A History of Nuclear Disasters

A friend just sent me this:  Craig, you might be interested in reading this book: Atomic Accidents: A History of Nuclear Meltdowns and Disasters: From the Ozark Mountains to Fukushima. I found it informative, entertaining and sobering. Well-written.

Thanks very much.

This is obviously an extremely important topic—one that is hotly debated by both sides. It doesn’t take much work to find authoritative, convincing sources that will explain how, despite public paranoia, nuclear power is thousands of times safer than per kWh than any other large-scale form of energy, that it’s the only low-carbon source that can possibly grow in scope to meet the needs of seven billion (soon to become nine billion) people whose use of energy per capita is going through the roof, and that the generation of modern/”advanced” nuclear has essentially zero chance of safety issues.

But….it’s just as easy to find people like this guy, who will put the fear of God into the reader, at least in part based on the fact that the nuclear industry has a dismal record in terms of honesty and transparency.  The public here in the U.S. (not to mention the poor folks in Japan) have been consistently and deliberately misled over a period of half a century. Rightfully, that alone gives us pause.