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Tom,

Wind, surely, is cleaner than just about anything.  I simply do not know if it is sufficient for large scale consumers, like industry.  Also, wind is not without effect on the environment.  For starters, large wind turbines are plain ugly.  The wind farms tend to kill some number of birds.  Also, the wind turbines are noisy, which bothers people and wildlife alike.  I have heard reports on NPR of wild animals coming in more contact with people in areas where wind turbine farms have pushed animals away from usual hunting grounds.  As I said before, no power source is problem-free.

As far as nuclear energy not being clean - do you see other problems than fuel/waste storage?

posted 3 years, 4 months ago
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Tom,
Please let us be precise.  The threat I believe you are referring to is a "dirty bomb" - a weapon of contamination, not destruction.  Regardless...  Your question of storage of spent fuel rods is a very valid one.  There is environmental safety and security to consider.  One of the proposals that I have heard is placing the rods in wedge-shaped concrete blocks and dropping them in well-chosen location on the ocean floor, where the wedges would move into the Earth's mantle.  This solution (one of many) is outlines on Wikipedia, among other places.  I prefer this one because it automatically takes care of security and environmental safety.
To be clear: nothing is free and nuclear power is not easy either.  At the same time nuclear power is, *i believe* the cleanest option.

posted 3 years, 4 months ago
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I think the early closure is a good idea.  The future is in moving away from coal and I think PGE is smart to get ahead of the game.  As far as costs of finding replacement - those concerns are valid.  Personally, my preference would be nuclear power to anything that we can run a wire to.  Nuclear power can be done safely. 

posted 3 years, 4 months ago
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