The argument against nuclear energy is always safety, safety, safety. But for a handful of well publicised accidents, Nuclear power is incredibly safe.
Chernobyl is obviously the most famous, and is widely regarded as being the result of a combination of:
Poor reactor design (design would not have been certified anywhere but the Soviet Bloc)
Poor maintenance of said reactor
Little to no safety measures/backup plans/emergency evacuation procedures
3 Mile Island is often cited as the next most famous disaster. However it was not a disaster at all. It was a near miss. Gases and small amounts of other radioactive material were vented into the atmosphere (much like what is happening now in Japan) after an accidental core meltdown. The reactor was cooled, stabilised and then closed down permenantly. However compared to the disaster zone that is Chernobyls legacy; the ghost town, thousands of lives affected by radiation, major environmental damage etc, 3 Mile Island was minor.
The facts surrounding safety of nuclear energy speak for themselves.
Despite being the second most famous nuclear energy 'disaster' in history, 3 Mile Island nuclear facility is still in operation to this day, with the sister reactor to the one that failed operating a few hundred feet away from the decomissioned one. There has been no lasting damamge to the environment, and no quantifiable health effects on the residents who still live close to the site.
Nuclear energy is policed strictly by National and International safety organisations, and as we are seeing in Japan right now, even when an Earthquake and Tsunami destroy/break all the safety features of a reactor, skilled engineers can still keep things under relative control. As of yet there has been no major meltdown crisis, despite using what could be considered medieival technology compared to the advanced features of a reactor; pumping it full of seawater and boric acid in an attempt to cool the fuel rods.
The media likes to create a lot of hype about radioactive hydrogen being vented, but it breaks down to normal Oxygen within seconds. The explosions seen were the result of hydrogen (a flammable gas) exploding
after leaving the reactor.
Obviously Japan's not out of the woods yet, but in what situation could an Earthquake and a Tsunami simultaneously hit Switzerland? The Swiss today decided to close their nuclear plants when they reach the end of their current licensed periods to operate, citing the risks exposed by the Japanese crisis. OVER REACTION OF THE CENTURY.
Evry one thinks yay nuclear power and that its safe if its maintained and everything else but what happens with the nuclear waste and depleted cores(tho they take along time to be used up).What are you going to do with them.The cores tho depleted are still radioactive.
The spent fuel rods can be stored safely and securely in various facilities until they break down enough to be considered safe. They aren't just dumped at sea as some activists would have people believe.
I appreciate we don't have a sufficient answer to the problem of nuclear waste, but our current solution of long term secure storage is not only adequate, but most importantly, safe.
I appreciate the arguments for other energy sources, like wave, wind and solar. The problem is, these are very costly to set up, cannot be supplied constantly, ie it's not always windy, and produce far less energy than a nuclear reactor can.
Nuclear power is comparitively cheaper than the other solutions too. It would take an incredibly large field of wind turbines to produce the same amount of energy that a nuclear reactor can, even more so if fusion reactors are developed. I believe the best solution is a combination of both nuclear and wind/wave/solar. Nations that experience little wind, or are landlocked can't benefit from certain sources of energy for obvious reasons, this is where nuclear power can come in.
I also believe nuclear is our only short term solution to the impending energy crisis, its already widely used, provides a steady, stable amount of energy, is cheap compared to some of the methods which are essentially still experimental and can be adopted by most of the worlds nations tommorow if all the coal and gas suddenly ran out.
Solar and wind in particular are very costly, and take up a large amount of space, which the Earth is quickly running out of, whereas a nuclear plant can be housed on a comparitively small piece of land.
Sorry if i seem like some sort of pro nuclear nutter, forcing stuff down your throat, but I'm just stating what i feel to be facts, i haven't given any real opinion here, all points are based on facts.
They can re-process the waste so that it can be used again, they just haven't developed a reactor that passes the safety tests, yet.