Panel: Nuclear to remain key Japan energy source

[hunter]

4. Well, let's see. They can burn coal or LNG...

... or they can sit around cold, hungry and unemployed in dark waiting for some kind of solar miracle.

Germany shut their nuclear plants and replaced them with coal and natural gas. Japan could do that too, but coal sucks as bad or worse than nuclear power. A coal mine and power plant belch out many tons of greenhouse gases, carcinogens, toxins, and even radioactivity every day in their normal operation. Germany's solar and wind schemes were essentially greenwash.

Before anyone accuses me of being pro-nuclear again (and again, and again...) remember I advocate something much more radical -- the end of "consumer society" and "economic productivity" as we now know it. Throw away the cars, the big box stores, the highways; increase the density of cities and pull out of suburbs and other low density populated areas that are not suitable for high intensity organic agriculture; create a society where walking becomes the primary mode of transportation, etc., etc.

If that's not the sort of society you want, living and working on farms that look rather Amish, or in a dense urban environment, then you've got to pick your poison: Nuclear, fossil fuels, or expensive and environmentally destructive "alternative energy" schemes.