Electricity generation pumps about 9.5 billion tons of carbon dioxide into the air every year, mostly from coal-fired power plants (“Uranium”). Nuclear energy, on the other hand, …show more content…
One reason is because they are very expensive to build. In his essay, A Roadmap for U.S. Nuclear Innovation, Richard K. Lester, an associate provost at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, estimates that new nuclear technology could cost over 10 billion dollars. This is well beyond the reaches of the United States government in the current fiscal state. He suggests leaving this spending to the private sector, where many investors have already shown their interest. He also proposes other incentives such as a carbon tax to promote “low-carbon energy generation” (Lester 51). In the long run, these power plants may be cost-effective. In order to promote nuclear energy, the private sector needs to invest and begin to propose plans to build new