At least you have some sort of rational tone to your argument Bazz,

You did fail to mention: Reduce consumption.

Our current levels of consumption are simply obscene and silly.

Do we really need to leave the lights in office blocks all night and weekend?

Do we really need to power millions of poker machines, or CRT tubes in telvisions and computers that spend most of their time talking to thin air?

Do we need V8s that travel at over 200kmh just to keep amused?

Do we need to pour power into factories that produce an endless stream of expensive landfill? (also known as consumer goods)

The list is almost endless. Our addiction to cheap oil has turned the human race into a wasteful and thoughtless bunch of self-centred slobs.

The answer is not nuclear: it's a social awakening to the reality of what the past two or three generations have done to the planet and how to stop doing it.

Accent; Reducing consumption will give more time to find the permanent
solution, but it is literally a stop gap.

>You did fail to mention: Reduce consumption.

>Our current levels of consumption are simply obscene and silly.
>Do we really need to leave the lights in office blocks all night and >weekend?

Absolutely not and the best answer to that is to increase the
electricity charge whenever a floor is unoccupied.
It can be done automatically

>Do we really need to power millions of poker machines, or CRT tubes >in telvisions and computers that spend most of their time talking to >thin air?

A incrementing electricity rate would fix that.

>Do we need V8s that travel at over 200kmh just to keep amused?

I don't drive a dinosaur !
>Do we need to pour power into factories that produce an endless stream >of expensive landfill? (also known as consumer goods)

We should do away with the "Throw it away and buy another" syndrome.

>The list is almost endless. Our addiction to cheap oil has turned the >human race into a wasteful and thoughtless bunch of self-centred >slobs.

>The answer is not nuclear: it's a social awakening to the reality of >what the past two or three generations have done to the planet and >how to stop doing it.

Yes, well you are avoiding the question again !

>Posted by accent, Friday, 20 October 2006 6:10:05 PM

Okay, Bazz you win. What is the question?

This discussion is called 'Nuclear Power is the Future!'

Not a question, a bald statement of erroneous presumption.

The future need not be nuclear at all if we learn to live within our means.

In fact, a nuclear future seems less and less likely. Even the government's hand-picked bean counters today declared it to be not economically viable.

As I said in my first post on this topic, the only people who stand to profit from nuclear power are those who want to exploit the planet and the people on it for their own greed.

Whether they produce the power or the consumer crap they are equally guilty of planteray vandalism.

>This discussion is called 'Nuclear Power is the Future!'

I stand corrected, I am off topic. The question is the one that
worries me if we accept the no nuclear argument.
What do we do to keep the lights on ?

>The future need not be nuclear at all if we learn to live within our >means.

That is my question, what are our means ? Solar, Wind ?
They present enourmous technical problems that so far no one has seen
the answer.
This why nuclear is being canvassed. CO2 sequestration may or may not
be practical.
No matter what we will have to shift from oil to electricity.

>In fact, a nuclear future seems less and less likely. Even the >government's hand-picked bean counters today declared it to be not >economically viable.

Looked at from our current position you are probably correct.
Looked at from the point where the load shifts from oil to electricity
it will mean more coal fired generation or nuclear.
We are in the lucky country again as we have a mild climate and can
always put on a jumper while we sit in the dark during rotating
blackouts. Pity the poor b#$%^&*s who have ice forming on the inside
of their houses.
Make no mistake, technical planning is occuring in the electrical
distribution industry for how blackouts are to be rotated.
They are as aware as I think most people reading this are that no
additional generation will arive in time be it nuclear or any form of
alternative energy.
When it hits the fan, it will be beyond personal greed it will be a
case of how can we operate with some degree of comfort.

"Whether countries "reprocess" their nuke waste or use the "direct disposal" method has nothing to do with the greenies in the US."

In 1977 President Carter established a national policy that prohibited reprocessing based on the premise that limiting plutonium would limit the spread of nuclear weapons around the world. This was in response to greeny pressure groups. The noisy minority.

"Would you advise me of the countries operating a "thorium" reactor?"

It's new technology.

Thorium.
http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/348?gclid=CMCqmP_e7IUCFUEbIgodEmeTmg

"As for finding uranium on other planets, that is really clutching at straws. Why on earth should humans be allowed off Earth to pollute and plunder other planets?"

God forbid we should allow ourselves to mine the dead barren wastelands of sterile rock in the rest of the solar system. I'm pro-human. Either a catastrophe will knock us back to the stone age or we will colonise space in the near future. Luddites need not come along.

"how are we going to produce enough energy to ease the world into a
smaller population"

Thats easy. We don't.

Bazz ( and to a lesser extent, Wayne)

PLEASE - don't let the 'No Nuclear' argument worry you! Pretty Please??

Put just a fraction of the faith you have in the wonders of a nuclear age into the brains of people equally as smart as nuclear scientists who are capable of developing all the answers to those worrying technical questions that cause you such doubt (and apparently for Wayne, loathing and derision) once our government stops accepting megabuck bribes from the Nuclear lobby and is capable of seeing the value in anything outside of it's own collective arse and self-interest, and starts putting some decent funding into renewable technologies that don't cause lethal amounts of pollution or consume finite resources to anywhere near the extent we have been able to enjoy for the past two centuries. (But are now starting to pay a severe price for).

Please don't assume that batteries are the best, or only, solution to providing energy from wind and solar during each 'downtime'. Energy (of the Potential, ie 'static' kind, capable of being reverted back later to Kinetic for electricity generation) is able to be stored easily, as hydroelectric dams demonstrate in just one PROVEN method.

Just because you have not looked at alternatives please don't assume that others have not got the spark of inspiration ready to provide the answers to the doubts you have. Or that these could not be developed faster than a nuclear reactor could be built in Aus and so lead the way for other countries.

The greatest difficulties we face in getting these technologies developed is not technical or lack of ingenuity. It is the lack of will and willingness for support, from intelligent people such as yourselves, being drawn to follies that only favour powerful businessmen, while ruining the planet for the rest of us who cannot afford to isolate ourselves from the lifelong effects of their greed and short-sighted views.

Damn this 350 word limit! : )