What if lawmakers forced us to bury 95 percent of our energy resources?
That is exactly what Washington does when it comes to safe, affordable and CO2-free nuclear energy. Indeed, 95 percent of the used fuel from America's 104 power reactors, which provide about 20 percent of the nation's electricity, could be recycled for future use.
To create power, reactor fuel must contain 3-5 percent burnable uranium. Once the burnable uranium falls below that level, the fuel must be replaced. But this "spent" fuel generally retains about 95 percent of the uranium it started with, and that uranium can be recycled.
Over the past four decades, America's reactors have produced about 56,000 tons of used fuel. That "waste" contains roughly enough energy to power every U.S. household for 12 years. And it's just sitting there, piling up at power plant storage facilities. Talk about waste!
The sad thing is, the United States developed the technology to recapture that energy decades ago, then barred its commercial use in 1977. We have practiced a virtual moratorium ever since.
Other countries have not taken such a backward approach to nuclear power. France, whose 59 reactors generate 80 percent of its electricity, has safely recycled nuclear fuel for decades. They turned to nuclear power in the 1970s to limit their dependence on foreign energy. And, from the beginning, they made recycling used fuel central to their program.
