Submitted by Michael Stuart, May 15, 2007 08:49

Even the biggest drawback of nuclear energy - the waste issue - is small in comparison.

Nuclear waste is one of the best things going for nuclear energy, since it generates such a minuscule amount for such a vast amount of energy, without any of the harmful emissions associated with the other baseload energy sources. A small pellet the size of the tip of your finger can generate about the same amount of energy as 2000 pounds of coal. The resulting used fuel is a solid ceramic that can be (and has been) safely isolated from the environment indefinitely. Nuclear power is practically the only energy source that is responsible for containing its waste. No one has ever been harmed by the waste from commercial nuclear power in North America. Compare that to the waste product from most other forms of energy generation which use the environment as their storage container. A Harvard Medical School study concluded that between 15,000 and 30,000 lives are cut short each year from the emissions of fossil fuel energy sources.

What's more is that 95% of the waste is not waste at all! The vast majority of this "waste" can be recycled into new fuel. The small part (

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