The energy in nuclear waste could power
the U.S. for 100 years, but the technology
was never commercialized

Reactors powered by thorium would have been helpful in decreasing our dependency on fossil fuels. Thorium cannot be made into bombs and can more easily be handled. There cannot be no thorium "three mile islands' or 'Chernobyls.' Why haven't we used thorium in the past? A good question.

Current "once through" use of nuclear fuel, without reprocessing the "spent" fuel into new fuel rods uses about 1/2 to 1% of the available energy in the fuel, depending on exactly how your measure it. Extremely stupid, short sighted and inefficient. And Jimmy "the Nuk-Yah-Ler Scientist" Carter in 1977 closed down our only fuel reprocessing plant and banned the reprocessing. Now HUGE quantities of "spent" (and still highly radioactive) nuclear fuel rod assemblies are stored in water filled, open pools adjacent to their nuclear power plants. the article says 80,000 TONS of these radioactive, yet very powerful, fuel rods are left to rot....and provide risk on open storage pools. All the off site harm (which is far less than the Enemedia has reported) at the Fukishima nuclear power plant disaster was due to these "spent" fuel rods. They were stored, as usual, in a tin covered industrial building, basically a rain cover, over concrete pools filled with water...and no tops. The earthquake cracked the concrete of the pools, and the water leaked out over a period of days. Once these spent fuel assemblies were not covered with water to both cool the rods and absorb their radioactive emissions harmlessly, they began to get hotter and finally, red hot from their own residual radioactive decay, they caught fire, burning in air. These combustion products were smoke particles which were radioactive and which drifted on the wind carrying radioactive particles off of the site. The actual reactor meltdowns were entirely contained in the first generation, very simple, containment systems and did not leak. This important to grasp....three reactors lost total cooling and did total meltdowns what the propaganda movie falsely called the "China Syndrome"....and there was NO leakage. These simple, first gen systems worked as designed. Modern reactors have even better containment systems. But the adjacent storage pools, often considered safe, lost water, so the open fuel rods burned and THAT spread the small amount of radioactive contamination that was spread. These storage pools, which nobody fears, are far more potentially dangerous than the reactors that everyone fears. And, yes, we should be reprocessing the nuclear fuel and powering other reactors with it. Those reactors can actually CREATE more nuclear fuel than they use, a seemingly impossible feat, but radioactive transmutation of elements is possible, making materials which are not reactor fuels in to useful reactor fuel if they are stored inside the reactor while it is running and absorb radiation, changing their atomic structure. An extra benefit, almost magical.

Too many American voters still haven't figured out that elections are vital to the health of our nation. A lot of them probably never will figure it out. The rest of us unfortunately have to live with their stupidity and the results of their ignorance.

It's too logical, and doesn't create a whole new government agency that will require tens of thousands of employees, so it won't happen. Nearly the same reason they don't "fix the border", it doesn't pay off with more government workers, thus, growing the empire for promotions and positions. #2, thanks for the update, and did know about what happened at Fukishima and makes you wonder why they wouldn't report the correct news when it's known.

Don't most of these alternative sources cost more energy to use than they generate, though? What about this particular one? Not sure where I could find a credible answer to that -- one that isn't just speculation or spin.

Re #5, that is a very valid question. With windmills and solar panels, highly questionable. I had several friends in the early '70s in a class in eco-something at UF, under a Dr. Odom. Dr. Odom asked if nuclear power plants created "net energy", which was a novel question at that time. His grad students did some significant research (paper and library, not real work in mines, etc) and the conclusion was that, yes, nuclear power COULD provide net energy, but the current system used petroleum for many parts of the nuclear fuel cycle....mining, refining, manufacturing of fuel rods, making the portland cement for large amounts of concrete in a nuclear power station, mining and refining the metals that made up the reactors, buildings, pumps, etc. But there was enough energy that these things COULD be done with the power from the plant. But, it wasn't the most convenient or sensible way to do it, with only the electricity that is the final output of a nuclea power plant.