Drill Baby, DRILL!! You wouldn't think this if you listened to some of our President's critics. More at the link.
Not really news, although it's an ongoing progress. We will also be energy independent within a generation. But at what cost to the environment?
Other than solar and thorium reactors, I'm not currently seeing any - and the former is only good at certain latitudes and still requires the Holy Grail of suitable energy storage to be found, and the latter is still in it's early stages. Of course that's just the energy aspect of oil, there's also the fact its derivatives impact almost every aspect of our lives from food production to clothing. On the bright side, the Greens Malthusian tendencies - be they on purpose or just by being stupid cunts - move relentlessly forward. Subsidies to the likes of wind driving people into fuel poverty, biofuels starving the poor and stripping forests (causing soil damage, yay!) Lockheed's Skunkworks were displaying new fusion tech recently too, so some hope there too. I very much want to see alternatives, but the current options are bollocks.
Very little wrong with conventional nuclear power. The Green movement has gotten that one dreadfully wrong in my view.
By making the permit process difficult, they sure have succeeded in damning at risk areas with obsolete designs.
Decades of disnformation from the anti-nukes have caused many to view nuclear power about the same way they view witchcraft. They've convinced a large portion of the population that all reactors are ticking timebombs. New reactors are even safer than the old ones. But people will continue to use Chernobyl (not just human error, human stupidity) and Fukashima (learn from problems, don't just abandon), and Three Mile Island (which caused no harm to personnel or the environment.
Apart from the price. When EDF was going to build new nukes in the UK they demanded - not asked - a 40 year deal covering price (they wanted triple the current wholesale cost), cost-overrun indemnity and their own costs underwritten. Suffice to say Cameron borrowed a spine from someplace and cordially invited them to bugger off. And then there's what is happening to France where their aged reactors are having their life extended and with added protections - adding around 15% to the average energy bill. There's also the farce in Flamanville, which indicates just why EDF wanted so much subsidy from the UK given the cost/time overruns as the new design turns out not to be quite as workable as advertised. And lets not get into lifetime costs when decommissioning them gets included. There are possible mitigations - science is always finding new ways to get power from the waste, but the timeline from experimental prototype to actual reactor is multidecadal and we need somewhere to place the waster. Enter the shenenigans in Cumbria right now where desperate attempts to justify sticking it in places where the industries own geologists are having kittens about. More nuclear fission is nice possibility, however the costs are high. Too high.
So basically EDF is sleazy and you are equating them with the entire industry. As to the rising cost of energy in France...I'm not sure if you've noticed by energy costs have gone up everywhere. You can pay more for cleaner energy or you can use fossil fuels and still pay more.
Yeah, but better to cover the costs of nuclear than fuck the place up with greenhouse gases. Change isn't optional.
I'm happy as long as the magic continues to happen when I plug something in. Keep it up, Wall Gnomes!
No. I'm pointing out that EDF looked at the economics and crapped themselves. They weren't being sleazy, they just didn't want to incur massive losses. As for energy prices, much of the reason they're going up is investment in renewables. Sticking several hundred tonnes of metal a few miles out to sea requires infrastructure costs to wire it into a grid, and you're also paying for the fossil fuel backups which are busy running at the same time.
