Bush pushes nuclear power at home and abroad
President Bush has embraced nuclear power with a vengeance (on us?). On a tour of a nucular … er, nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania yesterday, Bush called for the construction of new nuke plants to help curb greenhouse-gas emissions. “Let’s quit the debate about whether greenhouse gases are caused by mankind or by natural causes; let’s just focus on technologies that deal with the issue,” he said. Thanks to a new raft of nuke subsidies Bush signed into law last year, 16 companies have expressed interest in building new plants, though none has submitted a formal application. Exelon Corp.’s president has said his company has “no intention” of building a new nuke plant until there’s a solution to the problem of where to put nuclear waste. What a fuddy-duddy! Also yesterday, Bush signed on to a treaty with the European Union, Russia, Japan, India, China, and South Korea to spend $5.9 billion attempting to build the world’s first nuclear fusion reactor in France. Fusion technology has never succeeded, but like victory in Iraq, it’s always been just around the corner.
