The Minnesota Legislature is debating lifting a moratorium on new nuclear power plants in the state while the world watches a nuclear crisis in Japan following one of the largest earthquakes and tsunamis in modern history. Both Sen. Al Franken and Rep. Michele Bachmann weighed in on the safety of nuclear power, and the two politicians, diametrically opposed on most issues, both said roughly the same thing: Proceed but with caution.

“I think we want to take all the facts into account,” Bachmann said of the situation in Japan in an interview with Fox News on Wednesday. “I’ve been told this is the highest regulated industry, and rightly so, in the United States.”

She added that we should learn from the tragedy in Japan.

“To say we should do away with nuclear would not be a good idea. This is a good safe clean history that nuclear has provided the United States.”

Here’s video of the interview:

In an interview with Northland’s News Center, Franken said that the crisis in Japan was good reason to pause and think about nuclear energy carefully.

“I think if we learned one thing it’s that we shouldn’t be building nuclear facilities on seismic faults, and there are a few in California, and that’s very troubling,” he said. However, he added that nuclear energy is part of energy reality in the United States.

“It is part of our energy portfolio,” he said, “and we need to make sure we do this safely and that we can store and monitor the waste.”

DFL Rep. Tim Walz and Republican Rep. Erik Paulsen have joined together to urge Gov. Mark Dayton to sign a bill that would lift Minnesota’s moratorium on new nuclear power plants. The moratorium repeal is currently in conference committee after passing the House and is likely to end up on Dayton’s desk this legislative session.

“Today, the people of Minnesota have a unique opportunity to move the country forward and embrace the path to a cleaner, more secure energy future. They can do so by repealing the moratorium on building new nuclear power plants in the state.,” Paulsen and Walz wrote in the letter sent to Dayton. “We believe a 21st century energy mix must include nuclear energy, providing well-paying jobs for local communities, tax revenue for the state and clean air for everyone. Please join us in supporting repeal of the moratorium on nuclear power plant construction in Minnesota.”

In 2009 and 2010, Walz and Paulsen teamed up to urge the Minnesota Legislature to pass a moratorium repeal.

DFLers Sens. Al Franken and Amy Klobuchar have also expressed their support for nuclear power as part of the solution to pollution and carbon dioxide emissions.

Sen. Al Franken told the Rochester Post-Bulletin that he has changed his mind on nuclear power due to a conversation with former Vice President Al Gore. Nuclear power has become a hot topic in Minnesota politics as legislators, mainly Republicans, look to lift the ban on new nuclear power plant construction. That plan has already passed one committee in the Minnesota House.
Franken said that with newer technologies, nuclear waste handling and storage capabilities can be improved and nuclear power can play a role in curbing global warming, the Post-Bulletin reports.

“Yes, (the nuclear waste) will be around for hundreds of thousands of years, but I am kind of hoping we will, too,” Franken said. “And I am kind of hoping that just as we’re going from a decade to map the human genome to a day or two days or whatever it is that we will be more and more sophisticated on storing the waste.”

He said it was a conversation with Gore that helped him change his position on the use of nuclear power to reduce greenhouse emissions.

“Nuclear has to be a part of the solution to that,” he said.

Franken didn’t directly address the lifting of Minnesota’s ban on construction of new nuclear plants, but the Post-Bulletin editorial board came out in favor this week of lifting the ban on nuclear power plant construction, which has been in place for 17 years in Minnesota.

Concerns about air pollution and global warming are blocking the construction of new coal-fired plants, and although wind energy is an important part of our future, it won’t keep up with our state’s increasing appetite for energy. Our two nuclear plants provide one-quarter of the state’s electricity — more than all “green” energy sources combined — but their futures beyond 2030 are uncertain at best.

The bottom line is that Minnesota needs to keep all of its energy options open.

In the (cooling) tank for new nukes: Michele Bachmann proclaims, 'In my back yard!'

First it was the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) that Congresswoman Michele Bachmann claimed was the “most perfect place on the planet to drill” for oil. Now, the overnight energy expert has declared that she would “welcome” another nuclear power plant in the 6^th Congressional District—and specifically in her own backyard.

“Another nuclear power plant would bring down the price of people’s monthly energy bills,” said Bachmann. Xcel Energy already operates one nuclear power plant in the district at Monticello, where high-level spent radioactive waste storage on-site in dry casks was approved in 2006.

Bachmann spoke glowingly of John McCain’s plan to add 45 more nuclear power plants to America’s energy supply.

“It’s a great idea. And the sooner the better,” Bachmann told hometownsource.com, an online extension of ECM Publications in the northern suburbs.

Sixty-six nuclear power plants with 104 reactors operating in the U.S. According to the Scientific American, the industry is beginning a resurgence. The first application for a new nuclear reactor in 30 years was filed last year by a Texas utility, and more are on the way:

Armed with the backing of the White House and congressional leaders—and subsidies, such as $500 million in risk insurance from the U.S. Department of Energy— the nuclear industry is experiencing a revival in the U.S. As many as 29 new reactors may be added to the current U.S. fleet of 104, according to Bill Borchardt, director of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s (NRC) office of new reactors. “It is going to be significantly different than it was in the 1970s,” he says.

While pro-nuke evangelists like Bachmann preach that nuclear power can stand on its own without subsidies, they conveniently fail to mention the Price-Anderson Act, which limits the U.S. nuclear industry’s liability in the event of an accident to a total of about $10.5 billion. After that, the taxpayers pick up the tab—and that could conservatively run into the hundreds of billions of dollars.

Estimates of the value of the Price-Anderson subsidy to the industry vary widely, from $237 million to $3.5 billion annually. However, it’s clear that the subsidy insulates the industry from much of its risk and unfairly distorts nuclear power’s competitiveness in the energy marketplace.

Bachmann didn’t specify in which back yard she wanted a new nuclear power plant. While she currently resides in Stillwater, the Bachmanns’ house is on the market and they are moving to Woodbury, according to her office.

In either case, it’s not likely that her neighbors will be joining her in rolling out the welcome mat for a nuke on the street.