Wednesday May 14, 2008

Developing countries eye nuclear power: report

news.yahoo.com :

More than 40 developing countries have recently approached United Nations officials to express interest in starting nuclear power programs, the Washington Post reported on Monday [12 May 2008]. The interest among developing countries ranging from the Gulf to Latin America is a concern to proliferation experts, who say it could provide the building blocks for nuclear arsenals in some of the countries. The newspaper said much of the interest in nuclear power is driven by economic considerations including the high cost of fossil fuels. However, some Middle Eastern countries with access to large stocks of oil or natural gas, such as Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, appear to be investing in nuclear power partly because of concerns about a future regional arms race, the Post said.

- The part about nuclear proliferation fears is pretty much bogus. You only need 4% enriched uranium to power a typical nuclear fission reactor. Sure, anyone who is going beyond that is probably up to no good, and anyone who refuses to let others inspect their facilities is also probably up to no good. And with the current spy satellite technology, there really aren't many places to hide a secret nuclear weapons making facility.

As for the Arabs, the point is not that they are supposed to have access to "large stocks of oil or natural gas". The point is that they know these resources do not last forever, and they are making conscientious plans to think ahead for the future by planning to build nuclear power stations. And furthermore, with the prices of crude oil and natural gas on the rise, you can't really fault them for trying to build nuclear power plants so that they can export more of their precious fossil fuel products for more money, can you?

How about we look at China. They will be building 20 to 30 new nuclear power plants over the next decade or so. Is anyone in their right mind going to seriously yell that the Chinese are building these nuclear power plants in order to build more nuclear weapons? Now that's a crazy thought. These two technologies, nuclear weaponry and nuclear power plants, actually have little in common besides the fact that both use uranium. The anti-nuclear faction wants you to believe otherwise. They want you to associate nuclear power plants with "kaboom". They have convinced many people around me, and now all they can think of when "nuclear" is brought up is "kaboom". The anti-nuclear faction would rather you clamour for more coal plants, which actually release a lot more radiation into the air (via coal ash) than operating nuclear plants do.

But I am picking a side and I am sticking to it. I am putting sizeable amounts of money into nuclear-related companies, mining, infrastructure, utilities, I am buying via my private investment fund into the same area, and I am also buying into clean energy companies as well. But I am putting exactly zero dollars into coal-related companies. And that's how I am playing the game.

See also :

1. More nations clamor for nuclear energy
2. Asia going nuclear amid rising oil prices, global warming concerns
3. China's nuclear energy plants to power up
4. Gulf Arab states want nuclear power
5. Malaysia requires two nuclear reactors to generate electricity
6. Vietnam is going nuclear

(2008-05-14 23:53:00 SGT) [Energy] Permalink Comments [1]

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