Consider nuclear power

To the Journal editor:

Nuclear power, what is it? It is one of the cleanest, most reliable power that we have today.

A number of years ago, I wrote a letter to this paper about nuclear power on naval ships, aircraft carriers and submarines. The following year, I went to an REA membership meeting at the Chassell high school. There were 2 VIPs there. One from Lansing and one from We Energies in Green Bay.

About a year later I was on a conference call and we talked for about an hour about nuclear power. I said if we can put them on subs and carriers, we can build small plants and put them in many locations around the U.S. Last summer, I read that 13 small plants have been built and 12 are operational and one is being used for research.

France derives 70% of its electricity from nuclear power. There are 6 operational reactors in Sweden which produce 40% of that country’s need. The rest is hydroelectric power. Finland currently has 4 nuclear reactors providing 30% of its electricity with a fifth one under construction to make it 60% provision and the rest hydroelectric.

A consortium led by Rolls-Royce has announced plans to build 16 mini-nuclear plants in the UK. These small mini-plants are safer, easier to build and maintain.

The natural gas power plant that they recently installed in Baraga is a gas-fired turbine and has a lot of moving parts.What would happen if there was an interruption in the gas flow, or a major breakdown, with no back up like coal?

With a cold spell in Texas, most if not all the natural gas comes from Texas or Oklahoma. A coal-fired plant has the fuel on site. Ask yourself, how close did we actually come to a total freeze, with no coal for back up?

When we built our home 40 years ago, I put in a wood-fired gravity feed heating system with oil back up. My zone valve or balance valve, are what I call butterfly valves, so I don’t need electric or outside fuel to keep our home warm in the coldest weather. During a week of very cold weather, like last month, with no gas for heating, what would the northern part of the country do?

John Kerry has said, we have closed hundreds of coal fired plants, in the U.S. to save our environment. But China has many more very large coal fired plants. Six years ago, they were told they didn’t have to clean them up until 2035!

NMU, Lake Superior State and MTU and others could build their own mini- nuclear power plants for heating and lighting.