Editor’s Note: The following text was prepared by Dr. Norris for a presentation at the Woodrow Wilson Center’s 2013 Summer Institute on the International History of Nuclear Weapons (SHARF) in Washington, DC. The primary goal of my presentation today is to reconstruct the nuclear order of battle of the Cold War, to see how nuclear […]
Introduction Rapid growth in the developing world has changed the economic center of gravity towards Asia, especially with regard to the world’s energy economy. World-wide demand for energy, especially energy that can propel automobiles, is increasing. High energy growth is producing two problems. The first, widely recognized, is the increased greenhouse gas concentrations that result […]
In the wake of the devastating meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Japan, many Americans are now reevaluating the costs and benefits of nuclear energy. If anything, the accident underscores that constant vigilance is needed to ensure nuclear safety. Policymakers and the public need more guidance about where nuclear power in the United States appears to be heading.
On 14 November, Peter Orszag, Director of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), testified before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee about the relative costs of plutonium reprocessing and direct disposal of used nuclear fuel. The oral testimony was quite brief and, unless otherwise noted, my comments are based primarily on the longer and presumably […]
This afternoon, a committee of the National Research Council, a research arm of the National Academy of Science, issued a report that is extremely critical of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, or GNEP, an administration plan to restart separating plutonium from used commercial nuclear reactor fuel, something the United States has not done for three […]