One Word, Kid: Thorium.

We could then stop arguing about wind mills, deepwater drilling, IPCC hockey sticks, or strategic reliance on the Kremlin. History will move on fast.

"Once you start looking more closely, it blows your mind away. You can run civilisation on thorium for hundreds of thousands of years, and it’s essentially free. You don’t have to deal with uranium cartels," he said.

What?  Free fuel?  True.  The USA and Australia are reportedly thick with the stuff - and it can all be used as fuel.  Hazardous waste?  Not a problem; thorium consumes it and converts it to energy.  Why do you suppose that this technology isn't being aggressively pursued?

Some might blame conservatives, because "everyone knows" that they're lapdogs to the military-industrial complex - whatever that is.  Of course, conservatives aren't in charge.

But "progressives" control our government.  So why aren't they jumping on this?

Get real.  Low-cost energy = less control.  That's the exact opposite of what they're about.

Comments

[ZZMike]

Earlier this month, I sent a note to Instapundit - and he ran it:

http://pajamasmedia.com/instapundit/104334/

Part of the note that got edited out:
http://www.nucleartownhall.com/blog/debate-of-the-week-is-thorium-a-viable-option-for-the-future/
"The story is that Eugene Wigner, Alvin Weinberg and other pioneers of the Manhattan Project era believed thorium offered a much better way to tapping nuclear energy. We went the uranium route instead because uranium was the more practical option for the immediate task of building a bomb...
...
Thorium is so abundant that the U.S. government has buried 3200 metric tons in the Nevada desert."

Another part of the story is that standard reactor rods break down, and have to be replaced - after only 3% or so of their theoretical life.

Pebble bed reactors are another good one. Their failure mode is that they shut down - that's the physics of the thing.

But "everybody knows" that nuclear power is an Instrument of the Devil, the Fifth Horseman of the Apocalypse, the End of Civilization as we Know It.

Do a search for "thorium" on Instapundit.