America has a quickly growing waste problem. I’m talking about how to dispose of or treat the vast, rapidly increasing amount of waste tied to the wind and solar energy, which the federal and various state governments have obsessed over, subsidized, and mandated.
This is not a theoretical problem of the distant future. It is a tangible problem right now.
Many wind turbines and solar panels are nearing the end of their useful life, or have already been replaced early, as new, more efficient panels and more powerful turbines become available. In addition, emergency situations are causing further waste, such as hailstorm damage in Texas in 2024. More recently, damage in Indiana and Illinois, where vast industrial solar facilities were destroyed by storms, including hail and tornadoes, took the facilities offline and created a clean-up problem. Nearby residents and communities have expressed concern about potentially toxic chemicals leaching from the shattered panels.
Recycling solar panels is challenging and expensive. It costs $30 to recycle a solar panel, to recover between $3 and $8 worth of minerals, metal, and glass. By contrast, it costs approximately $1 per panel to ship used panels to a landfill, and slightly more to ship inefficient used panels for reuse in developing countries overseas, shifting the waste problems elsewhere.
Because of the economics, less than one in 10 solar panels is recycled. With millions more panels being installed each year, the problem is growing, as was recently recognized in studies published by the London School of Economics in the Harvard Business Review (HBR).
Go Nuclear, themreactor buildings can withstand a wind storm, hail storm, lightning strikes, even an airplane crash. They make a very, very small amount of waste for the power they produce and are reliable 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. Sun not shining, no problem, wind not blowing, no problem. Nuclear is the answer to our power shortage, no question about it.