050118 Bush大統領が原子力発電推進方針を強調
Bush大統領がWall Street Journal紙とのインタビューで「原子力は
クリーンで、将来再生可能なエネルギーであり、近く原子力発電産業の
推進策を盛り込んだエネルギー法案を議会と協議して提出するつもりだ」
と語った由。 Domenici上院議員(共和党、上院員エネルギー委員長）も、
新規原子力発電所建設のための財政優遇措置等に関する法案を提出すると
述べた由。WSJの記事です。（提供：熱田利明氏）
--KK
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Bush looks to promote nuclear power
(Wall Street
Journal, January 17, 2005)
http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/01122005/world/58559.htm
President
Bush says the nation needs
advanced nuclear-power plants, calling
them a
clean, "renewable" energy source
for the future.
In an interview with The
Wall Street
Journal on Monday, Bush said he looks
forward to working with
Congress on an
energy bill that includes incentives for
the nuclear-power
industry. "It [nuclear
power] certainly answers a lot of our
issues. It
certainly answers the
environmental issue," he said.
"It’s always
gratifying to have the
president on your side," said John W.
Rowe,
chairman and chief executive of
Exelon Corp. of Chicago, which
operates
the nation’s largest group of
nuclear-power plants.
New
Mexico Republican Pete V. Domenici,
chairman of the Senate Energy
Committee,
said he welcomed Bush’s remarks.
"Without any question," he
said, the
long-term electricity-generating
alternative to the nation’s
dwindling
supplies of natural gas "will have to be
nuclear power. If
America is afraid of
it, the world will use it." Sen.
Domenici is expected
to offer an energy
bill that will include financial
incentives for the
first new
nuclear-power plants.
Nuclear power now supplies 20 percent
of
the nation’s electricity, according to
the U.S. Department of Energy,
while
coal-fired plants provide 51 percent and
natural-gas-fed plants
generate 17
percent. Unlike other major sources of
electrical energy,
nuclear-power plants
don’t pollute the air or produce carbon
dioxide,
which is thought to cause
global warming. But nuclear wastes must
be
disposed of in a way that protects
people from radiation.
Rowe said
the industry needs Congress
and the White House to help remove the
legal
and regulatory obstacles to using
Yucca Mountain, the federal
repository
for nuclear wastes in Nevada. The
industry is also looking for
government
help in building and licensing
prototypes for a new generation
of
nuclear plants with safety systems that
would be relatively immune to
accidents
caused by operator error or equipment
malfunctions. For the
first prototype,
the engineering and design work alone
are expected to
cost $520 million.
Rowe said he believes the next
nuclear-power plants
to be built would
include the new safety systems. The
industry projects
that the earliest
start for a privately constructed plan
would be
2013.