Half-Trillion Dollars for nuclear plants..... Lieberman-Warner

[RedEarth]

With Wall Street unwilling to finance new nuclear plants, U.S. Senators Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut and John Warner of Virginia have cooked up a scheme to provide $544 billion –­ yes, with a “b” — in subsidies for new nuclear power plant development.

Their move will be debated on the floor of the Senate Tuesday, June 3.

A Lieberman aide describes the plan as “the most historic incentive for nuclear in the history of the United States.”

The Lieberman-Warner scheme is cloaked in a climate change bill — the claim being that nuclear power plants don’t emit greenhouse gases and thus don’t contribute to global warming. However, the overall “nuclear cycle” ­– which includes mining, milling, fuel enrichment and fabrication, and reprocessing — has significant greenhouse gas emissions that do contribute to global warming.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/05/29/9268/

[marmar]

1. Lieberman ought to write a book: 1001 Ways to Sell Out

:argh:

[navarth]

2. They should be forced to live next to the radioactive waste then!!

BASTARDS both of them.

[bemildred]

3. A trillion dollars here, a trillion dollars there, pretty soon you're talking about real money.

I wonder what Ev Dirksen would think of these weasels we have in Congress today?

[DCKit]

4. Water vapor (from their cooling towers) IS a greenhouse gas...

along with all the other items mentioned.

The smart money says the power and construction companies - everyone's local power company and Bechtel Corp. - that would benefit from this largess are also listed as heavy contributors to both Senators as well as the RNC.

Since anyone likely to vote Republican in the next election is cursed with a reading and education phobia, I'll posit that they're all also terrified of Nnewcuelur energy and this will go nowhere. Even if they got the funding, where would they build the plants? NIMBYism will become epidemic.

[madrchsod]

5. half trillion -that could be solar panels,turbines,and geo-thermal

pollution free electricity.....

[rucognizant]

7. My old Community.........

in NJ ( & Clista FLockhart's) is putting in a solar powere waste ( sewer) treament plant.
They had a post office 30 years ago,solar heated with huge water filled glass tubes along the south wall.

[Captain Angry]

8. Stop thinking my thoughts.

:-)

That kind of investment could create some serious jobs around the country. As opposed to just the few locations these massive plants will be. Distributed wind/solar/geo don't need armed guards. Or no-fly zones, or railroads to bring in and remove the used material...

[struggle4progress]

6. Corporate welfare is reaching unprecedented levels

[EC]

9. So, since there is a water shortage and draughts

where do they plan on cooling these plants?

[populistdriven]

10. I think Hannity said hes against this, So sad the Right cant even agree on Corporate Welfare anymore

[thoughtcrime1984]

11. Interesting that it will be debated on the 3rd

I'm sure they were thinking Obama and Clinton wouldn't be there, and others would be busy endorsing a candidate. Shrewd move by the shrew.

[bhikkhu]

12. If corporate money is uninterested, there's probably a reason

Its a lousy idea. So it becomes corporate welfare that is unlikely to do us much good at all as far as energy. IMHO.

[diane in sf]

13. This would be a hideous waste of money that could be better employed

implementing conservation and renewables, which would be orders of magnitude more effective at curbing greenhouse gases. It would also be a big waste of time, create radioactive waste, possibilities for terrorism, etc. Only people on the take would propose such criminal idiocy.

[yurbud]

14. We need a solar protest: everybody show up with a mirror & all point mirror at same thing

until it bursts into flames or gets white hot. I would not advocate doing this to Joe Lieberman's head. It's too thick and well-insulated.

The beauty is, if you get arrested, the nuke people would be saying that you can get a dangerous amount of energy from the sun by very cheap, low tech means.

[OneBlueSky]

15. what do folks make of people like James Lovelock and Stewart Brand favoring nuclear energy . . .

both of these long-standing environmental leaders, as well as others, have in recent years changed their positions on nukes . . . they apparently feel that humanity has no choice if we want civilization to survive . . . any thoughts on this? . . .