Railroads' role in helping U.S. achieve energy independence

[Anonymous]

The following quote is from F. Mack Shelor, Independent Consultant, South River Consulting, in an article from Energy Central at:

http://www.energypulse.net/centers/article/article_display.cfm?a_id=872

I will cut and paste his reference to railroads rather than providing the whole article:

"4. The U.S. could provide legislation and supports to the four major railroads to convert from fossil fuels to electricity on their lines. This would move the railroads from strictly fossil fuel to a market basket of fuels and could reduce fossil fuel demand by another 2.5 million barrels of oil per day.
a. As a sub-set to this activity, the U.S. could provide a private initiative to create a national D.C. transmission system along the major rail corridors. This would provide a national grid that would not only provide a direct way to electrify the railroads but it would also significantly improve the national electrical efficiency.
b. If the freight railroads were converted from diesel electric to direct D.C. electric, the cost for moving freight would be significantly lower and the displacement of fossil fuel for trucks would further reduce the demand for imported oil. This displacement could reduce oil imports even more.

5. Finally, the U.S. could create a D.C. electric high-speed passenger rail system along the major population corridors. When this initiative is coupled with the freight rail initiative it would create a viable national D.C. grid that would redistribute the lowest cost electricity from coast to coast.
Perhaps just as importantly, this initiative would provide a viable way to utilize renewable resources. Wind as an example, can be modeled as individual projects or can be modeled as a cohesive national resource. If the D.C. system was in place, the available wind energy in the U.S. would significantly reduce greenhouse gases and would be available and reliable.
Solar-thermal energy has not been well supported in the recent legislation, but if it could be properly supported, it would also become a national resource through a D.C. transmission system.
Biomass, Geothermal and Hydro-Electric energy would become broadly distributed and would also displace a significant amount of fossil energy.
A high-speed passenger rail system using electrically driven equipment would displace a significant amount of fossil fuel currently being consumed by airlines for reasonably short distance travel."

[Overmod]

Before any of the 'experts' comes on and mentions that high-voltage AC transmission is better suited to railroad operations, I advise a review of contemporary high-voltage DC transmission interconnects. It's interesting technology.

[techguy57]

Without having read the whole article, I can seesome of the merits of this idea. , However, I see two things I want to point out:

1) Who is going to pay for the overhaul? The US government? The railroads? Can either really afford it? I mean its great in theory but in practice it means converting all the lines to electric, not inexpensive by any means, converting existing and/or buying new engines, not to mention hiring personnel to boot. UP,arguably the biggest of all the Class 1s, already has more trains than crews so adding more would only be more of a headache. And while creating a high speed passenger system could be an added benefit it would also be a headache as it would mean a heck of a lot more CTC trackage with more trains on the tracks and, would in turn, ultimately require more dispatchers.

2) How are we planning to power these lines? If the power is coming from existing power plants, the majority of which are coal, aren't we just trading one fossil fuel for another?

I can't imagine any of this happening anytime in the future, well at least not in the next 20years or so. Even if it enacted to law tomorrow (it won't given the current president's ecological policies) it would probably take 20 years to change everything anyway. There is way too much cost involvedboth short term and long term and not enough immediate payoff. Short of being forced to change to avoid global ecological disaster, this won't happen in my lifetime.

Just my 2 cents.

Mike

[jchnhtfd]

I can imagine it happening, if someone could foot the bill (as Overmod says, that's the biggy). The use of high voltage DC interconnects is indeed the way to go -- eliminates a whole raft of problems with the grid. Easy enough to convert to 3 phase AC if you need if for something, but for the rails, yeah, DC is just as good -- but it would have to be down-converted in voltage. Minor details. Really.

As for power sources, indeed much of the electricity today is fossil fuel. But that is a political necessity, not an engineering one. Thjere are better ways to generate electricity, but they have political problems... and I don't want to go there...

[rrnut282]

I noticed nuclear wasn't mentioned as a source for this DC grid. As far as greenhouse gases are concerned, it's very clean. The newer designs that have been proposed also, theoretically, shut down in fail-safe mode.[:)]

[Anonymous]

Ladies,Gentlemen, Railroaders, Railfans, Democrats, Republicans, Independants, and all who refer to themselves as North Americans in the contiguous land mass and those areas of our interest beyond the seas: We have now arrived at a subject that is larger than just the railroad community but also the related communities of the Electric Generation and Transmission industry, the banking, construction, labor, and investment communities and not a few politicans. I have gone to the EnergyPulse website and have looked over the consultants recommendations. Being one with both a public (highway construction) and private utility (generating plant construction) background I feel that now is the proper time and place to begin the discussion for this "opportunity" within the groups that are effected and have an interest. Let us first understand a few things before we start: I have never known a consultant that could do much more than give an idea of what may be possible in an opportunity of this size. To give Mr Shelor credit he does bring out a real possibility. Unfortunatly he does not recognise or apprieciate the size, expense or time required for such a project. We are just with the railroads speaking of about 20% of the U.S. economy and the other half of his recommendation is at minimum involves the majority of the nations' economy that depends on electrical energy (for sourses check out the web site of the Edison Electric Institute for electrical projections and costs). As more than a few electric company execs rail and other execs have said "He really needs to study the whole picture before he recommends such a project" He has made no projection of the environmental impact, Gigawatts required, construction costs involved or the amount of understanding between businesses, legal requirements to be overcome and/or the economic sacrifices that would have to be made by more than a few people and that is before the first yard soil is moved, concrete placed or Megawatt generated and transmitted. Let's say that we as a nation descide to do this recommendation. It costs aprox $250 to $500 per kilowatt to be built under conventional fuels (meaning Coal, Natural Gas or Nuclear). Bio-mass while dependable is not as developed technologically and wind power is not the most dependable of generating fuel sourses. I think that our consultant needs to seek a calculator for the costs of such an undertaking. Now that's just the electric utility side. As for the requirements for ownership and operations on the railroads, I leave to you who work closer in the rail community for requirements and costs on that side of hte question. In the words of General's George Patton, U.S. Grant and R.E. Lee and others "May the balll begin."

[martin.knoepfel]

As a matter of fact, high-speed-tracks in Europe are electrified by high-voltage A.C.
(15 kv/16,7 Hz or 25kv / 50 HZ), even in countries where the conventional railroads run on DC.

Same thing for some new freight tracks (Betuwe-Line from Rotterdam to the Ruhr-region and for contries that electrified late (UK, Portugal, Denmark). There must be some advantage in high-voltage AC. But for large-distance transmission of electricity, high-voltage D.C. is the best solution. for example for a national grid.

IIRC, more than 20 years ago, there has been a "Trains Turntable" in "Trains". The author proposed a Interstate Defense Electric Railway. IIRC, it was more or less the same as in the article quoted above - except for the idea of the national grid. Unfortunately, I don't have this copy of "Trains" anymore.

[Junctionfan]

As far as the railroads are concerned, they should get electric if possible. Electrifying of the entire system? Yes but be prepared to spend billions here and there hopeful starting slowly so spending isn't all at once. Big problem though. That is alot of power to transmit. For this I will break away from the socialist view of nuclear energy that it is bad. Nuclear power is only bad if you don't know what the hell you are doing (ie Three Mile Island and Chernobyl). There is one such country that has seemingly been a nuclear energy wizard for safety and that is Great Britain. They offered help to Chernobyl who unfortunatly refused. Get them as a consultant and listen to them and do what is required. There is also an interesting process that was being worked on. It was a reactor that performed a chain process of fission-fusion-fission (something like that) With that kind of energy, you could power quite a large grid, all that would be required is the physical infrastructure to support such a large output of energy.

I don't know how much research if any has gone into diamonds as a part of energy along with energy (you have seen the movies) and I don't think there really is anything that resembles dilithium crystals on this planet anyways so I say go nuclear because this is not the 50s 60s etc, a lot safer and it's alot more productive and cleaner than coal and other fossil fuel generating plants. Also if possible, start some hydro dams and start thinking about geothermic and solar plants just to reduce the need for expensive high maintainance nuclear plants. Also as far as I know, there is no real safe way to dispose of radioactive waste other than lead cased holding cylinders stored deep beneath the ground usually in old mines.

At any rate, more electric using rails and other mass transit including buses, would make for a cleaner environment as well as a more independent energy user that could give the finger to OPEC and be comfortable about it.

[Anonymous]

Shelor’s article combines rail electrification with a new DC power grid. As I recall, AC power lines have a practical limit of 500 KV but DC power lines in Russia are 1MV and that implies half the line loss. I doubt that justifies replacing existing AC power lines. Then he claims conversion from diesel electric to direct DC electric would significantly lower costs. How can he claim that? I’d think operating costs would be comparable and then adding infrastructure costs for electrification and I think electric becomes more expensive, which probably explains why US railroads don’t electrify.

Someday, railroads will have to stop consolidating trains and send freight one remote controlled powered car at a time but I won’t live to see that on BNSF or UP.

[Anonymous]

I agree that Shelor is providing some naive but still interesting solutions for the goal of U.S. energy independence. At what price are we willing to pay and to what lengths are we willing to go to achieve true energy independence? I would think that in terms of what we would have to pay, oil at $50 or even $100 a barrel is still preferable to the mega billions that would have to be spent on electrifying the entire U.S. rail grid.

[Junctionfan]

Electricfication would be easier as you can draw more power to get tons of HP. Some of thease locomotives can get to 8,000 hp=2 SD70s about!

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Junctionfan

As far as the railroads are concerned, they should get electric if possible. Electrifying of the entire system? Yes but be prepared to spend billions here and there hopeful starting slowly so spending isn't all at once. Big problem though. That is alot of power to transmit. For this I will break away from the socialist view of nuclear energy that it is bad. Nuclear power is only bad if you don't know what the hell you are doing (ie Three Mile Island and Chernobyl). There is one such country that has seemingly been a nuclear energy wizard for safety and that is Great Britain. They offered help to Chernobyl who unfortunatly refused. Get them as a consultant and listen to them and do what is required. There is also an interesting process that was being worked on. It was a reactor that performed a chain process of fission-fusion-fission (something like that) With that kind of energy, you could power quite a large grid, all that would be required is the physical infrastructure to support such a large output of energy.

I don't know how much research if any has gone into diamonds as a part of energy along with energy (you have seen the movies) and I don't think there really is anything that resembles dilithium crystals on this planet anyways so I say go nuclear because this is not the 50s 60s etc, a lot safer and it's alot more productive and cleaner than coal and other fossil fuel generating plants. Also if possible, start some hydro dams and start thinking about geothermic and solar plants just to reduce the need for expensive high maintainance nuclear plants. Also as far as I know, there is no real safe way to dispose of radioactive waste other than lead cased holding cylinders stored deep beneath the ground usually in old mines.

At any rate, more electric using rails and other mass transit including buses, would make for a cleaner environment as well as a more independent energy user that could give the finger to OPEC and be comfortable about it.

Junctionfan: Your points made are music to an old generating plant construcion type like me and are in more ways than one somewhat refreshing. Well said[#ditto] and my complements on a well thought out and well put posting[tup]

[tpatrick]

If the goal is energy independence, we may not need a multi-multi billion $ electrification project. Just bring back the coal burning steam locomotive. Not the smoky, inefficient steamers we all know and love from the past. We know how to create clean burning highly efficient steam machines. We know how to MU them. We can address the balance and dynamic thrust problems. Even with other technical problems to overcome, we could do so far easier and cheaper than the proposed electrification. And the petroleum savings would be significant.

On the other hand if the goal is to end the use of fossil fuels, steam does no good. The real problem is to overcome the political resistance to nukes. There is no other technology presently feasible that could produce the massive amount of power required to electrify the entire railroad system.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by tpatrick

If the goal is energy independence, we may not need a multi-multi billion $ electrification project. Just bring back the coal burning steam locomotive. Not the smoky, inefficient steamers we all know and love from the past. We know how to create clean burning highly efficient steam machines. We know how to MU them. We can address the balance and dynamic thrust problems. Even with other technical problems to overcome, we could do so far easier and cheaper than the proposed electrification. And the petroleum savings would be significant.

On the other hand if the goal is to end the use of fossil fuels, steam does no good. The real problem is to overcome the political resistance to nukes. There is no other technology presently feasible that could produce the massive amount of power required to electrify the entire railroad system.

Shelor's article was about energy indepedence from foreign sources, not necessarily ending the use of so-called "fossil fuels" (because many petroleum geologists now consider the possibility of hydrocarbons being of abiotic origin, but that's a whole 'nother argument!). Indeed, he also advocates increased drilling of all potential U.S. sources of oil and gas.

Since you mention coal, it is more likely that if it comes to that railroads will utilize some form of liquified coal derivitives like coal-derived diesel which are compatible with the current motive power, rather than going to a modernized version of reciprocating steam power or steam turbine.

[Junctionfan]

Forget the coal. Ideally, it would be nicer to generations to come to let the coal turn into diamonds. Coal is bad for the environment and will eventually get used up.

Plutonium and stuff like that is man-made and so it will be forever to make. My only problem with radioactive materials is that it is difficult to deal with the waste afterwards. I can't think of any way to fast and safely dispose or destroy the waste.

[tree68]

Guess I need to restudy the physics of electricity. Thomas Edison was a proponent of DC transmission, but the idea fell to Tesla's AC because the DC was incapable of long distance transmission.

[rrnut282]

QUOTE: Originally posted by tree68

Guess I need to restudy the physics of electricity. Thomas Edison was a proponent of DC transmission, but the idea fell to Tesla's AC because the DC was incapable of long distance transmission.

[#ditto] Did I miss some technological breakthrough? Since when is DC transmission of electrical power more efficient than AC? A quick physics lesson is requested.

[ajmiller]

I'm not an electrical engineer, but electrical power is P = V I where V is voltage and I is current. The power loss in transmission lines is I^2 R (read I squared R) where R is resistance of the wire. To minimize losses for a given power, you need high voltage with low current. Back in Edison's day, DC voltage could not be easily stepped up, but AC voltage can easily be stepped up using inductive transformers. Although I'm completely unfamiliar with the modern high voltage DC technology, I assume that it is now possible to step up DC voltages at powerplants. Search around for HVDC.

[dldance]

Railroads already help the US achieve energy independence - compare the ton-miles per gallon of rail vs trucks and planes.

dd

[jchnhtfd]

QUOTE: Originally posted by rrnut282

QUOTE: Originally posted by tree68

Guess I need to restudy the physics of electricity. Thomas Edison was a proponent of DC transmission, but the idea fell to Tesla's AC because the DC was incapable of long distance transmission.

[#ditto] Did I miss some technological breakthrough? Since when is DC transmission of electrical power more efficient than AC? A quick physics lesson is requested.

Possibly you may have missed a technological breakthrough, since there are several which make high voltage DC interconnects not only feasible, but desirable.
As ajmiller noted, transmission losses are related to the square of the current in a power line, assuming the same size wire. Power transmitted is related to the voltage times the current; to reduce transmission losses, raise the voltage and lower the current. In Mr. Edison's day, changing the voltage of a DC system involved rotating machinery, which was expensive, required a lot of maintenance, and wasn't all that efficient. So Mr. Edison had to resort to relatively low voltages to keep from frying the customer -- but then he couldn't transmit the power for any useful distance. Mr. Tesla's AC, on the other hand, could be changed in voltage by means of a transformer, which has pretty decent efficiency, no moving parts, and requires very little maintenance. Voila: he could use high voltages for long distance transmission, and transform them down to not fry the customer.
And so things stood, until relatively recently.
Not so long ago, static inverters/rectifiers using solid-state devices became practical for high voltage and high power use (think of a transistor on MEGAsteroids!). These devices have high efficiency, little maintenance, and no moving parts (just like a transformer!). Now it is possible to take a medium voltage AC or DC power source, as it might be from a generating plant, step it up to a nice high voltage (say 500,000 volts plus), convert it into DC, send it off for a few hundred or a few thousand miles, and then convert it back to AC and bring it down to a usable distribution voltage at the other end. All as simply as using transformers all the way and staying with AC.
So why use AC at all? It has numerous advantages, particularly in the three phase flavour, over DC for power use: motors and the like. Also, it is easy to step up and down, so you can have 110 VAC in your home, 220 VAC for you stove, and 480 or 1100 VAC for your industrial power.
OK then... why bother with DC for grid transmission?
There are several major reasons. First, to transmit DC from point X to point Y, you only really need one wire (although two are often used); to do the same thing with AC, you need at least three. Wires is money. So are the poles or trenches they are put in. Second, AC is subject to a variety of losses in transmission in addition to the pure I squared R losses; why is much too much to go into here, but the resistance in a given wire is often higher -- often much higher -- for AC than for DC. Third, and perhaps at least as significant, if you use DC for an interconnect it is much easier to keep the whole electrical grid stable. This is a little tricky to understand, but grid instability is what ultimately did in the northeast in the blackout a few years ago. Even one DC interconnect would have blocked the instability -- no blackout. (Again, it is a little complex, but in an all AC grid it is possible to get huge amounts -- gigawatts -- of power whizzing around in the grid, with no usable power getting out to anyone -- or in. With DC, this simply can't happen).
All that help?
oh -- PS -- Junctionfan is quite right: nuclear power has some major advantages, environmentally, over any form of fossil fuel and over most forms of 'renewable resources'. Politically, however, at the moment nuclear power is bad news. There are technical ways to handle the waste problem quite effectively.

[Junctionfan]

Apparently, Plutonium for example which is 94 on the periodic table, can be rendered an inert gas if an element with a higher number was introduced to it like Lawrencium which is 103. Does anybody know of this?

[oltmannd]

If energy independence is truly a national goal, and I don't think it currently is, then we are going to need public works projects like those discussed. Projects of that scope generally have to have some sort of gov't funding, backing, facilitation or assistance in order to happen. Hoover Dam, Golden Gate bridge, TVA/rural electrificaiton, Erie canal, UP/CP RR are examples. from our history.

However, gov't debt and commitment to social programs have so overwhelmed the Federal budget that I doubt we could scrape up enough funding to plug in a toaster, much less rewire the country.

Now, if we could just start balancing the budget, get gov't out of direct social aid and into facilitating social aid, we might have a chance. (getting off soap box!)

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Junctionfan

Forget the coal. Ideally, it would be nicer to generations to come to let the coal turn into diamonds. Coal is bad for the environment and will eventually get used up.

Plutonium and stuff like that is man-made and so it will be forever to make. My only problem with radioactive materials is that it is difficult to deal with the waste afterwards. I can't think of any way to fast and safely dispose or destroy the waste.

Not to make to much of a statement here, but there is technology that is currently available (since 1978) patented by Southern Company, known as Solvent Refined Coal or SRC for short. This process available today cleans up the coal to an amazing level. If you were to see a piece of SRC it would appear almost crystaline, burns very hot, dry, and clean without the sulphuric acid residue with greatly redused NOX emission. This would be a musical note to both the nuclear industry that provides the heat requirement and the railroads for their traditional role. This is also the first cousin to the McIntosh process that is used to turn coal into synthetic oil. Unfortunatly it is still somewhat expensive, but who knows, with oil prices going North of $50 the barell something might just happen from that clay ridge in Atlanta on the perimeter, and things will never be the same again.

[RudyRockvilleMD]

I like the idea of more direct electrically powered railroads versus diesel electric, but at what cost for the infrastructure? As a further question what distances does the author envision DC transmission lines? If I remember my college e.e one of the reasons for transmitting power as alternating current is it can be transmitted more economically over long distances.

Other questions:
How will the power be generated? Conventional fossil fuel power plants, Hydroelectrict, Nuclear?

What effect would substantial railroad electrification have on air quality?

[ajmiller]

QUOTE: Originally posted by RudyRockvilleMD

I like the idea of more direct electrically powered railroads versus diesel electric, but at what cost for the infrastructure? As a further question what distances does the author envision DC transmission lines? If I remember my college e.e one of the reasons for transmitting power as alternating current is it can be transmitted more economically over long distances.

Other questions:
How will the power be generated? Conventional fossil fuel power plants, Hydroelectrict, Nuclear?

What effect would substantial railroad electrification have on air quality?

Again, the problem with power transmission over long distances is that you need high voltage to avoid line losses. The problem with DC was that it was hard to change the voltage unlike AC which is easy to change the voltage. Apparently these problems with DC have been solved. There are HVDC transmission lines in use today. Here's one used to connect grids on New Zealand's north and south islands. http://www.transpower.co.nz/?id=4798

[daveklepper]

1. The idea has great merit and should be put into place. We need energy efficiency if lobal Terror is to be ended. (Again, Saudi kids have to be raised without the idea that, in the Eternal's World, people who are not Wahabee Muslims should and can be treated like cattle.)

2. The investment should come from the Federal Government as loans to the Power Companies so they can modernize and also solve the transportation problems at the same time. The same stratergy that was used for the Harrisburg - Paoli, Trenton - Sunnyside/Greneville, and Wilmington - Washington/Potomic Yard electrifications. The PRR paid back the USA and so will the power companies.

3. In addition to pure electric and pure diesel locomotives, through freight can be handled by a series of EMD and/or GE compatibles: An electric and a diesel and mu together and have heavy power cables connecting them when required. In electric territory the diesel acts as a slug for the electric for maximum tractive effort and in non-electric territory the electric acts similarly for the diesel. Prime movers, electronic equipment, alternators, rectifiers, pantographs, etc., would be designed for maximum horsepower (8000-9000) for this type of operation.

4. Tunnels would be handled by third rail at lower voltage, possibly between the rails Lionel like. The transition zones would have installed heaters in snowy areas.

[Junctionfan]

Perhaps it is time to start investing in solar, wind, geo thermic, more hydro, methane, ethanol, and other alternative renewable resource power. It may not be much on their own but a whole bunch of thease definatly lessens the load of the fossil fuel burners and the nuclear power plus I have never heard of a terrorist wanting to blow up a wind turbine.

[Anonymous]

How hard would it be to also run a MAC off ~12-20kV A.C.catenary?? More than a transformer big enough for the load? How many phases do AC traction motors use??

[dehusman]

Also figure in the incredible cost of raising virtually every overpass and tunnel in the United States. Since double stacks and tall multi-levels are now the norm the clearance height is now fully occupied by railroad car. If you want to put overhead in Its going to have to be at the 23-24 ft high level which means a whole lot of bridge and tunnel work.

Either that or you will condemn the entire US railroad system to step back from double stacks and trilevel auto racks, which would be a horrible step back from current efficiencies and would result in horrendous traffic jams in constrained corridors.

I wonder if you won't save more oil by using conventional engines and putting more TOFC/COFC on the rails, eliminating the use by trucks.

Dave H.

[jchnhtfd]

QUOTE: Originally posted by RudyRockvilleMD

I like the idea of more direct electrically powered railroads versus diesel electric, but at what cost for the infrastructure? As a further question what distances does the author envision DC transmission lines? If I remember my college e.e one of the reasons for transmitting power as alternating current is it can be transmitted more economically over long distances.

Other questions:
How will the power be generated? Conventional fossil fuel power plants, Hydroelectrict, Nuclear?

What effect would substantial railroad electrification have on air quality?

Rudy -- please see my previous post for a fairly detailed discussion of AC vs. DC in long distance power transmission. The longest DC interconnects I know of are on the order to 1,000 miles, but there is no particular reason why they can't be longer. There is now no significant difference in operating cost for AC vs. DC; construction costs for DC are equal or less. Your college e.e. course was right -- when you took it! -- but things have changed in the last couple of decades.

The cost of infrastructure on the whole has to be regarded in two parts: overall grid infrastructure, and railroad (catenary) infrastructure. There is, I think I would be correct in saying, a truly desperate (dare I say emergency?) need to upgrade the North American electrical transmission grid, with the emphasis being on the US grid which is in really horrible condition. Who will pay? We all will, one way or another. If we don't do it, we will pay in increased power outages and lost production. If we do, we will pay either through increased taxes (if the Feds do it) or electricity rates (if the power line owners do it).

The cost for railroads for catenary would be very high, and is -- in my humble opinion -- probably the best reason for debating the wisdom of electrifying all railroads. Someone mentioned the clearances problem, which might be significant in some areas -- although I doubt that the cost of solving that would be more than a rather small fraction of the overall cost. However, the overall cost/benefit (including environmental costs) of electrification is certainly debatable, at least in my opinion. The issue is certainly exceedingly complex!

As to where would the electricity come from? OK, OK, you all have backed me into a corner and now I guess I need to come out of my closet: in my humble opinion, formed over working on and off in the power and risk assessment industry as an engineer for the last four decades or so, the power generation mode (for any industrially usable mode) which has the least overall cost to the environment (total environmental damage) and the lowest overall risk to the people, when looked at from initial extraction/acquisition of the energy in whatever form to the final user (which is the only valid comparison, by the way) is nuclear energy. Both the overall environmental hazard/damage and the overall risk to both workers and general population, particularly in terms of health consequences, are about two orders of magnitude less than the next best resource, which is natural gas. Coal and oil are simply off the charts, relatively speaking. The various renewable resources, while very attractive from some standpoints, either do not offer enough 100% reliable power (e.g. wind has this problem); enough power, period (e.g. biomass, geothermal) or have some pretty horrible environmental drawbacks (e.g. hydroelectric). Which is not to say they shouldn't be used where, and when, they make overall sense. But from the engineering standpoint, nuclear is preferable on every possible count. Politically, of course... oh well.

For what it's worth...