Royals Versus Ragtags
If you're curious to know why the Saudis aren't more responsive when it comes to US demands, implicit and explicit, to help alleviate energy price strains associated with Russia's misbegotten military adventure in Ukraine, look no further than the latest round of Houthi strikes on the Kingdom's infrastructure.
A multi-pronged drone attack successfully set a Jeddah oil storage depot ablaze Friday, creating a large cloud of acrid, black smoke and casting a shadow (figuratively and literally) over
A race (as in the past “space race”) to safe nuclear sourced power backed by the US, EU and any other country that is willing to prioritize such effort with money and human brain power, would effectively take oil off the table.
This is possibly the best (only?) strategy for saving the planet from destructive wars and life-ending pollution from fossil fuels.
TerraPower, a start-up funded by Bill Gates, is building its first nuclear power plant in Wyoming at a cost of $4B through a public-private partnership between TerraPower and the Department of Energy.
“How to Avoid a Climate Disaster” by Bill Gates is a quick and worthwhile read. Gates estimates that the US uses 1,000 gigawatts of energy and the world needs 5,000 gigawatts. The Wyoming plant is a natrium plant that uses liquid sodium, not water, as its cooling agent – meaning that high pressure does not build up inside the reactor and, therefore, has less risk of an explosion.
The Wyoming plant will generate approximately 350 -500 megawatts. TerraPower has a stated goal to get the cost of building these “small” reactors down to $1B.
Nuclear energy won’t be cheap- but probably worth the cost.
Before hyping this project, one should take a look at the state of the nuclear industry. Start with the Vogtle plant in Georgia. When Georgia approved the Vogtle expansion in 2009, the two standard Westinghouse AP1000 reactors were expected to cost about $14 billion and enter service in 2016 and 2017. It’s 2022 and the project is not finished after doubling in cost – so far. But ( this is too cool ) Georgia Power customers are already paying for the boondoggle. Imagine that part of your power bill was for an overdue and over budget power plant that may never produce a watt of power. The Wyoming project is in its infancy and already seriously challenged because their only source of fuel is Russia. The solution: more federal money please. Read about it here: https://trib.com/business/energy/terrapower-says-it-wont-use-russian-uranium-in-its-wyoming-reactor/article_0f8adf61-bbb7-5a81-8bd4-ca6a08ad33b5.html and convince me this isn’t another scheme to fleece the taxpayer. The only one set to profit from this is Warren Buffett who will not have to clean up the mess when his coal plant shuts down and he donates it to the government for a nuclear plant.
Better to “waste” money attempting a solution than subsidizing the problem (gas credits and tax breaks).
Go for it then. Sad thing is you will also be wasting you great grandchildren’s money because the radioactive waste requires expensive maintenance long after it becomes useless. A nuclear power plant lasts a few decades but its radioactive waste lasts forever. Now that’s subsidizing a problem on a grand scale.
“Never a she and certainly never a Shi’ite”. Well said, sir!
Seems to me that the Saudis could always find a few proxies to launch drones at Iran’s oil facilities.
Saudi depends on US for security. The US has more leverage over Saudi than vice-versa. Time to use it.
I spent two years on the Arabian peninsula in the late-90s when I was in the military. I was very, very fortunate to have been able to get to Yemen twice. Sana’a is a World Heritage site for a reason: it’s such a step into a world most people can’t imagine. I loved it, and I loved the Yemenis. The Yemenis—and to a slightly lesser extent the Omanis—are the only reason I wouldn’t mind seeing the entire Arabian peninsula wash away into the sea.