I agree with coal plants, but Solar power plants are getting bigger. Every week there is at least a megawatt of power completed. Its expected by years end another 200mws of power will be installed for corporate use, residential is unknown.

http://www.green-energy-news.com/ scroll down to seven days of solar.

that stuff coming out of those cooling towers that are mistakly shown in global warming scenes in news programs is steam. Basically right now we had very very disasters and far far far far far far less than Oil and coal plant disasters which has kill way more people that nuclear power. The only reason people worry is that think that they are going to turn into nuclear bombs and kill everyone. Nukes = bad and guess what the US , UK, France and Russia all have tonnes of them. 

Then you have the waste, well there are plently of spaces that have been nuked to use them like in south Australia where the UK used to test there Nukes. that zone is nothing. 

Nuclear power is the middle ground between moving away from coal, oil and gas to solar, wind and water power. 

Are thorium reactors the same thing as those Breeder plants? If so, I remember a talk by Bill Gates about how they can actually use the waste from old nuclear plants to generate electricity, and how by using the waste generated by the old plants, they could power the USA for about 200 years (which, I'm guessing, is the most optimistic value, but still very good).

If so... if they can provide so much energy, and the resource they require to do so is basically the waste that we currently don't know what to do with... why haven't we started building them, yet? Or is it all still theory?

The problem about green energy sources is that they require a hell of a lot more resources going in than nuclear and fossil. Solar and wind farms require more workers per gigawatt generated, and a hell of a lot more land.

As you require more and more energy to generate/collect energy, it obviously means that you have less energy in the end to play around with... meaning more expensive energy, more workers, and a less complex society.

The end result of solar/wind is that the cost per KWH is significantly higher than any other source that we know of. My brother had access to a local wind power company's balance sheet. According to him, it would take 70 years to pay back the cost to install and maintain the plant if they were to sell the power at current market rates.

Not only that, most solar we talk about (in the US) is solar thermal, and not just solar panels. Solar thermal generates a lot more power per square foot, which is somewhat more economically viable than solar panels, but such systems require massive re-distribution of water which in and of itself is a major ecological concern.

I know when and why Chernobyl happended, I know what happened, I was already an adult when it happened, I watched and read everything about it from the day the west learnt about it on April 28th 1986. Same applies to you what I already said to superchunk: Don't post links to "educate" me on the causes of nuclear events, don't tell me that nuclear event x is not comparable to event y or event z (while I wasn't comparing events superchunk and you are the ones who compare them and I'm aware that you won't ever understand why I consider both, Fukushima and Chernobyl, as severe events, no matter how "harmless" the Fukishima outcome will be in comparison to Chernobyl), don't try to explain me the subjective benefits of nuclear power, don't try to change my opinion which won't ever change, I don't try to change yours or the hundred of millions of other pro-nuclear people on this planet. I entered this thread to state my opinion on the matter as the OP wanted, not to discuss or defend my opinion. Okay?

India will have the first Thorium-based nucclear power plant in the world. It goes online this year. The US is also working on a few thorium projects in the near future, so I imagine we may have a plant or two online this decade if the tech turns out to be as good as advertised.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium#Thorium_as_a_nuclear_fuel

What thorium really boils down to for commercial usage is that its still being researched for implementation, but seems incredinly viable for the future of electric production. In the US, our problem is the damage done to public perception of nuclear-based jobs due to Three-Mile and other accidents, and the association that nuclear = bad. This caused a lot of research to be abandoned as our government was risk-adverse to nukes since the 70's.

However, that is changing, as we're building multiple new reactors, but such reactors are immense in terms of time and preparation. We aren't investing at the rate other countries are, which is hurting the development of more thorium-based reactors. However, if we (the US) and other countries continue to adopt a pro-nuclear policy, thorium reactors should become the norm over the next few decades. Its not a theory, but more of a problem with adaptation of thorium reactors into our current system, and the licensing of such systems. We've (America) have had some of the tech since the 1960's, but never researched and implemented due to our new-found aversion to the stuff.

Nevertheless, a molten salt reactor thorium would yield incredible results in terms of safety, cleanliness and cost, as a thorium-based MSR would be safter (doesn't need cooled down which is why we've had the Fukushima incedent), cheaper (4x the thorium reserves worldwide it takes 1/10th the thorium to provide the same amount of energy as uranium) and of course, is carbon-free.

Usually opinions are posted in forums for people to you know discuss them. You dont have to defend yours, but people will question it if they do not agree with it.

O_o

WTF? How big should an issue be to be considered serious by your standars? Nuclear appocalypse?

Of course they will but there's no reason to question my opinion or trying to "educate" me on the matter at hand. I never did and never will question the opinions of pro-nuclear people and won't try to convince anyone to switch to mine.

My country has decided to opt out of the nuclear power program already years ago, that's all that matters to me at the moment, but I'm aware that Germany opting out won't change anything in e.g. France or Russia.

People's opinions are always interesting to see, that's why I entered this thread, read through the posts and gave my opinion. Discussions on this matter or opinions are futile. On a worldwide scale nuclear power is here to stay and in a few days or weeks - once the Japanese government declares that everything's under 100% control again - I'm pretty sure we will see the first politicians use Fukushima as argument not for less nuclear power, but for more as "Fukushima proved the safety of nuclear power even in an extreme situation" or something along the lines.