Energy Issues

Everyday we use electricity without being aware of its existence. We are jolted out of our complacency only when there is a blackout or when we forget to pay the bills. Electricity has become vital to the form and function of our society; It is everywhere you look, in refrigerators to cars, EMG machines to toys. As the world began to need more and more this precious form of energy, we have sought it out in numerous ways.

In the 20th century nuclear energy became one of these ways, and at first it seemed to be the least-polluting option. The process primarily involves pressurizing water in a reactor: water is enclosed in three separate but interacting loops, absorbing heat in the first loop from nuclear fission, then moving into the lower pressure second loop where the water boils, emitting steam to power the generator’s turbines. The steam is cooled and condensed in a heat exchange within the third loop, which transports the water to the cooling tower. After cooling it returns to loop one, the water is re-heated, and the cycle repeats.

This kind of energy doesn't seem dangerous, but remember Japan’s Tohoku Earthquake and the leaks in three nuclear reactors. The entire world was worried about what would have happened those plants had exploded, as well as the implications the disaster set for their own nuclear programs. No country on Earth wants another Chernobyl on their soil.

What if a nucear plant was goig to be built where you live now; would you move?