. The most common form of plutonium is plutonium oxide-a compound of plutonium bonded with oxygen. In this form, plutonium does not easily dissolve. Plutonium oxide's impact on human health depends on how it enters the body. If someone eats or drinks it, a large percentage will be eliminated rapidly as waste. If plutonium oxide is inhaled, some of it remains in the lungs. Between 20 and 60 percent can remain, depending upon the size of the particles and other factors. The rest is eliminated from the body within several days. Of the plutonium remaining in the lungs, about half will be removed each year. Some is excreted, some lodges in the lymph nodes, and a very small amount migrates, settling in other organs but mainly in bones. If plutonium oxide gets into an open wound, it may move directly into bones and other organs, mainly the liver.
The next most common form is plutonium nitrate-a compound of plutonium, oxygen and nitrogen. This chemical dissolves somewhat more readily than the oxide. Plutonium nitrate behaves much like plutonium oxide in the body but moves out of the lungs more rapidly.
Research shows plutonium can be chemically toxic and contribute to tumor development. But the most common form of plutonium has more radiological than chemical toxicity.
Production and Disposition
Over 1,600 metric tons of plutonium has been produced worldwide, some for weapons use and most of the rest in electricity production. A commercial power reactor creates plutonium in its many isotopic forms, including Pu-239, Pu-240, Pu-241, and Pu-242. This is known as "reactor-grade" plutonium. In contrast, "weapons-grade" plutonium is almost pure Pu-239 (over 90 percent). This form requires a specially designed and operated reactor. Plutonium production reactors operated by the U.S. government during the Cold War have all shut down.
With the end of the Cold War, the United States and the former Soviet Union began dismantling thousands of nuclear weapons. This work created a surplus of high enriched uranium and plutonium. To keep the surplus from falling into the wrong hands, the U.S. and Russia agreed to mix their plutonium with uranium to make mixed oxide (MOX) fuel for power reactors. Irradiating the "weapons-grade" plutonium in a commercial reactor makes it "reactor-grade" and no longer useful for weapons. There would be no reprocessing or subsequent reuse of the MOX spent fuel. It would be disposed in a deep geologic repository along with other high-level nuclear waste.
January 2014
" End of Quotes from U.S. NRC
Interesting - "It would be disposed in a deep geologic repository along with other high-level nuclear waste."
Anybody want to buy a bridge?....
What a terrible sin.
The Obama Administration is as twisted and screwed up as you could possibly get. Talk about speaking with a forked tongue, the left hand doesn't have a clue to what the right hand is lying about.
So over 40 years have gone by since the first major Arab - OPEC Oil Embargo...and we still don't have an honest, effective U.S. Energy Policy in the interests of Our Country's People.
Further reading on Nuclear Reactors:
Chernobyl: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_disaster
Chernobyl: http://www.elenafilatova.com/
Fukushima: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disaster
Fukushima: http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/campaigns/nuclear/safety/accidents/Fukushima-nuclear-disaster/
The United States needs new compelling industry desperately.
Our Energy requirements, including distributed Electricity, Heating, Cooling and Transportation requirements and necessary equipments offer much potential for possible industry in the U.S.
Environmentally responsible fuels, alcohol, tidal, over energy electrical and magnetic possibilities, hydroelectric advancements including advanced magnetics, ultra high temperature incineration for non recyclable wastes powering steam turbines, solar hot water tubes and solar photovoltaics, many items having the potential to operate directly in the hands of individual homeowners and smaller companies, achieving true energy ownership and independence. Many possibilities not providing the dangers of radioactive half lives of hundreds if not thousands of years, or the potential to be utilized within devastating terrorist purposes, including just within targets.
Support financing of individuals and smaller companies seeking this independence. It is time to stop promoting Nuclear power plants. Chernobyl and Fukushima have scarred many...there's no place to put the waste, many people feel "not in my backyard" and you can't blame them, there are still stockpiles of nuclear waste around America which are nothing but possibilities for problems.
Farmers are typically struggling. Yearly cycles, inclement weather, new disease and advancing bugs and pests...help find better fuel crops and to enhance fermentation.
Stop paying farmers to burn crops to support prices
Help them sustain diverse lucrative fuel crops instead, including oil seeds, etc., wherever it's possible. We have to reduce our dependence on OIL. Domestic or Foreign, Period. (preliminary only)
