Ontario Power Authority fails to phase out coal, wants 12 new nuclear

[NNadir]

plants.

This is a note in an article in Physics Today:

Late last year, officials from Bruce Power, one of Canada's largest power companies, announced a Can$4.25 billion (US$3.6 billion) investment to rebuild two reactors that have stood idle for nearly 10 years on the eastern shore of Lake Huron, north of Kincardine, Ontario. Last December, the Ontario Power Authority proposed plans to build 12 new nuclear plants to help phase out Ontario's coal-fired power stations.

http://www.physicstoday.org/vol-59/iss-2/p19.html

The usual crowd is helping to make global warming worse by shouting loudly about renewable options in spite of the obvious failure to produce significant energy in the long announced Ontario plan to phase out coal.

Ontario Power is the only company to have talked about the obviously most important thing we need to do: Phase out fossil fuels.

Of course you cannot phase out coal by talking about renewable energy. If, in defiance of reality, you insist instead that you can phase out nuclear power, you will end up building more coal, like Germany is doing.

[benburch]

1. Go Ontario!

Go CANDU!

[Massacure]

2. Vive CANDU!!

Oh, You meant Ontario? I thought you meant Quebec. ;)

[NNadir]

3. All of Canada is officially biligual.

The proposal in any language is serious good news. The CANDU is an essential reactor type. It is ideally suited to work as a thermal breeder using U-233 from thorium and to burn plutonium at the same time. It is important that a fleet of CANDU's exists in the world.

One needs, however, to keep CANDU's internationally monitored, since it is the one type of commercial reactor that can allow for the preparation of weapons grade plutonium, since the reactor can be continuously fueled. I think the risks of not having lots of available CANDU's outweighs the risks of it's plutonium potential, but I certainly trust the Canadian people with these reactors. The Indians, of course, are also committed to CANDU's, because of their huge thorium resources. This makes technical sense for the generation of nuclear power, but it would be a misrepresentation to pretend that India is not using CANDU technology for power and weapons. This is most unfortunate, but it is a political problem more than a technical one. The risk of nuclear war is obviously much lower than the risk of global climate change, since global climate change is a certainty.

Here's the truly uplifting part though:

Until reading the Physics Today article, I was unaware of any program on earth that was designed to phase out coal. On the heels of this summer's climate catastrophe - which is still on going - it is encouraging to learn that there is at least one group on the planet who actually can identify reality. The rest of the planet is sleep walking to the edge of the cliff.

I note that not one of the proposed fusion reactors, the subject of much hand waving and fantasy, is likely to operate without use of materials (tritium) made in CANDU's.