We can not allow Canada to have nuclear weapons!
Don't think comparing oil drilling to tar sand extraction really matters, I'm sure they are both equally damaging in their own ways (otherwise, what's the huge stink about drilling in ANWR?
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Building new nuclear power plants in the U.S has obviously been a huge public issue, and even with the promise of safer CANDU reactor designs, I just don't see the "not in my backyard" mentality changing until oil is so expensive it literally kills our economy. And even then, expect controversial issues like reactors going up in poverty stricken areas, etc...
And of course there's that pesky issue of storing all that radioactive waste that needs 10000 years to cool off... I nominate Missouri.
I do believe we have the smarts to find a better alternative then fossil and nuclear energy. . A better solution environmentally anyways, I do think the energy gluttony days of this last century are numbered and we will have to take energy conservation more seriously in the future.